11 months

At this time last year I had my bags packed and ready for the hospital, the nursery all set up, precious baby clothes were neatly folded and put in the dressers, and I was SUPER HOT all the time and really really really ready to meet my precious Coleman. And now, here we are....11 month later and my little baby is just about to turn 1! CRAZY how quickly the time goes. I just can't believe all of the changes that take place in the first year. It's so amazing to watch him on a daily basis and see him grow in to such a cute little boy.

So here are the amazing accomplishments from the past month...I know the post is long...but it's more of a scrapbook for us and for Coleman....feel free to just go through the pictures and you'll get a good idea of what has happened this past month!

We began to allow Coleman to self-feed at the table with a spoon and bowl. I need to be better about doing this more often, but it gets SO messy that I'd rather him just pick up pieces of food and feed himself than have to deal with the mess. Justin says that if he was always feeding him, Coleman would never get to use a spoon as Justin can't stand the mess it makes. He thinks its funny though to watch when he knows he has to leave for work and can't help with the clean up. It's fun to see how much better Coleman has gotten with a spoon as we've been working on it.

(I love that my husband took these photos of the mess, then left for work so I could clean up Coleman! j/k...I don't mind)

On May 5 Coleman learned how to CLAP! We've been working on clapping for a long time and he finally did it! A very proud day for mama. One of my favorite things to see each day is when Justin comes home from work....I say "Coleman, daddy's home" and he will crawl to the door where Justin comes in, sit down on his bottom, clap and squeal, then cry as he waits for his daddy to pick him up! It's so adorable!  At the end of this month he learned the song "If you're happy and you know it"....if we start singing it, he will clap his hands. What a little genius!

No wonder he loves his daddy so much!!

A new trick that has been very fun is that Coleman has become quite the pointer. He points and birds and chipmunks when we look out the window. He points at mama and Dada when we ask him. He points at Harley. He LOVES to point at the fan. He is a very good pointer.

We have officially learned the words "Uh - Oh" as we now have a definite "O" sound. Anything he drops or anything that falls to the ground you'll hear a cute little "uh-oh" and he likes to repeat it a few times for good measure just to make sure it's been heard! Now if only we can add the "O" to E-I-E-I

Coleman has mastered a few new crawling tricks as well. One of his new favorite things to do is to put toys in his mouth and crawl around like he's a dog. He also likes to put his head down so he is looking at the floor...kinda like aerodynamics...guess he thinks he can move faster this way.

He's not walking yet...but he's walking along anything and everything as well as standing on his own! I'm hoping to have a walker by his 1st birthday. We're working on it.

I bought some magnet toys for Coleman this month for him to have something to play with in the kitchen (other than pulling out everything from all the cabinets). At first he needed lots of help putting the letters in and pushing the buttons...but no more than a few days later he has completely figured out how to put the pieces in on his own. It's really cute when he figures it out because then he'll dance to the music that comes on.

I knew Coleman was teething a lot this month as the drool has been out of control. He is constantly chewing on his hands or some toy and I've been giving him cold things to chew on as well. I didn't think he had any new teeth because when he smiles you can't see the top teeth. Well...one day I was tickling him and got him to open his mouth really wide when I discovered two top teeth beginning to poke through! CRAZY! I'm bummed I dont' have the official date as to when these teeth poked through, but at least they're here and they look HUGE.

This month Coleman also learned to put himself to sleep at night. It makes me a little sad that he doesn't need to be rocked to sleep anymore, but I'm also happy that the nighttime routine is so much easier now. Coleman knows it and we can just lay him down and walk away and he will go to sleep. I think our favorite part of the day is going in to peek at him before we go to bed to see what crazy position he has ended up in. We both love to end our day this way and it just makes us smile at how adorable our little guy is.

This month was also full of many visits to the farm (greenhouse season is in full swing in May and Justin spends 7 days a week there...so we often visit to say hi!)...Coleman loves to help his daddy with moving the cart to get flowers. We also took a few trips to Holland to visit my parents for Tulip Time as well as Memorial Day. Coleman loved the fountain downtown during tulip time and LOVED playing with the hose on a very HOT Memorial Day.

One of the funniest things we've seen Coleman do is learn to crawl through the grass. He must not like feeling of the grass on his knees because he does a very adorable bear crawl to get anywhere in the grass.

 "Yep...that's my daddy on the tractor planting the corn maze!"

"Eeewww....grass on my knees!"

I'm sure we're in store for some major changes in the next month as we approach the 1 year mark. I am so blessed to be able to stay at home with my little guy and watch him grow up each and every day. Being a mom is the best!