Happy Birthday Caleb!

A fun time was had by all in honor of our little guy's first birthday. Homemade apple cinnamon waffles for breakfast, storytime with mom, an invigorating game of crawl-tag, a power nap, lunch with dad at Chick-fil-a (complete with free balloons), a long afternoon nap, unwrapping presents, messy birthday dinner, chocolate cupcakes, and a birthday bubble bath combined to make for a fun-filled and memorable (for me atleast) birthday.

So how have things changed since Spike came into the world during that awful sleet storm one year ago today?

• He has significantly less hair. But not for lack of trying. This kid can grow hair like nothing I've ever seen before. He'll probably have a full beard by the time he starts kindergarten. His full mane of black hair has grown so much that he's had more than one haircut a month since birth, and he's left with a blond buzz cut instead.
• His communication skills have improved greatly. He understands a considerable portion of what we say, and recognizes quite a few specific words, including bathroom, playroom, kitchen, foyer, couch, shoes, hat, food, milk, breakfast, lunch, dinner, blankie, bath time, sharkie, duck, blocks, and airplane. His vocabulary includes words for Mama, Dada, Sharkie ("duh-duh"), banana ("nana," which is also his word for food in general), bye-bye, night-night ("ni-ni"), ball ("buh") and today he added balloon ("baba").
• He's a much better sleeper. Okay, so he was really never a bad sleeper. But a one hour morning nap, a 2.5 hour afternoon nap and 12 hours of nighttime sleep sure beats that waking-up-every-three-hours thing he did as a newborn.
• He eats people food. And lots of it. He finally mastered a sippy cup and is completely off the bottle and into the world of delicious whole milk. He's a huge fan of food, all food, and is setting himself up to eat us out of house and home before he turns three. Before Caleb was born, we were about a 1.5 gallons of milk a week family. Today, we go through an average of three gallons of milk a week. You do the math.
• He has no interest in walking. He's a champion speed crawler, and is completely satisfied with his current on-all-fours mode of transportation. He'll walk with us if we hold his hands, but collapses into a big heap on the floor if we threaten to let go. I blame it on his expanding waistline. Those chunky legs are going to need a little bit more muscle on them if they're going to hold up his top half.
• He's cuddly. He prefers being around people to being alone, and prefers being around his mom and dad to being around strangers. He has this primal scream that he whips out whenever we drop him off in the church nursery, and rumor has it that the only thing that calms him down is eating his weight in Cheerios. Last Sunday, even that didn't do the trick, and toward the end of the sermon we could actually hear him screaming from downstairs. I'm hoping he grows out of this before high school.
• As far as little brothers go, this one's proving to be big trouble. He loves to torment his big sister, and adores imitating everything she does, particularly when it annoys her. He repeats sounds she makes, climbs up next to her on the couch when she's trying to play by herself, and brings chaos to anything she's trying to order. If she's coloring, he's throwing her crayons on the floor. If she's reading, he's piling toys on top of her book. Today he crawled over to where she was sitting, put one hand on each of her shoulders and stood up and pushed her over, then fell on top of her and pinned her down, all with a big grin on his face. "Dude, stop!" is Abby's most frequently used expression.

I adore this kid, and he's growing up too fast for my liking. Since I can't seem to make time slow down, I'll just continue to enjoy every minute of it.

Happy birthday Caleb....I can't imagine my life without you in it!