Growing up!

I wouldn't say Tyler has a lot of hair, however, he's had a mullet fill in quite nicely over the past 11 months. Last night I decided it was time to do a little trim! Here's a quick recap of his first "unofficial" hair cut!!!

The mullet

An unsuspecting baby...

The approach...

Uh, oh, I've been spotted!

So content with his fishing net that he sat quite still.

See the mullet on the corner of the tub?!

By the way, where did this little boy come from?

11 Months Old!

Wow, where has the time gone? I've been really bad and missed Tyler's 10 month update, so here we are, one month before the big 1 year old birthday! I can't quite understand how he can possibly be this old, but that's what the calendar is telling me! So here's the latest happenings in Tyler's world...

Mobility:

T officially mastered crawling right at 9 months and every since then all he wants to do is stand. He is currently trying to get to standing without an object assisting him - he's very determined to do this, it's quite funny to watch! He's been a cruisin' fool this past month and his walking aide of choice is a large Rubbermaid container that he pushes around our wood floors bottom side up (walkers with wheels go way too quickly on our floors)! This past week I've definitely witnessed a step or two here and there when he's focused on getting to something and not thinking about holding on, but so far they all end with a diaper to floor collision, but it's certainly progress! I predict we'll definitely have a walker by Ty's 1st Birthday...

Favorites:

Tyler is all about any toy that allows him to stand up - he loves his activity table and busy zoo a lot. He loves balls, has really gotten into wanting to look at books lately, likes to play with anything I pull out of the kitchen cabinets and also loves to eat shoes... He's recently discovered everything in our house that I'd like him to stay away from: toilet, oven, computer wires, doors, tv... you name it, so there's a lot of distracting going on around here! Clapping, dancing (especially to Barbara Ann or aka "Bobba Ran" if you ask his father), and pointing are favorites these days too!

Tylerisms:

When cuddling or wresting Tyler loves to get his jaws around any body part possible and might have a tendency to chop down sometimes.... or, well okay, most of the time! We're working on it, but a big frustration in our house these days is him laughing or grinning anytime I respond with a firm "NO"... he seems to gradually be loosing interest in it, but not fast enough for us! T loves to say and we think finally understands what dada means, he'll say Mama, but it's infrequent. Sometimes I think he's got bye bye and he tries to imitate sounds in words I say to him often, especially shhhh for shoe or chee for cheese. Tyler's also recently figured out he can take his patch off on his own, so I can no longer put him in a car seat or stroller with it on and when it's on at home I need to monitor him all the time so he remains distracted... only 3 more weeks to go (at least that we know of!). Tyler has also graduated to the big boy tub after ducky sustained some sort of trauma, it was a sad day when we found him deflated in the tub.

Our once non-picky eater has also developed some opinions about food lately and will now spit food out faster than it went in, it's then followed by sticking his tongue out and using his finger to "wipe" the taste away! I'm not too worried about him though, at a recent trip to the doc our future linebacker weighed in at 24 pounds, 13 ounces... and yes, his weight is no longer listed on the infant Tylenol or Motrin boxes... he's hangin' with the 2 year olds now! Regarding food he's eating pretty much all foods now - loves any fruit, peas are a fav (but no other veggies), loves yogurt and crackers too, and had his first bite of ice cream this past weekend.... he's a fan!

After Ducky got injured, he became a favorite wrestling companion...

(as usual, please overlook the dinner in his hair!)

Our little smarty pants.

Check out my new drum, mom!

The men.

Silly little monkey.

A stroller ride can really it take it out of ya...

Learning about food storage options.

"Tyler's spot"

Family Time!!!

We had a visit from Aunt Nancy and Cousin Katie this past weekend, as usual it was so great to see them! We appreciate them trekking it all the way from St. Louis the past few trips, we really need to get our act together and get down there so Tyler can finally meet his GUB (Great Uncle Bob) and all the rest of Quigley/Neier clan! We sure do miss everyone!!!

Here's some pics of our fun weekend!

It sure isn't easy to wrangle this bunch of kids together...

This is the best we can do!

One good lookin' crew!


Ali and Will demonstrating their "cheesey smiles" for the camera...

Who needs a swimming pool anyway...

or swim trunks for that matter!!!

This kid's happy in his Birthday suit and a Rubbermaid ... if life could just stay this simple!

Back from up north!

We had a wonderful trip to Michigan this year with the Hoffmann family! It was Tyler's first trip up north and his first experience with an 8 hour car ride and he did great! Tyler's adventure up north officially marked the 5th generation of the Hoffmann family annual summer vacation to Northern Michigan - what a wonderful tradition!

Here's our car riding champ on the way up... interestingly enough I had to get new sunglasses the next day!

Our typical 7 hour drive is now an 8 hour drive with a little one in tow... we stopped and had a picnic dinner and got T into his jammies for the night! This picture just cracks me up, I envision him saying "What do you mean we have to get back into the car dad?"


Here's Tyler with his Daddy for the first time on the shore of Lake Michigan.

Instead of crawling with an object in hand, he chooses to transport it by mouth these days...

He really enjoyed inspecting the sand while at the beach, he took to it much better than when he was in Florida 4 months ago! This photo is all "Tyler", he inspects everything with his little pointer fingers... too cute!

The "men" at the beach.

Here's my little character eating dinner one night, what a ham... and no wonder we usually use bibs!

Happy 4th of July!

Tyler watching his first 4th of July parade...

Okay, well maybe he's more into the flag than the parade right at this moment!

I couldn't resist giving Tyler a big slice of watermelon while on the beach, he LOVED it... it sure made for a stained and sticky boy though!

Thanks for a great trip Grandma & Grandpa Hoffmann and Uncle Tim, it was great to spend time with you all! We're already counting down the 365 days until next year...