Finn hearts Haydee

This is Finn's friend, Haydee. She is 4 months old and comes and hangs out with us on Fridays and Finn really loves her. He tells her all sorts of stories and hugs her and pats her little hands and tries to take off her socks (because he hates having socks on) and pushes her in the swing. He is going to make a great big brother some day.

Beach

Ed and Kerri are visiting us from London so we decided to make a day trip to the coast. Unfortunately, it was raining and windy and rather miserable, so we ended up spending a lot of time in the car and not too long at the beach. Finn had a blast, though. Water and sand are two of his favorite elements and there was plenty of both!

I miss mumma bear and baby bear

Heading to DC today for meetings and missing my little family. This picture was taken a few days ago on a shopping outing in Seattle.

The words he speaks

Finn on a walk in the arboretum (he walks himself now!)

My brothers came over to give Finn a big hug and kiss and we told them a story about a new word Finn learned today. Ben asked what words Finn can say these days and Nick and I started listing them off. He is in a real mimic phase and will repeat a lot of what we say, if he is in the right mood. Then there are a few words that he says a lot that we are not exactly sure the meaning of. Doh is one of those words and he says it and points outside usually.

But these are the words he says frequently:

Car, cold, hot, Dadda, Mumma, numnum (bottle or dummy to me only), Ninn (Finn), truck, sit down, Inca, airplane, nahnah (bottle or dummy, to Nick only), book, boat, ball, down, hi, ha, cha-kin (a variation of chicken), doggie, wow and oh-wow.

Pretty good list for a barely one year old?

This morning was busy.

We all woke up a little later than we planned and were rushing around trying to get our projects done. Nick went straight to his office to make a bunch of calls to the Eastcoast and I tried to get Finn and myself ready while picking up the kitchen. Finn was in an especially good mood and gave me lots of hugs and kisses before I put him in his highchair for breakfast.

The little daredevil loves to stand up in his highchair, perched precariously high above the kitchen floor, looking us straight in the eye. This morning was no different. 'Sit down' I say in my meanest mummy voice. He does. Then I turn around and he is at it again. 'Sit down' and he sits. Then the third time I say it, moving towards him with my maddest mummy look and Finn looks me straight in the eye and says 'sit down' clear as a whistle. The he sits himself down and laughs.

I keep thinking I am hearing real words when Finn talks to himself in his own language, and now I know that I heard 'dats mine' and 'inca go out'. And he was talking about cars and trucks yesterday in the car with Auntie Chrissie and Daddy. I am really excited to be entering the stage where he can communicate with us verbally. He has been a real little talker since he was born and I look forward to hearing all of his little thoughts.

interrupting the birthday news

We will be posting more birthday pictures over the next couple of days, but in the meantime, we have some more Baja shots to share. I love this series because it epitomizes how incredibly, indelibly, blissfully happy I am as a mother. Finn rocked my world one year and one day ago, and continues to do so every moment.

Finn's First Birthday

Finn has had a weekend of birthday celebrations and there is still more to come! For example, that cute Monkey cake that I posted about below? We still haven't lit the candle and given it to him yet (too much sugar for the end of the day, especially for those certain little people that raided the Halloween candy when we weren't looking).

After a busy weekend on Bainbridge where we celebrated Finn's birthday with some of his favorite people, we spent his actual birthday with Daddy (who just came home from a last-minute photo assignment), Inca and a long walk in Discovery Park. Then we came home to a procession of trick-or-treaters, the Sunday paper and new birthday toys.