On the outside, smiley happy boy, originally uploaded by caseycasey.

Matthew is growing up.

Josh and I were talking the other day about how we were so excited when Matthew started sitting reasonably well on his own - around 6 months. “It’s so great!” I remember saying. “We can sit him with some pillows around him and a small box of toys and he’s interested for an hour!”

Ha!

Soon, the sitting became leaning and pulling and reaching, and then the leaning and pulling and reaching became crawling (first backwards), then the backwards crawling became forward motion and now, crawling has led to reaching up and pulling himself up. He’s so strong now - we think that he’ll be walking before he turns 1 for sure.

Before Matthew was born I kept hearing over and over again about how fast time flies with a baby, so remember those moments and cherish them. I find it’s partially true - some moments during a day move painfully slowly - but when I think back to his growth over the last ten and a half months, I am in awe. I mean, in the course of the last ten and a half months, he’s learned to smile, to nurse, to drink from a bottle, to eat food, to laugh, to wave, to recognize faces, to cry meaningfully, to hold his head up, to crawl, to crawl forwards, to eat his toes, to grow teeth, to chew, to splash in a tub and a pool, to give kisses, to sit up, to roll over, to roll into a sitting position from being flat on his back, and now he’s about to learn how to walk.

That’s pretty busy for ten and a half months. Makes me feel like a damned slacker, that’s for sure.