Christmas pictures

Acrobat

Visitors

Aunt Christy, Uncle Mike and Gabriel came to visit yesterday. Ben had SO MUCH FUN playing with his cousin! They gave Ben a play tent for Christmas and the boys had a blast playing in it. It was hard to get a good picture of them because they were in constant motion. We went out to dinner and then Gabriel helped me get Ben ready for bed. Ben had fun playing in the tent this morning, but it wasn't the same without Gabriel.

Basketball!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We were very disappointed that we had to cancel our trip to New Jersey for Thanksgiving due to Ben's cold/croup. I ended up going to the grocery store this morning and getting everything I needed to make Thanksgiving dinner for us. It turned out pretty well and as we predicted, Ben loves Thanksgiving food!

Santa ( a little early)

So Ben and I were at the mall this week and we saw that Santa was already out taking pictures. Since there was no line and we don't go to the mall very often, I figured we might as well take the opportunity to get Ben's picture taken with Santa. As we were walking up to him Ben was happily babbling away(I think he liked all the decorations) and he was fine when Santa started to talk to him. But as soon as I put him on Santa's lap he started squirming around and was generally very unhappy. I think he looks very concerned in the picture. My caption was "Does Daddy know we're doing this?" but I also liked Josh's suggestion, "Does Santa know I'm Jewish?".

Legos

We put Ben's legos away about a month ago because he was playing with his foam blocks more. I brought them back out earlier in the week because he was getting bored with his toys and since then he has discovered how to put them together. I wonder if we have a future CJ on our hands?

Touchdown

Over the weekend Ben had fun walking around doing "touchdown" and then clapping for himself. In this video he had just woken up from his nap, so he was a little wobbly, but you can see how proud he is that he can walk.

Happy Halloween!

Ben had so much fun trick-or-treating tonight! At first he wasn't so crazy about his costume, but once he saw the neighbor kids he perked up and had fun. He liked visiting the houses (especially those with doggies - he would shout "Da! Da!"). And he liked carrying his lightstick. Ben has been walking so much the past 2 days it's unbelievable. He's even getting good at walking in the bumpy grass outside.

Here are some pictures from tonight and from the Halloween party we went to yesterday. Yesterday he dressed up as Hannah. :) Halloween is so much fun with a little one!

Big Boy

We had a nice visit with Grammy this week and I need to post a couple pictures from her visit. But first, here are a couple pictures I took today. Ben was playing on the floor with his toys so I put a show on for him and went upstairs for a couple minutes to start dinner. When I came back down I found him sitting on the loveseat holding the remote and watching tv. Ben can climb onto the couch pretty easily these days, but he's never sat back and relaxed like that before. He looked like such a big boy and it made me laugh to see the top of his head sticking up above the couch like that.

Ben walking

We had a nice weekend - today we went back to the pumpkin patch to go on a hay ride. We weren't sure if Ben would have enough patience for the hay ride, but he did great. We picked pumpkins in the field and then got to visit with some of the farm animals. After a few days of not wanting to walk at all, Ben is doing better than ever with his walking. It's hard to get a good video, but enjoy the short clip below!

Pumpkins!

Fast Fast Slow

We like to listen to SteveSongs by Mr. Steve during dinner and Ben especially enjoyed Daddy singing along to the Fast/Slow song...

First Steps!

Ben took his first unassisted steps today at 13 months and 1 day! He wanted to hand me a block and took 3 steps towards me. Yay! We don't have pictures of him walking (without the lawn mower), but here are some cute pictures from earlier today.

Stacking Blocks

As I mentioned before, here are the pictures of Ben stacking 5 blocks. He did it all by himself (Josh is just trying to keep him from knocking them over before I could get a picture).

Ben at 1 year

Since I never really did a big post for Ben's birthday, here's what he's been up to now that he's 1. He just had his 1 year check-up and is 23 lbs and 31 3/4 inches. He is very tall and wears 18 month clothes for the length. He has 7 teeth now with several more getting close to coming through.

Food -Ben is 100% on table food now. He's a pretty good eater. He'll try most everything and his only big dislike so far is chicken. He loves dairy (cheese, cottage cheese, yogurt, milk), turkey (meatballs, meatloaf), ham, tomato sauces, any kind of melon, beans, peas and avocado. He doesn't especially like being fed with a spoon, so I spend a lot of time cutting up food so he can feed himself. I try to give him modified versions of what we're eating for dinner and it seems to be going well. We haven't been brave enough to go to a restaurant since he's been on table food but hopefully we'll try that soon (it was much easier to just take a jar of baby food with us!).

Sleep - His sleep is going well. He usually falls asleep easily at 8 and will sleep until 6 or so. He usually takes two 1 1/2 hour naps. Of course sometimes he will wake up at 5 am and not be able to fall back asleep.

Playing - Ben is very playful and curious. He loves his toys, especially anything he can stack. He likes to stack his blocks (his record is 5 at a time - I'll post a picture later), is starting to put legos together and is stacking his foam blocks too. I am always surprised by how gentle he is when he stacks his blocks and how he knows to put the bigger ones on the bottom.

As active as he is, he also likes to sit and look through his books. He will pull every single book off his shelf and flip through them.

Ben has a funny sense of humor and likes to tease me by offering his toys and then taking them away as soon as I try to grab them, he shakes his head "no" to every question I ask (and he has a huge smile on his face when he knows the answer is really "yes"), he loves to be chased and crawls away from me laughing when I tell him it's time to go somewhere. For now it's cute. :)

He also loves to chase Hannah around the house. She pretends she doesn't like it, but when he's not paying attention to her she'll sit in the middle of his toys. Of course I watch them very closely when they're together.

Ben is clapping a lot, "dances", plays peek-a-boo, points to things if I ask him to show me where they are (light, fan, trees, ducks), says Dada/Daddy and "Um" for me. He gives kisses and also does high-five.

I think Josh would agree that Ben is such a joy at this age. We both get such a kick out of him communicating with us more. There are some not-so-fun parts (like the 5am wake ups), but overall we are really enjoying our sweet little boy.

Rosh Hashanah

Here are a few pictures from our trip up to NJ for Rosh Hashanah. We had a nice visit and spent time with a lot of family & friends. Ben had fun showing everyone the light/fan, clapping, and walking around Grandma and Popi's house. He also thoroughly enjoyed his first taste of Grandma's matzo ball soup.