More Friends the Merrier

Dear Henry, 
 You have a new friend to play with!  Matt and Eunice, a couple from our support group's little boy was just born via c-section.  His birth mother is doing well and resting and Keegan's Mommy and Daddy are busy gushing over their new 6lb 15oz  21" long boy.

So happy!!!
Now we just need our buddies Nissy and Jim & Doug and Peter to find their match and our group turns into a play group!
Love, Mommy

A bird? A Plane? NOPE! It's Super Henry!

Dear Henry,
Mommy has been a sewin' fool during your nap times.   Up until this week the dinning room was my sewing castle and crap was strewn everywhere.  I've completed many projects now since November.  I've made 6 dolls, a robot, a tooth, an ice cream sandwich pincushion,  two quilts, two robots for your future mobile,  countless ribbon blankets, and a superhero cape.

I am particularly proud of your cape, which you tried out for the first time while Grandma P and Crappaw visited the other day.

 

 

You're also still loving playing in your room and always end room time by attacking the door stop.  You pounce on it like a little tiger on it's prey and sproiiiiiiiiing!!!  you jump back to watch it undulate up and all around.  After five or six goes at it you're ready to move back into the living room.    

If on the way to the living room the bathroom door is left open even a crack you're in there.
Yesterday you wore your cape around for quite a while and found some mayhem in the bathroom to tend too.  This time I just sat back and watched what you did and took photos.  You pulled and pulled on the toilet paper.  You wrastled it to the ground at one point, tore it to pieces and then stood up and started wiping on the sculpture Amanda Waddle gave us.  You were bustin' dust and takin' names!  You came out and saw me watching you and sheepishly tried to eat the evidence still in your hands.  It turned out to be a rather dry snack and you spit it out and threw it in a soppy ball on the floor.

 

You can always tell people who have little kids because their toilet paper rolls always look like this...lumpy and re-spun on the tube.

Great fun!  I had visions of when you're able to run grabbing the roll and running through the house until it is all gone to see how far it will stretch.  Maybe that isn't a good Mommy thing to do but it is gonna be a heck of a lot of fun!
Love, Mommy

I Like Animals!

Dear Henry, Little animals litter the floor day and night.  Sometimes I step on them and they moo or growl at me, they have little buttons on the bottom that activate a sound box.  Mommy perches them on my head and you will bound across the room to snatch it away.  You've started making moo sounds on your own.  Mommy makes the animals talk to each other, eat grass and give each other warm farm kisses.  Your eyes follow my movements and you will babble a storm onto the little farm and whisk the animals away with tornado hands.  When I'm extra special lucky after you see the animals kiss you come and give Mommy a besito. 

Mommy loves this!  Sometimes when you take a nap I will have them lined up and grazing in a line so they are ready to play.  On your hands and knees you survey their faces closely before knocking the entire herd down domino style.  Sometimes Mommy puts them on your head and you think it is a hoot.  You hold them there as long as you can, about 2 seconds, but you try to skew your eyes up to see it sitting there and you can't do this without throwing your head back too.

Mommy started stocking up on these Target dollar bin animals a couple of years ago so when cousin Johnny and our friend Ruby came to play they'd have some buddies.  I'm so happy I did because now my little Peep gets to enjoy them.  I love playing animals with you.
Love, Mommy

To Keep a Boy's Head Warm

Dear Henry, 
Daddy's worker friend Anne took the time to make with her very own hands some beautiful hats to keep your melon warm.  How much it touched Mommy's heart that someone else would think of my sweet boy and his warmth during these cold months.  They are both functional and stylish.  I posted the brown one previously.  Here are the rest.

 

 

 

Love, Mommy

That's Entertainment

Dear Henry, 
Yesterday Daddy arrived home a little early to get in some extra play time with you.  We watched you play for probably 30 minutes with the little rabbit cart our friends Lori and LIzzy gave you for your welcoming party.  You grab onto the string and try to pull it along and then just flip the string around as much as you can while doing this deep sucking in eeeeeeeeeeehk sound.  

 

 Then you rascled around the room from place to place to arrive at the door to play with the recently discovered door stop.  You flip it and bbbbbbbllllllllllllliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnggggggggg it vibrates all over the place.  You do this over and over and over again.  

