Austin's 11 Month Update

My baby is 11 months old. He is almost not a baby anymore! Toddlerhood will soon be upon us. Oh how I love my boy. He is the light of my life.

What to say... what to say...

Let's see.

At 11 months Austin definitely has stranger anxiety. Anytime he is passed off to someone he doesn't know he screams his head off. Poor guy. I have to admit that it does make me feel just a *little* bit awesome inside knowing that he loves me and trusts me more than anyone else in the world. The only place I can leave him without him crying is the YMCA. He has been going there several times a week since he was 3 months old and is pretty familiar with the facility and the ladies who watch the children. He loves them.

At 11 months Austin is showing affinity for two blankets. They are the first items he has shown any real attachment to. He loves the football blanket I made for him. I love that that is one of his favorites :) And he loves this fuzzy jungle blanket that I got from someone... wish I could remember who!

His favorite book is "Moo, Baa, La La La" by Sandra Boynton. He just sits there and lets me read it to him over and over without getting bored or trying to turn the pages or reaching for another book. It is so cute.

At 11 months Austin can finally crawl. He has been army crawling for months. And he was so darn good at it that he just didn't feel the need to crawl for real on his hands and knees. He actually started pulling himself up onto furniture and our legs and the stairs before he started crawling for real. Speaking of which, he is a champ at that. It started around 10 months. He pulls himself up on to everything!

His favorite item to pull himself up next to is the piano. He can finally reach the keys :) He loves to pull himself up and reach as high as he can and push the keys down. He is a little musician already. I love it.

Austin loves to each cheese puffs. They are definitely his favorite snack. His favorite food is still yogurt. That kid loves yogurt. Some of the new foods he has had lately that he loves include strawberries and waffles. He still has only two teeth so solid foods are still a challenge, but he definitely makes the best of the teeth he has and just gums everything else to death.

Austin still has a very contagious laugh and a very contagious smile. I live for the smiles he gives. He is such a happy boy.

He is a very, very curious boy and loves to just crawl around and get his little hands into everything. He  still loves to bang toys together and on the ground. One thing he has developed and interest in recently is button pushing. He LOVES to push any buttons he can find: computer keys, tv buttons, remotes. You name it-- as long as it has buttons he loves to push them!

Austin is a back archer. Yep. A back. Archer. If that kid doesn't want to be put down/into his carseat/into his crib he arches his back and just lets you have an earful. I just have to tickle his belly and he gives in although the crying usually doesn't stop :)

Oh how I love my boy. I couldn't imagine my life without him. He is such a little light in this house. I still look in on him every single night before I go to bed just to make sure he is real and that my life is real and that I am really his mom. It is the best job in the world.

Thoughts About Weight

Giving up is easy.

Weight loss is mental. You have to want it more than you want to eat a cupcake instead of a veggie. You have to want it more than you want to sit on the couch instead of go to the gym.

Weakness can be made a strength.

God wants you to feel peace. Being peaceful is his commandment. It is ok to feel peaceful.

Write yourself a letter of encouragement. Take a picture of yourself in your underwear and do before and after pictures. YOU CAN DO THIS.

Does eating feel better than having a good body image? Than being healthy?

My Friend Tiffany

I have a friend. Her name is Tiffany. (Geez! I look so young in this picture! She still looks the same :)

She and I went to Mexico on a study abroad together. She is an awesome girl. After our study abroad she served a mission. She married an awesome guy in the temple. She got a degree in Communications from BYU. She is a talented musician and also a talented photographer. She is just awesome.

Now Tiffany and Walt are ready to start their family. And they are choosing to do it through adoption. They have a medical condition that does not make it possible for their children to come to them biologically. But of course that is not the only way to grow your family! Their children will come to them through adoption. As we all know it doesn't matter if you grow a child in your belly or in your heart. Your child is your child. Heavenly Father has a plan for Tiffany and Walt and their children and a plan for the birth families of their children. They will just have to come together in a less traditional way. It is still an awesome way though.

Adoption is so much about word of mouth. My friend Emily and her husband Richard just welcomed their first child into their family through the miracle of adoption last month, and it was through word of mouth that their daughter's birth family found them! Someone knew someone who knew them. So it is powerful!

Please, if you could go to their blog here -- Be a Part of Our Loving Family -- and grab their button and add it to your own blog that would be awesome. Or maybe you could write a post about them. Or maybe you know of someone who is considering adoption and you could send them to Tiffany and Walt's webpage. Anything. I know that Tiffany and Walt would be so thankful and that their future family will be so thankful too :)

Doesn't she just look like a woman who would be the perfect mom? This is her with her sister's first baby.

Here she is with her husband:

Please share their story and help them on their journey to find their family through adoption!