12 months!

My baby is one!  Where did the past year go?  He grew up so fast, and changed so much from the first of these monthly photo shoots 'till now.  I. Can. Not. Believe. It.

You may notice right away that his hair is shorter and way lighter than it was last month.  I finally caved and had my friend Greta give him a "big boy" haircut.  It was all kinds of straggly and getting in his eyes, and some days I loved his long, crazy, multi-colored hair, but other days it just looked sloppy.  But, now he looks so grown up, and all his gorgeous natural low-lights are gone.  Boo.  Oh, well, it had to happen sometime, right? Plus, he is mighty handsome. Moving on.

This month was full of lots of first, and lots of new tricks.  Krew can now tell you where his head is, and where his mouth is.

He is full-on walking now!  He walks more than he crawls, and it's still so funny to me when I look down and see him walking past me.  Or, when I'm in the other room and I hear him coming, and I expect him to be crawling toward me, but no, he's walking.  It's super fun.  It happened really quick.  He took his first step the day before he turned 11 months old, and a couple of weeks later he was walking as much as he was crawling.

Besides the animal sounds mentioned last month, Krew also likes to tell us what a car says, and when asked, "What does a gator say?"  He does the gator chomp.  Actually, it looks a lot like just clapping, but he'll get the top-to-bottom motion soon enough. My favorite though is he now knows what a horse says.  Only he doesn't do the "neigh" part but the "ppthhhhht," like blowing a raspberry (you know, like the sound a horse makes?) and he spits all over.  Too funny!

Here are some of the words he says: hi and bye (these words come out with a very strong southern accent), ball, bat, bath, bus, and Buzz (as in Lightyear), although these words sound very similar when he says them, except bat (because we had a Halloween decoration hanging above our kitchen table that he was in love with) which came out very clear, but very forced and quick.  He says Mow for Mickey Mouse, dut for Donald Duck, and ha for hat.  He will sign "more" and "please" and "eat," but only when he's really desperate, as in he's asking for something like a cookie.  When I try to get him to sign please, or more, I do the sign and say it, and usually he just tries to say it instead of signing it.  I have a feeling he's going to be a talker!

He still only has his two tiny bottom front teeth, but I think the top front ones will be here shortly.  Which will not be fun because he loves to bite chins and noses.  And not just the tip of the nose either.  Be warned, if you lie down on the floor at our house, Krew will crawl over to you and try to bite your entire nose.  He's done it to several people, not sure what that's all about.

I love these next pictures of Krew playing with his daddy.  They have such a special bond and it's so fun to see them together!

This has seriously been one of the best years of my entire life!  Being Krew's mom makes me happy every single day.  (Plus add on top of that the fact that I am Ky and Kade's mom too!).  I still feel like I didn't get enough of the baby stage.  Not enough swaddling and rocking to sleep, not enough new baby smell, not enough teeny tiny baby clothes, not enough baby wearing, not enough lazy hold-my-baby-all-day while he drifts in and out of sleep days.  Just not enough.  But I am excited about what this next year holds as we get to watch this amazing little guy grow and learn new things every day!

Happy Birthday Krew!  We love you!