 

To my delight as you started to wind down I asked you if you'd like to read a book and is you knew exactly what I was saying you walked to the book shelf and pulled out the cool pop up book Great Auntie Glo bought you a while back.  We sat on the corner of the bed so Daddy could get close too and read the book before dinner.

Small things peep but they are things that we waited our whole lives for and we appreciate greatly as we still have friends waiting for their familys to begin.  Everyone should have this kind of happiness.
Love, Mommy

The Pool You Never Had

Dear Henry, 
Please forgive Mommy and Daddy.  The first year of your life we had a pool in our backyard.  The old man that lived here before us didn't open it for 10 years.  We tried for years before you came to us to get that dang thing doing what pools are supposed to do but the maintenance was too far gone.  So, this week the removal began.  No worries though...Crappaw and Grandma P have a pool and you enjoyed the IU pool this past summer well enough.  In place of broken, cracked and peeling concrete, cold water due to too much shade and a water bill burning up money faster than the water leaking will be a nice big lawn for you to run and play.
Love, Mommy 

Little Mr. Independent and Mommy 007

Dear Henry, 

WHAT has gotten into you?  Now that you are walking you think you have to be 10 years old or something.  Today I was in the living room checking e-mail as you were walking around our Brady Bunch style dividing wall and I spied on you.  Yep, I had my camera right next to me and witnessed you playing at the window only to stand up and walk down the hall.  Mommy waited a couple of minutes wondering where you went and started her search.  I found you in your bedroom playing.  Yep! Playing all on your own.  

Before you spotted me I took some surveillance photos to show Daddy later.  When you did spot me you pulled a book off of your new shelf and walked over to me, shoved it in my face with a grunt and plopped on my lap with the Dr. Seuss character Uncle Gary and Auntie Michele gave you for Christmas.  We read the alphabet book with great interest and then played with blocks.  Look at these photos Henry!  You're just a little baby!  I can tell things are getting ready to get so much more fun around here.
Love, Mommy

Just Because I like These Photos and You're so Handsome in Them.

Dear Henry, 
Just because you're so good looking. 
The hat is complements of a very nice and talented lady from Daddy's work, Anne, that crocheted you a blanket when you were first born.  She made you a handful of beauties that I need to get photographs of you in.  Here is the beginning.  She really thought about the color.  The yarn has all of your eye, skin and hair colors blended and it makes you OH SO CUTE!  there is a sweater to match.  Hunk little boy.

Mommy found this t-shirt at a thrift store.  I love it.  My little corn dog.  Auntie Krispy bought the two pairs of shoes featured in these pictures at a thrift store.  She helps me to keep you looking cute.

Love, Mommy

Ikea, An Adventure

Dear Henry, 
We recently made the 2.5 hour haul to Ikea in Ohio to get your bookshelf.  Your library of books has grown and you needed a good place for them.  Anytime we go there we end up staying for HOURS!  I don't really know how it happens but the vortex of Ikea sucks you in mind, body and soul.  You have to eat their cute little meatballs and delicate little green princess cakes with cream and raspberry sauce.  We learned long ago one must eat before and after you shop there if you want to maintain any modicum of sanity for the subsequent two weeks from the experience.  We begin to shop and of course the cafeteria sits just outside of the children's section.  The finger puppets, toys, utensils, little tot beds, quirky lights and accouterments at low low prices for superb design and style render your ability to say no useless.  Daddy's Achilles' heel is the little room set ups and small square footage apartments.  The time we spend sitting in them and talking about what it would be like to live in them easily adds on an hour to the visit.  At this point you've began walking 4 or so steps on your own so you began to explored around the children's section with gusto.  You spun around in the little egg seat, went down the slide a couple of times and found your dream kitchen...which we plan to purchase next year for Christmas.  

 

Then you sat in each of the bitty butt room set ups exploring the toddler beds, lofts and lights.  There were ginormous bins of super soft stuffed animals.  As our cart went by the kangaroos with babies in their pouches Grandma LaJean called Papa and so we stopped. 

You went wild over these kangaroos.  You grabbed onto their arms and pulled them close nuzzling them with your mouth then quickly pushing them away with a giggle.  Mommy couldn't resist and she became one of those parents, yes, I stuffed you right into that large bin of kangaroos...only for a few minutes but you were in heaven! 

 

You also made faces with Daddy in the mirrors and enjoyed the weight and texture of the sheep skin on your head.

