Mango Chicken Surprise!

Ben has been babbling even more lately, and started shaking his head a lot - even though he doesn't actually know that it means "no", it's still fun!

I accidentally covered the mic for a few seconds in the middle when I asked him if he liked mango.

Mornings With Dad

Backin' Up

Whenever there's anything to do with having to "back up", the YouTube song "Backin' Up" always pops into our head! We can't help but sing it when Ben gets stuck with his walker, and it seems like he thinks the song is fun, too!

This is the song for anyone who doesn't know it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIoG4PlEPtY

Box Car

Sick

Ben got his first cold last week and is just about over it now. He had such a stuffy nose and was so tired - he even fell asleep on the couch once, which he never does!

Ten Months!

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Ten Months

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This month's picture brought to you by Cheerios.

To say that Ben is active is an understatement. He is everywhere this month - crawling, cruising, climbing, chewing on something, playing with his toys, laughing, and generally having a great time.

• He started babbling for real and more consistently this month! Lots of bababa dadada mamama, and a bunch of other sounds - it's so much fun to listen to!

• He also has started to refuse being spoon-fed which has gotten... messy (clearly). He's great at picking up finger food, but some things are a little more gooey. For that, he finally started to get the hang of putting his spoon in his own mouth these last few days, though! (pre-loaded with food)

• He's also gotten pretty ticklish! It's fun because he was never ticklish before, so "This Little Piggy" and lots of other games were lost on him. In general, he's been laughing more and more.

  

• We love it when he's in a lovey mood. He'll come over to us and give us a hug, and sometimes plant a big kiss on us!

• He plays peek-a-boo for real now!

• He loves to go swinging in the park - we can't wait until Spring so we can go every day!

Happy 10 months, little boy!

Christmas!

On Thursday morning at 4am we packed up the car and headed to Ohio to spend Christmas with Matt's family!

Ben was such a trooper the whole time. He slept for the first few hours and took a nap around 9am, but other than that he was awake and in a great mood the whole time!

The last time Ben and his cousin Zane were together was when Ben was 3 months old, and Zane was almost 6 months old. They didn't really notice each other much back then, but this time when they met, Ben went straight for a kiss! 

We did so much over the week - we celebrated Zane's first birthday!

We went to Nick's hockey game, and hung out with friends!

Ben was dedicated!

We celebrated Christmas!

And we all got violently ill!

Good thing we don't have pictures of that.

It was a such a great week, though - can't wait to see everyone again soon!

"Walking"

Ben has been using his new walker so much! He loves scooting around on it and making his way toward me and Matt.

Gift Exchange!

The Fourniers had a Christmas party again this year, and Ben took part in the gift exchange! There were 20 kids - it was so much fun to see everyone running around and playing together. Ben was his usual reserved self at first, soaking it all in. After a little while he warmed up and started exploring, though!

Blinds!

Note: This was before he was incredibly mobile, so the extremely dangerous looking surge protector with many plugs and cords tangled together is no longer back there!