{Twelve Months OLD}

 Every month for eleven months I have referred to you as "such and such months NEW," but it's month twelve now and time to come out of denial. You are officially one year OLD!! We celebrated with a fox themed birthday and your very own cake smash! You smashed in to your cake more than Addy and Eli ever did and it was really funny watching you. At one point you propped your foot right up on the cake stand. We thought you were trying to dig into the cake with your foot, but then we noticed you were actually trying to avoid putting your foot in the cake that was on the ground! At the end you very strategically tried to crawl over top of the cake trying to avoid touching it. I think we have another like to be clean child on our hands.

I've tried really hard to keep you my baby, but let's be honest, you've always seemed more like a toddler trapped in a babies body. You came out 9 pounds so you never exactly felt like a newborn to me. You also have been much quicker to do all of your "firsts" than your brother and sister. We all keep trying to tell you to stop growing, but you have a plan of your own. I think that plan has a name. TROUBLE. You are an extremely busy and into everything little guy. You can't hold still longer than a minute, you are always on the go.

You my boy are so stinkin' cute. I want to squish you all the time. You seriously get cuter every single month. It's so weird for us to have a big baby. Every one always comments on how tall you are and of course how large your head is. I think you're going to be a smart one! At one year old you are 32 inches long (99%), weigh 23 lbs. 12 oz. (84%), and your head is 96th percentile. You are a very well rounded GIANT. We have no idea where you came from, but we love it! Usually I don't want my babies to walk. But you can walk any day now. Lugging you around is quite the exercise!

 You came into this world with a very calm and happy spirit about you. You still are happy, happy, happy. I can't even describe the joy you bring to our family. You have filled our home with more happiness than any of us could have ever anticipated. We never knew what we were missing until you came. You are oh so loved little one.

When I say you are loved I mean it. Around here you are loved on HARD. Addy is very sweet to you and is such a big helper with you. She can always get you to laugh. Eli on the other hand can not mentally and physically handle just how cute you are and so he resorts to squeezing you to death and putting you in a head lock so he can smother your head in kisses a thousand times a day. He also calls you his Bubba. We are constantly having to get after him to give you your space, but he just can't leave your cuteness alone. One day I asked him "Eli, I just don't understand why you can't leave his head alone!" His reply was, "It's just so soft Mommy!" I would have to agree. I'd be okay if you stayed bald forever ;-) Okay I lied. Grow some hair already boy! We can't even picture what you would look like with hair! It does appear to be strawberry blonde though which is new for us! You're taking after your Mommy. Finally, someone has some of me in them! You also have gorgeous big blue eyes that every one always comments on.

 Mornings and nights have become your one on one time. It's the only time you remotely come close to snuggling with me. You are our least snuggly baby yet. Once a week you might lay your head down on my shoulder. MAYBE. But I can generally get you to lay by me every morning and I'm bad and nurse you to sleep every night because I love to hold you while you sleep. It's my favorite part of my day. You also are not attached to anything which I supposed is a good thing, but when you are upset there isn't much we can do to calm you down. 

  
You don't say many words, but you jabber all the time and you love to talk to anyone and everyone on the phone. So far you have said uh-oh, Mama, and we swear you say dog, but we are not completely convinced yet.  You're our only child to have much stranger danger and you love men. I could be standing next to a complete stranger that is a male and you will lean right over to him and want to be held. You also are trained to wave hi when we say "say hi, say night night, and say bye bye!" You give the cutest flappy armed wave ever!

You love to put everything in your mouth, blow kisses, pull all the floor vents off the floor, open the toilet seats, play peek-a-boo, pull the toilet paper off the roll, steal my phone, follow your brother and sister wherever they go, and you love to be outside. If Addy and Eli are outside you will stand at the window and cry until I take you out.

We don't know if you are a Mama's boy or Daddy's boy. For now you seem to love everyone. We needed you in our family Easton. You are a constant reminder of how happy life can be if we embrace it to it's fullest. When they placed your in my arms for the first time I thought to myself "pleased to me you little one." But what I didn't know then is that you would soon be welcoming us all into your happy, silly, full of love life. We love you for so many reasons, but the one we love you for the most is for the world you have introduced us to. You're our bucket of sunshine. Our happy place. Our everything. Happy year Eastie Beastie. We could eat you up we love you so.