A new duvet cover, finger puppets, napkins, storage supplies, a shelf, and a set of curtains later it was time to head back to Indiana.  Mama and Papa were having a date night.  Yep!  So we dropped you off at Grandma P's and Crappaw's in Columbus on the way home.  We went out to see our friend Mason DJ and we boogied and had a LOT of fun.  

We missed you so and they brought you back the next afternoon so we could go to Max's 9th birthday party at Western Skateland.  I love that we can go to Ikea with you and you love it as much as we do.  You didn't get over stimulation, you didn't freak out, and you didn't get anxious.  You are such a good little trooper!

Love, Mommy 

Roads! Where We're Going We Don't Need Roads!

Dear Henry, 
One of Mommy and Daddy's favorite movie is Back to the Future.  We've watched it a good crap ton of times and love the lines.  As I was thinking over your most recent achievements and the changes that they bring to how you exist in the world a classic line that popped into my head.  It is the last line of the movie where the Doc Emmett Brown responds to Marty McFly's concern that there won't be enough roads to get up the 1.21 gigawatts and 88mph to make the time travel jump safely.  What Marty doesn't know is that in the future there are no limits and the more you know the farther one can go so Doc responds to Marty, "Roads!  Where we're going we don't need roads!"  Classic!  

Mommy mentioned the other day how it blows my mind that one day you aren't doing something and the next day you are...whatever the doing might be it is usually new and fascinating to all of us.  Well, sometime a day or two before you turned 10 months old you got your wheels revving with a little giddy up in your step and took off on your own.  Yep, walking.  Since about a week before Christmas you had been walking with me grabbing hold of my right hand with your left moving around the house together.  You seemed stable and often didn't really even need the support of my grip but Mommy welcomed the closeness and didn't push you too much on your own.  I looked for opportunities to increase your solo distances and in no time the steps started adding up.  The first day I really saw progression was at your 10 month doctor's appointment.  The room we were in had two wooden chairs and you wanted to cruise across them so I started separating them little by little and soon you were two steps on your own, three, and then four!  I was quite impressed by you and happy to see you taking excitement in your own accomplishment.  A few nights later Mommy and Daddy set the ottoman and chairs around the room like an obstacle course and again I made larger and larger separations between objects until you ignored the objects altogether and you were WALKING 5, 6, and 8 steps.  Shesh!  Well!  A few days later Daddy had his wisdom teeth removed and so you spent a night at Grandma LaJean's and a night with Crappaw and Grandma P.  A few hours into your Grandma LaJean visit I get a call, "Hey!  How long has he been walking because he just walked across the living room."  Oops, I forgot to mention it!  When you returned home yesterday you were walking into other rooms, to people, with things in your hands, and long distances!  I really can't believe it.  You look so tiny.  Your Frankensteinian arms and walking stance have turned into delighted little twinkle hands up by your face as if you are savoring delicious little chocolates.  You don't need roads Peep...you go wherever you want now such as to try and put your hands in the toilet, the kitchen trash can, and to pull books off of your new shelf.  Auntie Krispy heard the news and rushed over today to see you.  She too was in disbelief.  

It is a beautiful thing.  I am a bit scared though, in these early steps you're fast...I mean REALLY fast...and I know the speed will only increase and soon we will be in the future.

I love you McFly, 
Love, Mommy

Getting Some Fresh Air

Dear Henry, 
The other day it was unseasonably warm the day before a large snow so we sat outside for about 10 minutes and played before going to the library.  When I say unseasonably warm I mean it was like 35 degrees verses the 10-17 we had been having.  You didn't mind at first and showed great excitement to play around the step and crunch on some leaves.
You tried to put an acorn in your mouth, you have been watching those squirrels from the kitchen window all winter so I was not surprised.  I fished it out quickly.  

  Then when you went to suck your thumb after playing with the leaves, sticks and acorns you pulled it out promptly and stared at it clearly revolted by the taste, shrugged your shoulders, and when on sucking it.  You love your thumb,  nothing can keep you from it.

And that is reason 127 why not only do I love you but I really like you too!  You and your thumb.  I'm still in wonder of reason 332...how are you getting yourself to walk across the room now when those cheeks weight 20lbs each?  J says that's why you are doing the Frankenstein walk.  I think she may be correct.

Love, Mommy