10 Months!

Our little Miles Evan is 10 months old! It's crazy. This guy reminds us that life is so fun. 10 month is a total blast.

It took two sessions of paint EVERYWHERE, but I think the final photo is a total keeper. It took some encouragement (ie: me moving his hands for him) to paint the canvas. He was too interested in the paint itself....and the taste. ha!

A close runner up:

To see all his cutie month by month photos, click here.

HI mom!

This thing is weird...

Get it out of my way.

I need to focus on this colorful wet stuff. I shall taste it!

Hmm... *spends a second thinking*

I lick it!!!

YUM!

Miles' typical relaxed personality (ie: not super motivated) has been a total anomaly when it comes to walking. He is determined. It's hasn't even been a week since his first steps and we are at a record high of 23 STEPS unassisted. He can stand from sitting, catch himself when he's off balance and keep going. Check out these moves!

 Listen to those squeaks! 

When I said he'd be walking by age one, I didn't realize how quickly things would evolve. I feel like he JUST started crawling. He sticks out his tongue when he's really concentrating. It's so cute! You can really see him thinking - "one foot, two foot, three foot...I got this!"

He's become very comfortable with all areas around the house. "Back in the day," he would stay in the sun room, kitchen and living room. Now, he's everywhere. His new favorite spot - the laundry room. I do my best to keep sight of him, but in the blink of an eye, he's in the laundry room eating dog food. Gross. His other spot? The bathrooms. Any bathroom. Really he's just after those small white caps that sit over the bolts of the toilet. Until now, I thought those were attached. Nope.

Where he's gained interest in areas, he's lost interest in others. He CAN crawl up the stairs. But he's decided that's not where he wants to spend his time. Good for me because we haven't installed the gate yet. We'll get there. Just been busy keeping dog food out of his mouth!

Miles knows his name and seem to understand certain things like 'eat', 'milk', 'lucy' & 'this way'. We've been keeping up with sign language but haven't seen anything consistent from him yet. We are working on waving and clapping, which we've seen from him. Maybe he doesn't want to perform on command or just simply doesn't care to mimic us. ha! We'll get there.

More about Miles @ 10!
- He's very vocal. The "DADADA" is prominent these days. No "Mama" yet. *sigh*
- He's rolling around on the changing table, making things quite difficult to change him
- His pallet has broadened and does well when trying new foods. He is still spitting everywhere which is annoying, but if he can feed himself, he does much better.
- We switched him to a straw cup and he's doing fantastically. It's been great because it's taught him to suck on his squeezies, which he's almost able to do by himself.
- Thinks heavy breathing/shushing through the teeth, singing with motion, dancing, airplane game, being upside down and being thrown in the air is HILARIOUS
- He likes his books at night, but this guy is not a snuggler. Once the book is done, it's like he's saying, "Ok. All done. Bed now"
- A total water baby. He loves the pool
- Squeals like he's calling all whales. The pitch would break windows yall. I swear
- Chews/sucks on the edges of his snuggie at night/nap time to calm down/sooth himself
- Has 4 teeth
- He growls

All done. See ya guys later!

Maybe not an artist, but adorable, energetic, lovable, all smiles, curious, giggly, and all over wonderful. Happy 10 months Miles!

1 Step, 2 Step

Miles has quickly moved from cruising to standing on his own to even taking a few steps unassisted! Check out his new skills!

One Step:

Two (and a half) Steps:

I've counted up to FIVE so far! I've made bets he'll be walking by his birthday. It might be before that! ;)

Splash Pad

This past week the guys were out of town, so Becky and I decided to rally up the neighborhood and meet some people over at our new splash pad. I hadn't been over to our pool area before, so I was excited to see what it was all about.

Miles preferred the "off" style of the splash pad. It's pretty forceful when turned on

Look how tiny!!

Water + leaves = Excellent snack

We got there right after school let out, so we assumed after awhile the pool would become more crowded with kids - which it did. At that point, the splash pad was a bit too rambunctious for Miles to play. So, it's pool time!

Becky brought one of the girl's puddle jumpers to see how Miles did. It was a little too big and he kept face planting in the water, but he could float!

And a couple fun videos of the adventure:

Wet N Wild

Summer here in Texas is HOT. We are excited for the new neighborhood splash pad, but to cool things off at the house, I got Miles this great water table. It has cause and effect toys that move with the water and a tower that rains!

He was getting restless one day, so I decided to set it up.

With the table in pieces, he found the box to be quite entertaining!

Needless to say, I think he's enjoying it  :)

Deja Vu......x2

As I was working Friday afternoon, the common squeals, grunts, grinds of teeth, and general babble fell silent. At first I felt like, oh wow, maybe he's at that age where he can play quietly by himself. Amazing!.....yea right. I quickly came to my senses and decided to go seek out my super quiet baby-turned-toddler. 

