Ben's big birthday bash

Double B had a nice time celebrating his first birthday with his friends and family. He was in good spirit despite the lack of sleep due to a tooth that's coming in. (Yes, Ben's first tooth sprouted 3 days before his first birthday) Double B seemed to enjoy the ceremony a great deal, occasionally bouncing as the monks were chanting. He also paid special attention to the Thai classical music and the traditional dance.

Making the offerings

Helping Mae during Water ceremony

Listening to Thai classical music

Enjoying classical dance


And the cake...

Everybody survived the bash!

Ball games

Grandma Nancy got this magic yellow ball for Double B last week. See how much fun he has with it.


First watching the game and cheering on....





Then it's time for Double B too to play ball....

Munching

While having his snack, Double B was caught blowing air through his lips. This has become one of his favorite pastimes these days.

11 months old!

Yup, getting up there. Big Ben is cruising along and is enjoying the summer a great deal. He spent a really fun vacation in Tahoe with his parents, grandparents , aunts and lots of cousins. The altitude-induced ear infection bothered him one morning and he was up and running and as happy as a clam by dinnertime. Whew!!

So what has he been up to, you ask.

- Talking up a storm. Saying "mae or mama" to Mom and "dada" just about anytime along with new other sounds with which he's experimenting everyday
- Expert crawler. He quickly forgot his old favorite commando crawl.
- Pulling to stand--in crib, at coffee table, over Mom and Dad, at his Leapfrog activity table and Neurosmith cube, etc
- Sleeping through the night. Yes, Yippee! He sleeps 8 to 7 more or less most nights now, to MAD's relief
- Standing briefly on his own. It's fun to watch the expression on his face when he realizes that he can actually stand for a few seconds without support
- Bouncing and clapping when in good mood, which is pretty much all day. He's a happy kid.
- Enjoying Cheerios and bite-size finger foods. All this with no teeth!

Big Ben has been keeping himself pretty busy indeed.

With cousins Fiona and Liam in Tahoe

Fun!

Hanging with Dad

Silly crawling kid

Double B seems to be enjoying the new-found skill. His favorite game goes like this: say something funny, show off silly tricks, crawl a little, sit and talk some more then tackle and climb Mom or Dad. While Ben obviously loves all these new motor skills, we are frantically looking for the right baby gate solution.

Way to go, bud!

We think it's totally cool that Ben says 'mama'. But it's even cooler that he now actually addresses it to Mom...consistently. Needless to say, Mom is thrilled!

M...N...

As if today wasn’t exciting enough with the crawling and preparation for moving, Double B decided to make some new consonants and sounds to distract stressed-out Mom and Dad. He’s been doing “da da” and a bunch other sounds lately. But this afternoon, to Mom’s joy and excitement, he went “mama, mama” and has been playing with the sound since. He also enunciated the N today as well, repeatedly saying “na na”.

Two consonants just minutes apart!! It was a good day for Big Ben.