14 Months!

Every single month goes by and I cannot believe how much our little boy is growing! This last month has been a little crazy with Thanksgiving and Christmas keeping us busy and out of our normal routine. Carson is still loving sleep, he can't make it much past 6 for bedtime. He is getting used to sleeping other places and falls asleep in the pack n play (even though he doesn't really fit) for his naps or bedtime pretty much wherever we go. As long as he has Cubby Bear and his pacifiers. He started sleeping like this a lot--with his one hand behind his head.

He loves all food and lots of it. He loves vegetables and chicken but breakfast seems to be when he eats a 7 course meal. He is getting better at eating things on his own, taking bites and actually chewing his food. But he still loves things that I feed him like applesauce, yogurt, and pureed fruits. And if he even sees his sippy cup with milk before he is done eating he will quit eating and complain until he gets his cup and then he won't eat. He also knows where I keep his cup in the fridge and everytime my parents open it he seems to be standing there ready to grab it.

This is Travis and Carson at Oregano's. He ate his own food and then when ours came out he enjoyed that too! This was his first time in a booster seat, sitting next to his dad!

Carson isn't as scared when we leave as he was a couple of months ago. And is getting more and more used to the people he sees often. While we have been in Charleston, he is meeting a lot of new people and he is loving it. He loves his cousins, Taylor, Cameron and Megan and really, really loves his cousin Wyatt. He just stares at him and smiles! This is a picture of his cousin Cameron reading him his favorite book, "Mr. Brown Can Moo."We live where the average temperature is 80. We bundled Carson up just like the little boy in A Christmas Story. He tried to walk with his big puffy coat on and when he toppled over he had a tough time getting back up! Underneath the big puffy coat he has on about 5 layers. You can't really see his face but it is saying "what the?"

Even though it is super cold outside he still wants to be out there all of the time. Just leaving restaurants or stores he gets so excited the second we walk out the door. Yesterday we bundled him up and took him to the park to play on the slides and swing for a little while. I thought he was getting sick of it because he was pretty cold. So we went to the car to go home and he just cried and cried! I always think those little tears are going to freeze.

Today we took him to the church so he could run around indoors and play some basketball with Dad.

He has started signing a few different things and loves to copy people. Wyatt and Megan started saying "BahBah" to him and when they do he bounces up and down. They think it is so funny and then he just smiles at them. He copies anyone who laughs, coughs, sings, jumps, runs and he copies me when I stick out my tongue (for some reason, he doesn't really copy other people when they do that--probably a good thing). He is happy and likes to get into things. But instead of opening up a cupboard and getting the stuff out, he likes to just shut it. I think he likes the sounds of the doors closing. And he is obsessed with shutting any open doors. Yesterday when he woke up, I heard him opening and closing the doors to the dresser that are right beside his pack n play. This is him playing with his diapers. At least they were clean ones.

He still loves bathtime and I think he likes it better now that Daddy usually gives him his baths. His dad makes them warmer and puts way more bubbles. This is his first bath in Grandma and Grandpa Garrett's big "whirlybath".

Carson loves to cuddle with stuffed animals, Cubby Bear, his cow or his new monkey. He loves to run from room to room. He loves looking at books on his own or sitting on someones lap and being read to. He likes to stack things and take things in and out of containers. At church on Sunday he was entertained the whole time by colored pencils, just taking one out and putting it back in. He adores his dad. He just hears his dad's voice and gets all excited. He has been having so much fun with his grandparents and whenever they walk by he just gives them a big grin. He now has 9 teeth, even 1 random little molar. He loves water bottles or empty coke bottles and eyes anyone who has one.

Carson is always happy. I don't know how we got so lucky to have such a cute happy little boy, but we are so grateful for what he brings to our family. Just tonight when Travis and I were looking at that bath picture we both talked about how stinking cute we think he is and we decided to go look at him while he was sleeping. I told Travis we are going to be doing that with all of our kids and we probably won't ever get any sleep when there are more of them.

Happy 14 Months Carson! We love you so much!