One Year Letter

Milo love,

Well, it's official.  You're a big bad 1 year old! I can hardly believe it - sometimes I feel like you should be 10 and sometimes I feel like you're still 3 or 4 months old.  As you've been growing up time has been passing in the weirdest way, I can't explain it.

You are really starting my blossom.  Your personality is really shining through and I kind of love it! You love to rough house with your dad and you love to snuggle with your mom. Your brother loves to give you a lot of hugs and kisses, rub your head, and steal your toys.  For the most part you just let him do whatever you want, but slowly you're starting to fight back just a little bit.

You, my little boy, have made my heart increase in size at least ten fold.  You were a surprise from the day we found out we were pregnant with you, the very best kind of surprise! We didn't think I could go pregnant without medical help, but you were ready to come to our family and decided it was your time.  Ever since you were born you've been full of surprises. Some of them good and some of them scary.  But you've been a brave little trooper through all of it.

You are sleeping pretty good at night, but not napping very well during the day.  You wake up in the morning at 6:15AM on the dot.  You nap from 11-12/12:30.  I try my hardest to get you to take a second nap in the afternoon, but you're so stubborn.  You refuse to nap and then you want to go to bed at 5:30.  I try to keep you up until at least 6:30, but sometimes you make it until 7.  I've started letting you cry when you wake up during the night, because you are to old to be still needing a bottle in the middle of the night.  It breaks my heart to hear you cry, but you're getting better. 10 or 15 minutes of crying and you usually go back to sleep.

You're still not crawling or walking, but you are starting to gain more control over your body everyday.  You're starting to be able to pull yourself up to the standing position, but you use your arms to do so.  Which is pretty hard.  Hopefully soon you'll figure out to use your leg strength instead and it'll be much easier.  You are making such great progress dealing with your spina bifida that I just bean with pride when I watch you learn new things.  You're a tough one, little man.

I love you the most.

Love, Mom