The Chair Project: Ten Months

Brooks at Ten Months!

Wings

On the knees

At nine months, Brooks is like a bird with wings. His crawl is commando style, where he uses his right arm and leg to scoot his large body across the room. His stomach may not get off the ground, but the crawl is effective, and Brooks will gladly race you to the bookshelves or the little table where he isn't supposed to be. It's his favorite game, getting a head start, looking back until Mommy comes running after him and then turning back around and taking off to beat her. Sometimes Mommy lets him win, but always scoops him up before he gets into trouble.

Sliding doors

It seemed like it took Brooks no time at all to go from the basic rock to crawl. Mommy started using the sliding doors in the living room to keep him contained, but that only lasted days. Soon, Brooks mastered opening those doors, and again, he was off. The world opened up and Brooks became our little explorer. The kitchen, the hallway, the dining room. Wherever he can scoot, Brooks will go.

Standing on the stairs

Then came the knees. Brooks quickly learned how to scoot his chubby knees under him so he could kneel. The kneel became a high kneel. The high kneel became a stand. And like that, our boy was instantly transformed into a toddler. (While he isn't in fact a toddler yet, seeing him stand at 31inches while being almost ten months is alarming!)

Piles of books

Now, Mommy's days are spent on patrol, following Brooksie on his adventures around the house. Upstairs we explore the laundry room, the bedroom, the nursery, Dad's study and the playroom. Downstairs, we are often in the kitchen opening and shutting drawers and cabinets, playing with the pots and pans, or in the living room pulling books off the shelf, or on the stairs practicing our stand.

As Brooks explores, his mind is absorbing so much. He copies Daddy and Mommy, but mainly Daddy and says "Ohhh" and "Dadda" and "Momma" although not always in context. He says "Mmmmm" after a bite of food, and waves, and high fives. He squints his little face and crinkles his eyes as he smiles.

His new favorite book is Baby Hugs, a rip off of Pat the Bunny. He loves to smell the flowers, kiss Hugs the bear, and find Tiny Pup under the blanket. And he loves Where the Wild Things Are, which he should as we have 3 copies!

Swinging

Bath time

Playtime includes fun at the playground, where Brooks swings and then takes a few turns down the slide with Mommy's help. At home, fun is found in the bath with squirt toys, and with Lila, who is such a good sport and let's Brooks play fetch with her bone.

Waving

Fall, Family, and Fairy Princesses

Watching the games with Daddy

 Fall came quickly at St. Georges and yet Tropical Storm Irene took away much of the fall foliage. But that's ok, we found fall in other ways, Such as in the brisk days watching the Fall sports on the fields by our house. Field Hockey, Football, Soccer, our choice. Brooks loved being part of the fun!

Brooks's sick face, poor guy

And with fall came the first cold. First it was Mommy, who quickly passed it on to Brooksie and then Daddy, who caught it worst of all. What a meanie she is. In fact, it was the first cold that helped Mommy make the hard decision to attempt "Cry It Out" with Brooks. Mommy hoped to never have to resort to this method, but after many nights of waking in the middle of night, and a final bout with Brooks not wanting to be put in his crib, Mommy had enough and realized it was now or never. The first night, Brooks cried for twenty minutes. The next night for six, and after that, only minutes. I guess we were both ready for some growing up and separation. Since then, Brooks has slept through the night with no fuss.

Grandma!

Mid October, Brooks was again showered by love from family, this time by his Grandma Pat and Ian. Grandma brought Mommy bibs that she made and there was even a Halloween bib! She played with Brooks, fed him, and read to him, and got lots of avocado kisses!

Percussionist

Brooks showed off many new skills, including his new favorite game called "where is Brooksie?". Brooks also showed how he loves to pull everything out of his toy basket or every book off the book shelf. It's a wonderfully terrible mess!

Mommy went to the Be Green Consignment sale and brought home many, many winter clothes and new musical toys for Brooks. Brooks has shown great interest in music since he started Music Together, and one his favorite things to do at home is bang on his "drums" which are: Lila's steel dog bowl, plastic mixing bowl, strainer and of course, the wooden spoon.

Yoda

After Grandma left, it was Halloween and Brooks donned his first Halloween costume imagined by his Daddy - Yoda! Mommy found the costume at Target but had to buy the toddler size for Brooks's head. Thus the robe was quite large and may make this a costume used for years to come. First came his Halloween themed music class where he got to come in costume and to top it off it was picture day! On the real Halloween day, Brooks got to dress up and have pictures taken with other faculty kids, who were all dressed as fairy princesses, except for his two best friends, Tigger (Nina) and Sophie the Giraffe (Luca). While all the princesses trick-or-treated, Brooks was home helping pass out the candy.