My baby just turned one! How can this be? It seems like just yesterday that I was co-sleeping with him in the kids’ room, waking up every hour and a half to nurse. And now he’s standing up by himself, imitating words like “dog” and “go,” protesting his dislikes, cuddling freely, clapping during mealtimes, and laughing at his big sister’s silliness.
As all parents with more than one child say, the past year has gone by in the blink of an eye. I feel like I haven’t even had a chance to process what it means to measure my baby’s age in years instead of months. And my acute case of mama-nesia doesn’t help. For the life of me, I just don’t remember the developmental milestones of a one-year-old anymore. Good thing I’ve got my hospital-sponsored child well-being newsletters!
Seriously, though, I’m having a blast re-living all of the early stages with Nolan, and try to remember how very lucky I am to have the opportunity to do so. Just yesterday, I was able to record his second stroll pushing his walker toy. And at dinnertime for the past week, he’s been encouraging me and Syd to read with enthusiastic clapping. At one, Nolan’s favorite play activity is putting objects into containers of all shapes and sizes, including containers that aren’t meant to contain things at all! He’s developed an impressively strong throw (particularly over his playpen) and is becoming more interested in books. I catch him studying things and I like to imagine that he enjoys figuring out how things work.
At one year old, I’m beginning to catch glimpses of my little guy’s personality, and it delights and astonishes me. I can’t wait to see more of him after my next blink.