a desert fete

Time for another letter to Henry. I hope you don't mind.

Last weekend your Uncle Billy, Aunt Becky, and cousin James (who you really seemed taken with) came to visit. Since your aunt Becky is pregnant with a little boy (you will have another cousin! A boy! Almost exactly a year younger than you!) we gave her most of your baby clothes that you have outgrown. I was showing her what was in the bag, and when I pulled out one of your first newborn PJs I was absolutely in shock as to how small they were. I laid them side by side with your current jammies, in awe. There is simply no way to prepare for your insanely rapid growth and development. It is amazing.

In the last few weeks you have become a guy with not one, but TWO front teeth; first one, then right after, the second. It has been a little rough here and there (ouchie) but you are a pretty tuff guy, I think. Last night you bit my nose for the first time. I didn't mind.

We have started feeding you bits of food. In fact that is how we celebrated your six month birthday- with a big plate of softly steamed veggies, bananas, and avocado. You go in waves with the whole food thing- sometimes you love on the solids INTENSLY. Pears especially. Other times you would rather just bang your spoon against the table for the whole meal. It's cool. We are not in a hurry.

You are just crazy about the animals. Especially the kitty. And Emmy Lou. (Diamond mostly hides from you.) When Manray comes into the bedroom every morning you grin a big grin at him and try to pet him. We are working on teaching you to be soft and gentle.

A few months of go, seemingly out of nowhere, you taught yourself to sit up. One day I noticed that you could (to my surprise) hold yourself up while leaning forward onto your hands in kind of a tripod pose. Then a week or so later, just like that, you were a guy who sits up. And boy, do you like sitting up. You don't tolerate being horizontal too much anymore. You haven’t liked being held in a cradle position in what feels like AGES; except when we rock/bounce you to sleep. Then you will lie in our arms until you peacefully drift. In the mornings when you wake up, you will lie happily for a few minutes, smile up at your owls over head, but before too long we have to sit you up. And that really gets the big smiles. You look around, studying that the room is still more or less the same as it was before; you smile at the fan or at the light, then reach for a toy or our phone to play with.

Soon, we expect, you will be teaching yourself how to crawl. I think this one is harder for you, because it means being down. Down AND on your belly. Not your favorite. But you do seem to know that this is the position required to get places. And so you dutifully flop yourself down, or carefully lower yourself onto your hands, onto one knee- then the next, then you know; sort of rock back and forth while staring at the object of your desire a few inches away. It is tuff work. You grunt and groan and eventually your little arms give out under the weight of your body- or your knees slide out because of the slick surface beneath you. We have been joking about putting rubber patches on the knees of your pants to help out. Either way, once you get going, we are certain to have our hands full. You are so curious, and so active!

Remember when I said that you were too serious to be bothered with being social? Well- now you are Mr. Charmer. You smile at all the dudes, and all the ladies. You squeal and kick. You crack some folks up with your antics. The front neighbors, who are always enjoying their porch, love when we go buy, cause you always give them the biggest baby hello. Not to say you are not still a mama and papa's boy. You will tolerate being in the arms of someone else, but man, there is no where that you would rather be than in one of our arms. You went through a brief fear of other people- the height of which was your grandpa fear. It was so terribly sad. He comes down once a month to visit you, you know. Has done so every month since you were born. And for about 2.5 visits- all he had to do was look you in the eye to make you wail. Luckily that has passed almost as quickly as it came on!

You love: looking in the mirror, listening to and watching your papa sing and play the guitar, exploring faces with your little hands, , iphones and sunglasses, going on walks, pulling blocks out of your basket (by either tasting one at a time, or dumping them all out at once), sitting in the grass watching big kids play, your train toy, swinging at the park.

You are still bald as an eagle.

I can't even tell you how much joy you bring to me and your papa. I won't lie; it is HARD sometimes. Harder than I might have ever anticipated. But the reward? The love we feel for you little guy? Exponentially greater. We might be feeling WRECKED for all the times you will get us up in a night, but the moment you wake up and smile in the morning? All of that literally just melts away.

We just celebrated your first thanksgiving (you mashed up some squash, but I don't think you ate any) and I am so excited for your first Christmas season. We are going to pick out a smaller table top tree this weekend, cause I do expect you to figure out that whole crawling situation in the next month.

Keep being so awesome man, we love you something fierce.