Beau: Eleven Months

Height/Weight: As always, who knows?

Milestones:

Mr. Beau has had a fun month of enjoying the summer and the beach. He has also added a few fun milestones into his repertoire. Beau is starting to stand all on his own and has even taken a few steps. Mom and Dad think that he will be walking by his first birthday. A sad milestone for Mommy is that Beau has completely weaned in the last month. Beau stopped nursing during the day at nine months old (except when he wanted to comfort nurse at nap time), but was still nursing every night and sometimes in the morning. Just in the last couple of weeks, he has stopped doing even that. As the last baby in the Russell family, this development comes with a LOT of emotions for Mommy. It's definitely bittersweet, but Beau made the decision all on his own. One fun milestone that Beau reached this month is that he now understands the concept of his "shape sorter." He still needs help figuring out which shape goes in which "slot," but he loves the process. It is so cute watching him figure things out. One final milestone that Beau has reached this month is that he now knows how to climb the stairs...which means that everyone needs to be extra careful about keeping the gate to our upstairs CLOSED at all times!

Loves:

Does it even need to be said? Still food. It will probably always be his first love (but, can you blame him??).  Like his older siblings, Beau also LOVES music and will shimmy his little shoulders every time he hears music. As the youngest member of the family, Beau is surrounded by toys that are well above his age-level. So of course he prefers his siblings' toys to his own. His current favorite is his brother's Bakugans. He loves to try to figure out how they fit back together...even if he is never successful. One fun little thing that Beau LOVES to do is touch his finger to other people's finger. It's almost like his own little greeting. He will stick his chubby finger out and expect the recipient to touch his finger back. He will get EXTRA excited if the other person says, "bzzzzzzz" when touching. See the picture below for a GREAT example...

Hates:

Beau is Mr. Shy Guy and doesn't do well with strangers. He is fine from a distance, but the minute someone he doesn't know well tries to hold him, he starts crying and reaching for Mama. The "stranger danger" phase has hit HARD for him!