I'm 11 months old..."Mama"

On May 14th Jonah hit the 11 month mark. Eleven months!! I can't believe it. Besides starting the countdown to his 1 year birthday (party prep underway!), this past week has seemed to unveil a whole new crop of things that this little man can do.

Jonah has started to clapping his hands in praise...usually of himself! It started with eating time, trying to encourage him when he would decided to eat the food rather than throw it. "Put it in your mouth--Yeah! Good job Jonah!" {clapping}. The clapping is now beginning to accompany the word "yeah" or "good job" no matter what they are in relation to. The funniest clapping timing is when he claps along to the song "Father Abraham". This timing is funny because he deemed it an appropriate time to clap without our prompting. I occasionally sing "Father Abraham" to him here and there because it is a fun song. One day I was singing it to him to distract him while being changed and he just started clapping along to it. (For those of you who don't know the song, at no point do the words "yeah", "good job", or "clap" show up in it.) Now, whenever I sing that particular song, he just joins in with the clapping!

The day after he turned 11 months, Jonah said his first word! He actually said his first word while we were with Nana, Aunt Louise, and Great Gran Bartlett in Wisconsin. While Nana held Jonah she asked him where his mama was. Deliberately, and clear as a bell he said "mama" and then smiled at our boisterous response. Up until this point I had never thought that it counted when he said mama because it still seemed so indiscriminate. But in a room full of witness, and with the clarity with which he spoke, we all agreed that that one definitely counted!


Jonah has also begun to enjoy it when I chase him. Often now when he is getting into something he shouldn't and I say "Jonah Eli..." he looks at me, smiles, and takes off crawling in the opposite direction. It is so hard to stay mad at him when he is laughing/panting/shuffling away like that. More often than not he suckers me into chasing him and it's onto my knees I go for the high speed crawling pursuit.