Month 11

Every day this baby is becoming less of a baby and more of a toddler and a little boy. His fearless and determined personality sure shows through in just about everything. Like when he doesn't want to eat the baby food, he'll fling his arms at you until he gets something he can chew. Or if he wants his water from his sippy cut, he will scream until you figure out that he wants water. Or when you put him down for a nap, but he won't nap because he is hot or cold or not sleepy enough and will fight and fight until you figure it out. He's a great little live deductive reasoning puzzle!

The minute you put him down on the floor, he bolts it for the staircase, so we have been putting a gate at the bottom of the stairs to keep him from climbing unsupervised, because he will do so in the blink of an eye. All the way to the top.

He loves to stand and do squats. He has started to let go and balancing on his own! He has also learned that he can crawl up to a grown up, get up by holding on to their legs and asked to be picked up.

He waves bye and says boo. He calls for Benji and Mama. He is always full of smiles and loves all things music.

He is starting to wean himself off the morning nap... therefore I've started calling him No Nap Nico. When he does that, usually he sleeps for 3 hours after lunch!

He still sucks his left fingers when he is sleepy... I usually post only one picture during the monthly report, but I just have to post two this time because I caught this classic:

Happy 11 months Nicolasi!

We Went to the Show

This past weekend we went to see these guys at the theater:

It was so fun! Benjamin was besides himself. While we were getting ready, he went and got his Mickey shirt and we brought Mickey along to see the show too..

Thankfully the theater is not very big, so we had great seats! 

The show was quite excellent, but I do have to say that one of the highlights was watching Nico bust a move: 

Too much!

Tunnel Fun

When Benji was little like Nico, he was terrified of the tunnel. It took a lot of time for him to finally warm up to it and start enjoying it.

We have one at the house now and of course Benjamin loves it now. We got it out the other day and that was the firs time Nico had ever seen it. Before we knew it, he was all about it!

It was so fun watching them play!

This picture right here says it all:

And this one, Benji is chasing him and he is looking over his shoulder at him. Look at that little tongue sticking out!

Here they are "in action"

I just love watching them play and crack each other up!

Problem Solving Skills

Is 10.5 months too young to develop and exhibit problem solving skills? Most would say "no". I say "think again".

This morning I was working at the computer and No Nap Nico was moving about the office. I could certainly hear him and would check him out out of the corner of my eye to make sure he wasn't eating the computer cords or had managed to open the cabinet door and crawled inside it.

At one point, I noticed him standing up, trying to get a hold of the coaster that sits on the side table:

I turned back around and kept working as he was entertained. A little bit later I turn again and saw this:

Yes, he had managed to pull the basket from inside the table, turned it upside down and had gotten a hold of the coaster. Finally he could file those three new teeth on that stone coaster!

So there you have it. Call it problem solving skills, call it coincidence. But this child stood up on the basket to achieve his goal. Kudos to you No Nap Nico!

Bye Bye Hair

Benji got his first hair cut after he turned one year. Complete story here.

Nico barely to 10 months before something had to be done about both his comb-over and his mullet.

Just like Stride Rite, there is no hair salons specifically dedicated to children around here like there are in Atlanta. However, we have found a hair dresser (that actually lives in our neighborhood) and she has been cutting Benji's hair (and mine). The other day, when I had had enough of Nico's disheveled look, I texted her asking her what's the youngest age she'll take. She said "any age".

So today we had his first hair cut and it was a family affair! It is so awesome to just be able to call on family the night before and say "hey, you want to come?" and they say "yes!" and it's that simple.

Before starting:

Then it started:

He did awesome with the electric clippers... something Benji can't stand! Benji said that next time he will sit still for them... Jaime asked for it in writing... ha!

At one point he grabbed the water spray bottle out of Jaime's apron... hey, whatever it takes!

Happy Baby!

Not the best family picture ever...

However, if you zoom in, you see this (and they are borderline identical... the mouth, the cheeks, the nose, the shape of the head):

Shoe Time

Finally we got around to going to the store - mainly because I still can't embrace online shopping - to buy Nico his first pair of shoes!

There are only a few things that I miss about living in Atlanta - one is going to the ethnic market, another one is the Stride Rite store since there's not one here in Augusta. So for Nico, we first went to Carter's to see about giving their shoes a shot.

Well that idea fell apart quickly (according to them, he should be wearing a size 4.5 due to age, however, the size of that shoe was twice the size of his foot). And the selection was non-existent.

So we went to Dillard's which apparently is the only other place you can buy baby shoes around here. There we found the nicest lady who helped us! Nico got his little feet measured and they were tiny!

We picked out this pair of shoes, which was the smallest size they make and he started getting around right away:

 Happy baby with sales lady:

He got to wear his shoes home and he was so exhausted!

Besides his "everyday shoes" size tiny, we also got him a pair of cute little summer sandals! They are one size larger (because that's what was on clearance...)

Next up this week, is his first haircut! Stay tuned...