Thirteen Months

Riley is thirteen months old today, which means Kenny and I made it not just through but past the first year. Woo-hoo!

We don’t go back to Dr. N until he’s 15 months, but here are some unofficial stats:

• Weight: 26 lbs
• Height: 31 in
• Head: 18.5 in

Here’s what I want to remember about this past month:

• He is still eating (and sleeping) really well; he LOVES tomatoes and blueberries. And he still loves to feed himself.
• No more bottles or formula! Woo-hoo! As of early on this month, it’s whole milk (or water) and sippies, all the time. He gets approx. 24 ounces of milk a day, and as much water as he wants. I started giving him some milk with breakfast and lunch mid-month (instead of a whole serving before naps and bedtime), and then I added dinner a week or so later. So now he gets 6 half servings instead of 3 whole servings, and that is working well.
• He still has only four teeth, but I think a couple more are going to sprout very soon.
• He still shakes his head “no” a lot but he is also now nodding “yes.”
• He knows where his ears, toes, belly, mouth, nose, and hair are.
• He has started to blow kisses, and he still loves to give kisses to everyone, Jem included.
• He is saying his version of a number of words, including the latest ones of banana (“nana,” and he can also recognize these), ball, quack, more, meow, wow. He is also repeating a LOT, mostly the last word of any sentence we say to him, and his pronunciation is actually quite good.
• He can tell you what sounds cows, ducks, tigers, and cats make, and we’re working on pigs, sheep, owls, and snakes.
• He is walking! Since he’s still trying to figure out his balance, he walks with his arms bent and his hands up near his ears. Nopsi calls him Frankenstein because of this.
• He likes to hand/bring us things (shoes, paper from the trash, his toys, etc.), and he loves to push his toys down his slide and then go after them.
• He loves being outside in his wagon or his swing.
• He is starting to get upset when told “no” (scrunchy face, fussy, some tears).
• He is getting more leery of people he doesn’t know and clings to whoever is holding him when seeing someone new. But he knows who “Mama” and “Dada” are. Now when asked, he pats our chests instead of his own.
• He points to everything. He loves looking at the “riley” canvases hanging on the wall above his crib and also the picture banner from his birthday that Nola hung above his closets.
• A few cute things: he sometimes eats with his feet crossed at his ankles, he holds up one finger when asked how old he is, he waves bye-bye to his swing before going inside, and he kisses the bird pictured on his last prayer every night.

He is such a happy and smart little boy, and Kenny and I feel so lucky that he came into our lives. We love him so very much!