13 Months

I've been lazy with updating the blog lately. James is now 13 months old. He eats A LOT. I expected his appetite to slow down some once he turned 1 year old but I think it has increased. In this photo he had just eaten (and worn) 3 pancakes...not just the silver dollar sized pancakes either. He is also very messy when he eats, as you can see!

About two weeks after James turned 1 year old he started walking. At first he would only walk from mommy to daddy and back. After about 2 weeks of that he started walking from one piece of furniture to another. These days he walks all over the house, turns corners, and can walk in circles. He still can't stand up on his own without pulling up on something so he still spends a fair amount of time crawling.

This month James learned to take the rings off and on this toy. He is very proud of his accomplishments with this toy and will clap for himself and look to you to clap for him also. He also loves to put clothespins in a two liter bottle, crayons in a crayon box, and pom poms in a juice bottle. He takes these things as serious work and will sit for long amounts of time working on it.

He has also started talking a little bit. James loves to say "uh-oh". At first he would just say it when he really accidentally dropped something....I happily remarked about that to someone and the very next day he started throwing things on the floor and looking at me innocently and saying uh-oh! Mostly this happens when he is finished with his meal and he feels like maybe the floor is hungry for his leftovers. He also says "hi" and "bye" to anyone near who isn't paying attention to him. If you say it first however he will just stare at you like he isn't sure if it's ok to talk to strangers. He says mama and daddy (the latter all day long about everything). He points to anything he wants and says "this". Most of the time he is pointing to things he knows he isn't allowed to have!

He has also started giving us the nicest, wettest, open-mouthed kisses. Lee thinks it's important we teach him the closed mouth appropriate version soon. He may be right since I did catch him giving our little 4-year-old friend Emma one of his special kisses on the mouth recently.

James also got several new teeth this month. He got his 4 first molars and another lower incisor. He nows has 11 teeth in his mouth. It is funny to watch him eat now that he has gotten molars. He has figured out that his molars help him chew so he sticks food in his mouth and uses his hand to help position the food just right so he gets it on his molars. Then he chomps down!