Good thing I caught him when I did....

 

It could have been much worse....

Lia (9 Months)

Funny back story. Becky was working, very similar to me, while Lia was little. Things were quiet and happy until BANG! Becky gets up to find Lia, thinking the screaming would soon follow. However, all she heard was a single sneeze. As she rounded to corner, she saw this. haha!

Seems as though Miles and Lia are tracking very similar to one another  :)

San Diego

** Partial #Repost from Becky's Blog  (Thanks for being my photographer)

A couple years ago, Becky and I took a trip to Chicago. Our main reason for the visit was the see my Grandpa and other family who lived there. But it gave us an awesome excuse to travel and explore. Now that Miles is old enough, we decided to take on another adventure. San Diego, here we come. We were able to visit for 3 nights and it was a great time! Our friend, Reese, was able to come along as well which added to the fun.

This was the first time I've left Miles overnight since he was born, so needless to say, I was a little nervous. Stephen is amazing, so logically I knew everything was totally fine. But that Mama bear feeling sure does come through hard. I saw him right before we went to the airport, gave him a kiss and told him I'd see him later. No turning back now!!

We decided on a resort type setting on the beach and we are so glad we did - it was amazing! The hotel was setup with the rooms being little bungalows. Ours was a beach-front room with views of the bay. I assure you - our back door (which opens to the beach) was open the entire weekend. Soak it all in! We spent the afternoon checking out the hotel grounds and had an easy dinner.

View from our patio

View from our dinner table

We spent the evening lounging and chatting in the hotel hot tub.

Thanks to the time change, we were up bright and early the next day. Our main plans for the day - the Zoo! But first, we had brunch at a place called Snooze. Great food, so so mimosas - boo. After brunch, we snagged some rent-able scooters and scooted our way to the zoo. The impromptu grab was such a good choice. So fun!

The zoo was amazing. You can tell the city takes really good care of this place. Everything was so clean, looked new and overall very well kept. Some of the animal enclosures were a little smaller than expected, but the overall experience was well worth it. This place is huge and you could easily spend all day there. We grabbed a map and made our plan to hit the high points - koala bears, panda bears, GIRAFFES (of course), penguins and monkeys.

These guys were so funny. They would actually "pose" and then a few minutes later would turn their backs like "Ok guys, move along"

Gondola ride over the park

After the zoo, we headed over to Balboa park. There wasn't much going on since it was a Friday afternoon, but we heard this was a great place for street entertainers, etc. We explored a bit and then headed to Little Italy for happy hour and dinner.

It was a big day and we were all super beat. Having pasta for dinner didn't help matters. We headed back to the hotel and crashed.

The next day, we got up and made our way to La Jolla - an area I was excited to go see. We had brunch at this rooftop restaurant with expansive views of the ocean.

After brunch, we walked down to the beach to see the sea lions. It's "pupping" season (I guess when they have their babies?), so there were a ton of them just sun bathing. So cute to see them waddling and swimming around. And the views? Wow.

All of those dark "lumps" on the beach are sea lions!

La Jolla wasn't at all what I was expecting. I thought it would be like a park that was hooked on to the beach. From the reviews we read, we were under the assumption we'd be hiking and walking scenic trails. I was pumped to find these "secret" swings that overlooked the ocean. Sadly, it was not that way. La Jolla was more of a beach walk - a large sidewalk along the edge of the beach with adjacent homes and businesses. We discovered the swings would have been a 15 minute drive in the opposite direction. So, we all decided they weren't worth trying to find and headed back to the hotel for some pool time. While I was bummed, the pool was perfect. Drinks, sunshine, friends and, well, amazing people watching! :)

That evening, we got ready and went to Pacific beach for dinner. We walked down the pier to check out the views and watched the surfers try a catch a good wave. We saw some good runs! From there, we snagged a beach-side table with great positioning to watch the sunset.

Little black specs in the water are all the surfers

We'd heard that after about 9:30pm, the great places to grab a drink turn into night-life bars. Not really my scene these days. So, we grabbed an after dinner drink and then headed back to the hotel. Becky crashed while Reese and I spent the evening drinking wine on the patio and chatting.

Before driving to the airport the next day, we had brunch onsite at the hotel. It was "freezing" on the patio, but after bundling up with blankets and having the manager turn the heaters on, it was bearable. We HAD to soak up one last meal with the Cali views - not the same inside. Worth it.

We were all sad to say goodbye, but I was excited to get home and see my boys. Miles was asleep when I got home, but the next morning, I got a big, smiley greeting :)

(a little blurry - he was jumping around ha!)