Mack is 11 Months!

Mack is 11 months old today!

I can't believe in just one month he will be one year old - where has the time gone? It's been the craziest year of my life for sure but Mack has been my one constant and my biggest joy.

Mack is all over the place, I can barely keep up. Look at those red knees - he is the fastest crawler in town and is just itching to walk. He has mastered standing on his own and "cruising". I have caught him several times when he would take a step and then realize what he was doing and stop and sit down. He can sit from a standing position and stand from a sitting position. He tries to climb anything and everything - stairs, coffee tables, couches, wagons, fireplaces, TV consoles, chairs and more.

He says Mama and Dada with a purpose, loves patty cake, "where's Mack?", his tunnel, Libby & Brown Bear (our labs), his mom - he is a mama's boy right now. He loves his dad's silly voices and being tickled by his beard. He thinks it's so funny when Libby barks. He can put smaller objects in large containers and remove them. His favorite toy is an electric book that Grammy (my mom) gave him when he got tubes. It sings different nursery rhymes.

He is as curious as ever, focusing on new items until he can figure out what exactly he can do with it. Jon had to child-proof the kitchen cabinets the other week after Mack pulled a bowl out and it broke. He is still trying each and every day to open all the cabinets. I love that he never gives up.

Mack loves books with texture. On his nightstand currently is Dog, Tails, Goodnight Moon and The Big Red Barn. We rock in the chair in his room and read the books, he loves to turn the pages himself and is so fascinated by the textures in Dog and Tails.

He is obviously a great eater, weighing in at 23lbs and 31 inches, 60th and 90th percentiles. He has been eating table food for a few months now and we have dropped down to two bottles a day - morning and night. His favorite foods are peaches, sweet potatoes, pears, avocados, cheerios, cheese ravioli, chicken and shredded cheese. We still haven't tried beef yet but there is no doubt that he would love it. He is a messy, messy, messy eater. He hasn't figured out that you don't have to throw the sippy cup when you are done with it but I'm sure that will come.

He has a love/hate relationship with baths these days - he loves playing in them but hates the actual bathing part.

Mack is excelling in his fine and gross motor skills and catching up on his language skills since having his tubes put in. He imitates so many sounds and noises - especially a bath toy duck that goes, "quack, quack, quack, quack".

He has dropped his 5pm cat nap for the most part but Mondays are always long days and yesterday we took a long cuddle nap. We haven't done that in several weeks and I have definitely missed it. There aren't enough words in the dictionary to describe my love for Mack and this is only the beginning.