Mr. Scooter Booter Butt:
Here is one thing I have learned about myself as a mother: I have absolutely no rock bottom when it comes to ridiculous nicknames for you. I’m sorry but I’m not sorry at all. And you should be warned that it’s probably only going to get more disgusting as you get older and start doing more new stuff and I start making dumb rhymes and puns and … I feel for ya, kid.
ANYWAY!
This month has been all about mobility. You sort of flipped a switch in your head and figured out that you didn’t have to just hang out wherever we sat you down; you could go from point A to point B without our blessing or input. And even though you’re not crawling per se, you are still getting around in a manner that is more or less equivalent. You do this truly hilarious/adorable commando crawl thingie, sort of like the lady half-body zombie from season one of The Walking Dead. What’s really funny is that you always seem to propel yourself with your left foot, your right leg sort of suspended in midair as you boogie your way down the hall.
You get a big kick out of opening and closing doors and of lunging at the kitties, who are completely horrified that you have finally figured out how to move around and come after them. Especially Ms. Kitty — she cannot HANDLE the fact that you can come after her.
You have a few new, weird little things you like to do that are endearing but that drive me crazy. For one, you are grinding your teeth like a madman lately. Your daddy texts me sometimes when you won’t stop and he’s contemplating yanking your teeth out with pliers and needs me to talk him down. You will grind them rapid-fire style, opening and closing your mouth like a nutcracker and making this insane staccato grinding noise. Stop doing that! You just got those teeth! Be nice to them!
You also have this crazy, insatiable desire to taste the bricks of the fireplace mantle. You scoot over to them and lower your head very carefully and either just place your tongue on the bricks or, sometimes, try to chew on them. As you might imagine, we really do not want you to do that. Nor do we want you to continue to taste the air conditioning vent in the kitchen. But you love putting your mouth on it. You are so weird sometimes. I say that a lot but I mean it!
(Somewhere out there in internet land, someone is gearing up to concern troll me to tell me you have pica because of an iron deficiency or something. Oh, internet.)
We have been getting ready for the crazy onslaught of the holidays.
Thanksgiving was nice; we stayed home and had dinner and you decided to nap right through it. Even though I was looking forward to putting your turkey bib on you, I didn’t mind. It let daddy and me have a nice, quiet dinner where we didn’t have to make sure you weren’t flinging food across the kitchen.
We debated over where to put the Christmas tree since the living room is small and putting the tree in there would be very confusing for you, as the only place for it would be smack in the middle of your play space and you might wonder why we had placed a giant, glittering toy in your area and then spent a good chunk of time telling you to leave it alone. So we put it in the bedroom and so far you haven’t tried to bring it down.
We went to Grammy and Paw’s one weekend early in December to put up their tree since Grammy wasn’t feeling very well. It was a surprise and Grammy was so happy to see you! You really lifted her spirits and had fun playing with your cousin Levi’s toys.
You and daddy have been having lots of fun adventures, too. He took you to the mall and you got to meet Santa! Even though you’re usually a big fan of facial hair, you weren’t really sure how to react to the man in the big red suit. Maybe next year you’ll decide to be good friends.
