It walks, it talks, it crawls on its belly like a reptile...

"It" of course referring to Noah. Yes, he's taking his first steps. REAL steps, not just one little step between the ottoman and the couch, but actually walking. There's a part of me that wonders why I'm so excited, because once he realizes how fast he can go walking, there's going to be no keeping up with him. But I AM excited--in fact, last night he toddled down the hall a fair ways and it brought tears to my eyes. We did catch his first steps on video, and Patrick was nice enough to load those to YouTube; you can see them by clicking here:



We also have him on tape saying "Flowers"--something that Mom & Dad taught him, and it sounds like "slauers" but he'll rip the head off of the unsuspecting flower, hold it to his nose and breathe in deeply. So, we're pretty sure he's saying "flowers." You can see that here:



He's really smart; I know that all parents say that, but we really think he's something else. His comprehension is really taking off--I'll ask him to do silly things like put 1/2 of the plastic egg he's playing with on his toes, and he does it. I got a placemat for him that has pictures of animals on it, and one of the animals is a pig. I point to the pig, ask Noah, "Where is the pig?" and he grabs his toe and makes his "Wee wee wee" sound (the one that you make doing the "And THIS little piggy went wee wee wee all the way home). So, yes, we don't want him growing up to think that bacon comes from his feet, but I did think it was something that he got "pig"--not "piggie" which is what we say when we're playing "This little piggie" but PIG. He's also got a pretty funny sense of humor, too, which is something that I didn't expect a baby to have--but he'll do things like grab a non-phone toy, hold it up to his ear and then laugh, as if so say, "It's so funny that I'm pretending this shoe is a phone!"

He's getting more teeth, too. His upper central teeth are starting to come in; and his whole bottom gum is just opaque white, so I know that he's going to wake up one morning and have 12 teeth. I'm a little sad to see the teeth coming in, to be honest, because that's going to change how he looks in such a dramatic way...but I'm also really enjoying the little boy that's emerging, and can't wait to get started on all the new adventures!

He's just so amazing; I keep kicking myself for not filling out his baby book every day, because, seriously, new things happen EVERY DAY. I'm afraid I'll forget them if I don't write them down! He's such a mimic, too, so we're going to have to really watch ourselves. I find that if I sing, he'll sing, too. He likes to dance, and if we're laughing, he'll join in, too. Oh, he's also a little bit of a smartypants--if we're playing a game, and we're laughing, but he's done playing the game, he'll give a laugh that is so incredibly fake, like he's saying, "Yeah, yeah, yeah; I'm just laughing to humor you. Are we done yet?"

He also threw his rubber ducky at me the other night--I asked him to sit down in the tub (which is a common refrain at bathtime), and he got irritated, and chucked it at me. He had pretty good aim, too. It was so freakin' funny, but I knew that I COULD NOT LAUGH. It was all I could do to keep Noah from seeing my face and trying not to pee my pants. Patrick was good, too, and managed to keep a straight face as I picked Noah up out of the tub & handed him to Patrick to get dried off. We've not had another bath since then, so not sure if he'll try to bean me with the duck again or not.

We go to the ophthalmologist on Wed. to check out his tear duct; we know that he'll have to have the cyst above his left eye removed (it's not malignant, they're just afraid that if it is hit and ruptures, it'll spread infection under the skin, which apparently is not a pretty thing), so if he's got to have his tear duct probed, they'll do it all at once. We'll keep you all posted, and in the meantime, feel free to watch the videos as much as possible. (Oh, and keep your eye out how we torture our son by not letting him have our REAL cell phone!)