End of year wrap up.

Ugh, this is just like peach porridge now (nine days old) so the into doesn't make as much sense as it used to. Sorry.

2010 comes to a close and I wouldn't be a crappy blogger if I didn't try to squeeze something out last minute. I could do a top ten list of my favorite Niuniu related moments or I could to a chronological recap of the whole year. But both of those would be harder than I really want to do between now and the New Year's party we're going to in a few hours.

Besides, really the best to do is recount what's happened in the last two months like I would with any other blog post, and throw some pictures up next to it.



November:

After Halloween we began settling into our winter routine, which is a lot like our summer routine without the evening walks. We still take Grant for walks when the streets are clear and he's gotten stir crazy from too much being inside. Fortunately he likes going out more than he dislikes getting bundled up. I think he knows how good he looks with his winter hat.

Halfway through the month was his birthday. I was under the impression that after this point I didn't have to remember how many months old he was and could just say he's one, but apparently that's not until he turns two.

Regardless we made his birthday a family affair. Everyone got together at his Great Grandma Burdett's house for cake and manual labor with a risk of tetanus (we spend the afternoon tearing down a rusty old down run in the back yard, but Grant just hung out in the house so we didn't get a picture of him with work gloves and bolt cutlers sitting in a pile of 40 year old chain link).



As per family tradition we had a special angel food cake for the birthday boy and a real (chocolate) cake for the adults. Normally in our family we set the kid in front of the cake and just let them got nuts, thereby properly introducing them to the world of emotional binge eating on special occasions.

Grant would have none of it though. Both the tradition and the cake. He pointed at it the whole time we were bringing it to him and looked excited to be the center of attention but as soon as the cameras were rolling and the cake was in front his hand shot out toward the cake, he took the smallest about possible and promptly through it on the floor. No amount of coaxing, encouragements or example would get him to pay the cake any attention. So with nothing else to do we could do the adults had two cakes.

It was a happy birthday.



Thanksgiving was another chance for the little guy to show off how cute and well behaved he is for the extended family. Unfortunately he was sick that day so he just sat on the floor between us and fussed the whole time.

We tried to get him to try some of the holiday foods but he was content with a few bites of roll and a lot of whining. Finally after most people had left and things had calmed down a bit those of us still around were enjoying some cheesecake. Who ever was holding Grant at the time gave him a small bite and his eyes just lit up. It was if he suddenly understood why we had drug him so far and made him be good around so many people, it was for this cake.

He immediately requested more. When that source would not longer give him any, he climbed down and then crawled over to the next person and began begging like a dog. He went from person to person until everyone had given him some. It's bad habit I'm sure but you can't get mad at cute.

And now we know what to get him next year for his birthday.



December

Like most people our December was buried in preparations for Christmas. Grant had apparently decided that since we weren't going for family walks as much that walking was over rated and stopped trying to become a biped.

Getting ready for Christmas is so much more fun with a kid. Every time we when to Babies R Us (our default stop when the kid needs anything) we found something new that he would love. We were able to more or less restrain ourselves but I'm afraid it'll only get harder once he starts to weigh in on the subject.

Actual Christmas was great. Another big family get together and with the exception of waking up at 5:00 AM and then going back to sleep at 8:00 AM when everyone wanted to do presents, he was a perfect Christmas baby. And I'll take him waking up at 5:00 to play with my grandma's 101 Dalmatian toys over staying up all night crying like he did last year anytime.



Grant had plenty of practice opening 12 days of Christmas presents, so we figured he'd be excited to do all the unwrapping he had ahead of him. He was super excited for the first two presents. After which he decided being a baby on Christmas was hard work and he'd rather just look at the pretty packaging and smile at everyone than open anything.

He did eventually get through all his presents and was thrilled with all of them. He was a good baby and would let everyone hold him, at least until he got bored and wanted to go back to Grandpa.



The day after Christmas I set him on the floor to make us some toast. He crawled right to his tub of blocks and was about to start playing with them when he looked across the floor and saw the toy cars his Grandma and Grandpa Shinney had given him. He squealed with delight and threw the blocks down and crawled over the cars as fast as he could. It was a fun moment for me.

For New Years we took him to a friends house. He was a great party baby again and had a great time except when he fell into an unused cable jack and cut his cheek a bit and gave him a nasty welt. It was one of the worst injuries he's had so far so I think it hurt Mommy and me as much as it did him.



All in all it's been a great 2010 with Grant in our lives. We've grown (mostly him) and learned (mostly me) so much and things just keep happening. Here's to an even better 2011.