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.

Dada

I still have to post some pictures from last weekend, but in the meantime here is a video of Ben saying Dada/Daddy (which he started saying in the past couple of days). He says it clearer in other videos, but he is so sweet in this one. Ben and I watch it together several times a day on my phone. :)

On to Toddlerhood...

It seems like Ben has truly gone from baby to toddler overnight. He has done several new things today. First, he likes to watch a short show called "Dance a Lot Robot" that comes on before Mickey in the morning. Every morning the robot teaches a new dance. This morning Ben started imitating the robot for the first time and was lifting his legs up like him.

Next we were in the kitchen and it took Ben all of about 30 seconds to figure out how to remove the cabinet lock that Josh installed yesterday.

Then after his nap I heard some strange noises in his room and turns out he somehow knocked his Yankees lamp off his nightstand.

After lunch he started pointing at the ceiling in the family room. I couldn't figure out what he was doing. Then it occurred to me that he was showing me the light. I asked him where the light was and he got a huge smile on his face like I understood what he was trying to tell me.

Shortly after that he walked across the family room all by himself pushing one of his new toys. Whew! What a day!

August 31

We had a nice day yesterday celebrating Ben's birthday quietly at home. We had to change some plans because all 3 of us were a little under the weather but we still enjoyed the day. Ben opened a gift at breakfast, we watched the video from his first few days, played in the backyard and then enjoyed cake after dinner.

Party time!

We started the birthday celebrations a couple weeks ago with a visit from Uncle Adam and Makiko. They couldn't make it to the birthday party so they came for a visit. Ben enjoyed their company and Sophie his new teether.

Of course his big party was last weekend and I think he really enjoyed it. He was a little overwhelmed during the singing/cake, but we did a re-do yesterday on his actual birthday and it went much better. We are so thankful that so many people were able to come celebrate with us, especially those of you who drove in from out of town. We just wish we had been able to spend more time with everyone. If anyone has any party pictures, please send them to us!