14 months

I think we have to take back the claim of Michael being able to say "nana" for "banana," because this month he has only said "apple" for both fruits even though we're sure he knows what he means! This month he has added a few other words, though, such as "all done" when he's finished with his food (although sometimes he follows that right up with "mas" so it's a little confusing), "da" for "down," "bye," "pan" (bread) and "baby". He understands everything you say in Spanish for the moment too. And his current favorite word sequence has got to be "Dada!", "Up!" and then a hopeful "Bambi?"

This all started because Mike would show the baby a little snippet of the movie on YouTube on his computer. It's a cute little clip that isn't annoying on repetition, where Thumper is introduced and all the little rabbits teach Bambi how to walk and say bird, butterfly, and pretty flower. (I tried to teach him "irony," since the pretty flower is of course a skunk, but Mike rolled his eyes at me. Heh.) Michael only watches up until Thumper goes home when it starts to rain, so we think he thinks Bambi means Thumper. Ever since we got home from Florida, Michael has become absolutely addicted to this five-minute clip, with a huge smile and attentive posture whenever he succeeds in getting Mike to play it. It really is cute although that is *exactly why* I have not wanted to have any videos around the baby for at least the rest of this year!! But Mike says it's educational since he will learn bird, butterfly and flower. Oh, all right :) (As an aside, it is so hard for me to believe that when we were one year old, there weren't even *VCRs* yet, much less PCs or the Internet to stream videos over, and I completely remember adjusting rabbit ears and getting a grand total of five channels on the analog TV -- no remotes, of course. I am only 29!!)

We also do let Michael watch small segments of the Signing Time DVD that Aunt Amanda got him for Christmas and we're practicing all those signs with him (apple, banana, bread, hungry, cheese, hot). He does seem to be learning some of those. He definitely gets "hungry" and that has already helped him communicate a couple of times when he was frustrated. He pretty much has completely abandoned the "more" sign, though, since he can say the word, and instead he just does the "please" sign emphatically. It's great.

I know every parent thinks their kid is cute, and I also know no kid is cute all the time, least of all mine. But there are still some kids who are just absolutely so cute and adorable (like, and without meaning to exclude anyone here, but Sarah and Minh's boys are just too unbelievably cute all the time and Rachel's baby is completely precious!) that you just want to eat them up or something :) So, as a new mom, I naturally have this feeling a lot with Michael. One thing in particular he does -- carefully stopping way before he gets to the step down to our living room, turning around, getting down on all fours and backing up bit by bit until he makes it back and down the step -- just gets me every time. Way, way too cute. We are pretty blessed.