Whew! What. A. Month. I am a couple of weeks late posting this 11 month (I still cannot believe he is 11 months old) update, but we have had SO much going on around here - most of it not fun. Since getting his tubes on August 27, Luke has had THREE ear infections, a cold, and pneumonia - scary stuff. It turns out that one of his tubes was blocked by fluid, so we had to go to the ENT and get that suctioned out - so sad. I don't know if he just picked up some germy germs at Mother's Day Out or just when we were out and about, but suffice it to say that Luke's immune system has gotten a good workout over the past three weeks! I am so grateful to have a pediatrician that is cautious and takes us seriously - he really cares about Luke and does everything he can to make sure we are doing everything we can to keep him well.
To top it all off, I got strep throat over the weekend - mama just cannot be sick - ever! K was sweet enough to take Luke on a little father-son escapade, so I got a few hours of solid rest, but it was a rough time! Fortunately, I think all of the Burlesons are on the mend - hopefully we can keep K from getting sick and we can head into October all happy and well.
As for that little 11 month old boy - wow. He is on the move and is SO close to walking! He will let go and stand all by himself and has taken a few little tentative shuffles. I don't know how the timeline goes, but I think we are close to having a walking boy!
One of his favorite things to do is to open and close doors/cabinets and to take everything out of the cabinets. He likes to climb into certain cabinets and into the refrigerator - I think he could play in the refrigerator all day if I let him. We put cabinet locks on the cabinets that have dangerous stuff in them, but left him a few doors to open!
He is LIGHTENING fast when he crawls and loves to crawl outside in the grass and in the driveway. Dirt/pinestraw/rocks/bugs don't seem to deter him at all and he just loves to sit in the grass and put his hands through it. I am so glad that it is finally cooling off around here so that we can spend more time outside. There are several parks that I really want to explore and some long walks that I want to take. He still loves his Bob Stroller and just goes into a kind of baby trance whenever we go on a walk. One of the funny things he does when he crawls is to hold something as he crawls around. It really doesn't matter to him what the object is, but he usually has something in his hands while he is scooting around!
Sleep has been a little hit or miss lately - with him not feeling well, it has been tough to keep him on any kind of structure. He hasn't been napping very consistently and it makes me wonder if he is trying to drop one of his naps. When he has felt well, he has slept through the night, so that gives me great hope for the future. The garbage trucks and other construction vehicles in our neighborhood seem to come through during naptime every day, so that has made it tough for him, as he wakes up with those very loud noises!
And, speaking of noises, Luke has been making all KINDS of sounds and noises! He has finally started to babble very consistently and it seems like he is trying to talk to us. I am having him evaluated by Early Intervention to see if he has some sort of speech delay, as he isn't really associating words with objects quite yet. With all of the trouble we have had with his ears, I am not certain that he has been hearing well. Once we got all of the fluid removed from his ears last week, his babbling improved dramatically - I hate it that he might not have been hearing us well all of these months!
One of my very good friends is a speech therapist and she assures me that he will catch up quickly if he does have a delay, so that is good to know. In the last week, he has started saying "Mama," although I don't know if he is saying it to me or just saying it (although I know what I want to believe!) He does look to some objects when we name them (light, kitty, ball, diaper, drink) and points to things he wants, but just isn't quite into saying anything quite yet! He follows commands sometimes, my favorite one being "Give mama kisses" and then getting sloppy kisses from my sweet boy!
Because of his sicknesses, he has dropped a little weight this month - I am hoping that he will put some weight back on, as he seems a little spindly compared to his usual chunky self. I think he weighs around 20 pounds and is close to 30 inches long. He is wearing mostly 12 month clothes, a size 4 diaper, and fits into a size 4 shoe (although, much to my mother-in-law's chagrin, I don't put him in shoes quite yet).
He loves to read his books and loves to play with his toys. He has a little basketball goal that he just is obsessed with - he loves to put the balls through the goal over and over and over. We also got him a little walk-behind toy that he just adores. He can now steer it all over the house and has figured out how to get out of corners/dead end streets/etc. He has figured out how all of his toys work and loves anything with buttons and lights. He has figured out how to get his sound machine off of the table in his room and loves to push all of the different buttons and listen to the different sounds. He also loves to drop things through the bars of his baby gates and watch them bounce down the stairs. Speaking of stairs, he loves to climb the stairs - we have to make extra sure that those gates are latched tightly!
We are in the process of planning his first birthday party - hard to believe that it will be taking place two weeks from Saturday - I think it will be a good time, but there is much to do!
This little man continues to be more joy than we ever thought possible - the absolute light of our lives!
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