Braden | eleven months

Here is what Braden has been up to this month:

- He has become a great crawler and only knows one pace: FAST.

- He is much more adventurous and always has bumps and bruises to prove it.

- He still loves to play with any kind of ball and is getting better at throwing.

- He learned how to clap

- His facial expressions get funnier every day. He loves when we copy the face that he's doing.

- He laughs at EVERYTHING! Sometimes I can't tell if it's a real laugh or a courtesy laugh.

- He does something funny and then looks around the room to make sure everyone saw it.

- He loves reading, but sometimes turns the pages faster than I can read them

- He loves going to the park to swing on the swings

We absolutely love the stage he's in right now! He is so active and so fun to play with. We're having to do some major baby proofing, but we're happy to do it.

It was impossible to get any sitting pictures of him this month! He would not sit still! 

This just about sums up the photo shoot. He seemed to be completely aware that he was not doing what I wanted. 

Trying to escape 

My favorite face! 

He loves toast with butter and jam!

Braden | ten months

So far this has been my favorite month. He has been so full of energy and personality. We have had a great month!

- He is crawling! I was convinced that he would walk before he's crawl because he was walking along all the furniture, but showed no interest in learning to crawl. It happened out of the blue one day and he has gotten better and better each day. At first, he'd be completely out of breath by the time he got across the room and would collapse onto his stomach, but now he has more endurance.

- Because he's crawling now, he has become so curious! He'll crawl over and play with the foot pedals on the piano and then make his way over to the pantry shelves in the kitchen. It has definitely been an adjustment. We had a lot of baby proofing to do.

- He has stopped nursing now and had a really hard time adjusting to a bottle. He's just starting to get the hang of it, which makes my life a lot easier. 

- When he plays with toys, he likes to find similar objects to put in each hand. He'll find two rings or two finger puppets and put one in each hand. Usually he tries to keep them in his hands while he crawls around.

This is Braden's new face he makes allllllll the time.

Here are a few more pictures from this month:

Every morning when I brush my teeth for the day, I get him his toothbrush and he brushes along with me. It's the only way he'll let me brush his teeth. It's so cute to see his reaction to such an interesting texture in his mouth. 

Braden crawled over to our food shelves and started pushing all the tuna cans onto the ground. Doesn't that look like a guilty face to you?? 

I found this hat for him on sale and was excited to try it on him. I got him the 12-18 month size thinking he'd be able to wear it all winter. Nope, it was tiny! I ended up having to go up two sizes to 2T/3T!

Sundance

Kristin and I wanted to drive up the canyon to see the leaves so we brought Braden along with us. We missed some of the pretty orange and reds, but the yellow aspens were still as beautiful as ever. We drove up the Alpine Loop, which had amazing views of the fall colors next to the beautiful snow-capped Mt. Timpanogos. We stopped and took some pictures of Braden, which turned out amazing! It probably seems like we do nothing but take pictures of Braden, but when you have such a talented sister-in-law who lives 30 seconds away, who can blame me?? 

Conference Weekend

We spent most of conference weekend up in Sandy with the fam. The kitchen is in the middle of a major remodel so we were downstairs most of the time. In addition to wonderful, inspired talks, we also had fun exploring the pumpkin patch in the backyard. Logan produced quite an impressive crop this year! Braden was a little nervous at first being surrounded by pumpkins, but he warmed up quickly. The only problem was that he kept trying to eat them and would poke his eye with the stem in the process! I am NOT a Halloween person and have to really force myself to be festive this time of year, but I do have to say that I really enjoyed the pumpkins!

.... and here's a random picture taken by Logan. Sums up the weekend perfectly!

More pictures

Kristin needed a picture of our family for something she was working on the other day, so she took a few pictures of us in the front yard and by the side of the house. I love how they turned out!

Braden and Ryker

We are so lucky to have such wonderful friends living on the other side of our house. There are so many perks to living in a house with a good friend. I can't tell you how many times I've had to run next door to borrow a few eggs or have her listen for Braden when I run to pick up Devin or give me a spare key when I've locked myself out...the list goes on. Braden loves having another baby to play with and since they are only 7 weeks apart, they get along really well! Before school started, we got to use our Pass of all Passes to all go to Seven Peaks together. We shared a double tube and would switch off watching the babies and going on rides. Braden and Ryker spent some time in the kiddie pool and then played a little more on the grass. I love watching the two of them interact! Ryker is much more outgoing and energetic, which is so good for Braden to see since he's more reserved and shy. I just love watching their personalities develop. Maybe someday they'll both be back here at BYU :)