Linnaeus 14.0

Today Sprout is officially fourteen months old.  Though there were a handful of moments where time seemed to be going sooooo slowly, most of the last fourteen months have flown by. A year ago, Sprouty had just started smiling, he couldn't roll over by himself & weighed only eleven pounds. What a different baby we have now: babbling, gesturing & clearly communicating what he wants, climbing up furniture & over double that weight. A big change for me is that after months of worrying about his weight gain & obsessing over percentiles, I think I can say I'm over it. Which is not to say that I'm not keeping track of his weight, but not as obsessively as before. Last time he was weighed was when we did some tests for the CHILD Study, over a month ago. Unlike eight or ten months ago, where I would get nervous if we didn't weigh him every week or two, I have no plans to weigh him anytime soon.

This week's latest:

Upside-down pumpkin pie, disappearing fast.

Favourite food.
Pumpkin pie: he ate a whole adult sized piece with whipped cream at Thanksgiving dinner chez Thomas, aka The Swamp. Not one crumb of it got tossed to the dogs...
Favourite toys.
Shape sorting blocks: he's starting to figure out which ones go where & loves putting anything through the holes in the box.
Tiny plastic spatula that came with his BBQ toy: he carries this around the house for hours. You can hear him crawling with it in his hand: whap-click, whap-click.
Favourite books.
Anything with high contrast images &/or balloons, like Goodnight Moon, Meg & Mog, But Not the Hippopotamus.
Favourite Activity.
Climbing on things: the footstool, the Spud bin, the kitchen chairs, his car seat, the toilet, Papa, Mama, any stairs, playground equipment, the bathtub.
Pointing at things he wants to draw your attention to: Crows! Someone walking on the other side of the street! Shrub! Balloon! Tree!

I'm tempted every time I write one of these updates to mention all the things he's not  doing yet, like talking & walking. I know it's ridiculous to compare him to other babies or what Oli & I are reported to have done. He's his own little person who will hit his milestones when he's ready. He's not late enough to be considered delayed in anything, so there's nothing to worry about. But still, I feel the need to comfort myself with the things that he has, thus far, been precocious with: eating solids & all the associated hand-eye-coordination & fine motor skills that go with it, growing hair, playing by himself.