My sweet little C turns one this weekend, so I’ve written this letter to him to commemorate the occasion.

Happy 1st Birthday, my C-Monkey!  We are so happy that you’ve come into our lives and filled it with so much love and adventure.

You are very investigative.  When you were very small, you carefully watched everything and everyone around you.  Now, you get into everything!  You always need to inspect everything to figure out what it is, how it works and even how it tastes.

You have an adventurous personality.  Nothing scares you.  If we let you, you’d crawl right off the edge of our bed or climb right into the toilet.  You’re not afraid of going into a dark room to investigate everything that’s inside of it.  In fact, you often close the door behind you!

You’re always on the move.  As a small baby, you’d wave your hands and legs wildly in excitement.  You still do this when we’re getting you dressed!  For a long time, you moved around via the army crawl.  You’ve been able to crawl for a while, but our theory is that you’ve preferred the army crawl because of our concrete floors.  This week, you decided to throw caution and comfort to the wind and start crawling to get places faster.  And boy, you are fast.  Your knees are super red by the end of the day, though!  You’ve also been cruising, walking along furniture, for a few months.  You’ve loved to stand ever since you were a month old, and cruising is by far your preferred method of transportation.  I am so looking forward to the day you take your first steps, because I know you will be ecstatic to be able to walk on your own.

You enjoy making noise.  A lot of noise.  Loud noise.  You like banging toys together, babbling and, most emphatically, screaming.  You know, when I was in the hospital and had just received my epidural, the labor pains started to subside.  I sent your dad out to get himself some dinner while I rested.  The nurse was so surprised when I was just lying there in silence.  I told her that I was enjoying it, because soon my life would never be that quiet again.  I had no idea how true that statement would become.

Dada makes you laugh harder than anyone else in the world.  I love watching you two play together and hearing your giggles when Dada tickles you.

You give Mama more hugs, kisses and cuddles than anyone else in the world.  I enjoy each and every one of them, because I know the day will inevitably come when you’ll be embarrassed to kiss me.

It took you 11.5 long, arduous, exhausting months to start sleeping through the night.  We started sleeping in the living room so that you could have your own bedroom, and it was a great success.  I’m so happy that we’re all getting more sleep at night!

You’ve changed our lives in so many ways.  I love you more each day.  I enjoy watching your personality develop and, while my opinion may be biased, I think you’re the awesomest person in the whole wide world.  I’m so blessed to be your mama.

All my love,
Mama