braggin on my baby

I'm so incredibly loving this little boy.

He's a total mama's boy, and you know I'm enjoying every second of it.

After his dad went to bed tonight, the two of us stayed up and decorated for Christmas (we looove Christmas in this house!).
Every now and then, he'd get this wide grin and start crawling away, looking over his shoulder to see if I was going to chase him. Of course, I make it sound like I'm in hot pursuit, and he just squeals in delight, followed by lots and lots of giggles. He loves to lay on his back and kick still. I think he likes to hear his feet make lots of noise when he bangs them against the floor. He also loves it if we kick with him.

Our boy is also incredibly tender hearted. That's really the only way to describe it. Because he's not wimpy. Trust me, he's total boy... unraveling toilet paper, throwing toys across the livingroom, falling and getting right back up. But his little heart is very sensitive, usually to uncertain or unpredictable things. Brad has a problem with accidentally scaring his son.

When he was about 8 months old, Brad went to get Noah from his nap. He didn't realize that I always go in there and softly say hello, kiss him, and get him up calmly. Instead, Brad swung the door open and said quite loudly, "HEY BUDDY!!!"

Which resulted in total freaked out tears.

The other day, Brad was feeding Noah some yogurt. During each bite, Brad would go, "Yuuummm..." in his deep, monotone voice. After doing this a few times, Noah's bottom lip poked out a little and, with a mouth full of yogurt, proceeded to sob and reach for mommy.

Poor baby.

Poor Brad.

But other than that, he's such a happy guy.

Even after taking a tumble and scratching his little face up outside, he was immediately happy again, babbling and flapping his arms like a little hummingbird.

He's signing, which makes his ASL interpreter of a grandmother very proud.

His signs:

Mommy

Daddy

Rain

and he recognizes food, dog, and cat (that I know of).

(this is him signing "mommy")

He's quite the musician.

Anything that makes noise is awesome in his world.

So when my brother introduced him to his drum set, Noah was in heaven.

(pure bliss)

Lately, he's been a total night owl.

He took a really long nap (4 hours!) last week and hasn't been the same since.

On Saturday night, I was worn out and crashed at 11. From what I heard, Noah didn't go down until midnight. He did the same tonight.

He's great at going to bed. I can tell when he's ready.

He doesn't ever cry. If he cries, something is really wrong. If he's not tired enough yet, he talks and bounces himself to sleep. It's the sweetest sound ever. I don't mind the weird schedule all that much. In fact, we've been taking advantage of it. Last night, we popped some popcorn (his new favorite snack), got some ice cream, sat in our pj's, and watched the Steelers game together as a family. It's so funny to see this tee-tiny person watching football and eating popcorn.

He cracks us up on a daily basis.

He's constantly discovering and learning and growing. And although it breaks my heart to pull out his handprint ornament from last year and realize how much bigger he is, it's still SO fun to have a little buddy. He can do things now that he couldn't last year, like reach up and give me a surprise kiss (my favorite) or grab onto my leg and giggle as I try to walk.

He's just the cutest, smileyest thing I've ever seen.

15 Months.

Can someone make the clock stop for me please?