11 months old!!

Today crazy Eric turned 11 months old!!  It’s hard to think that in only one month, he’ll already be a year old. 

To start off the day, he started talking to us in a different way.  Usually he wakes up saying “Ay, Ay” and ”Oh, Oh,” but today it sounded more like he was having a real conversation.  He kept saying mostly “Ba, bala, bala…”and he was changing the intonation of it all as if he were talking about something very important. 

Lately, he enjoys getting out of the house.  We go out to eat breakfast many mornings, and we have a portable chair that we can strap to the chairs of wherever we are eating.  He behaves really well in his little chair, especially when he’s distracted by Cheerios.  Lately he’s even been eating pieces of other people’s toast.  He seems to be fascinated by whatever anybody else is eating, and wants to try it all.

So, at home, whenever I bring Mauri a tray of food, Eric goes “running” over to him to see what he can eat.  Eric still doesn’t walk, but he can pull himself around, in a mostly sitting position, pretty quickly now, and can beat Mauri walking on crutches.  When he gets to Mauri and the tray of food, he pulls himself up and waits for Mauri to give him some food. 

Other activities at home include laughing at the dogs.  He still finds Sheena funny, especially if we say that Sheena is “gonna get him.”  He also thinks it’s very funny if we say things like “¡Qué susto!”  A bad thing about Cheerios looking like the dog food, though, is that he is constantly trying to eat Sheena and Molly’s food!!  More than once I’ve had to pull a little piece of dog food out of his mouth, and I’m constantly putting the bowls of food and water up on the kitchen counter to keep him from eating their food and splashing their water all over the place.

He still is fascinated by his favorite commercial, and now has a new favorite.  Whenever he hears one of his commercials, he drops whatever he is doing, runs to the television, and stares at it until the commercial is over.  As soon as either of these commercials is over, he goes back to whatever it was that he was doing in the first place.  

This week we also went over to swim in Maite’s pool.  It was a bit cooler than ours, and I eventually had to get him out of the pool because he looked pretty cold, even though he never complained.  He was too busy watching the kids at the pool jumping in and splashing around.  He really seems to like watching other kids.  Whenever a new adult speaks to him or tries to hold him, he gets a bit fussy.  If new kids come to see him, though, he lets them do whatever they want with him. 

So, he loves being outside.  He loves watching kids, and dogs, and loves following us around the house, even if that means throwing himself into the shower.  Since he also loves playing with water, the free shower is just an added bonus.  While he still isn’t talking or walking, he gets closer and closer to doing both each day.  He effortlessly pulls himself up, and sits himself down hundreds of times daily, and babbles and babbles more and more each day.  Soon I imagine it’s going to be harder to take care of him!!  As it is he’s constantly moving, but once he walks…