My baby is 10 mos. old!

Hunter is now 10 mos. old. He is rapidly turning into a full-fledged toddler, which makes me smile and also makes me sad at how quickly he's growing. He is crawling so fast it is more like flying, bear-walking, pulling himself up, walking along the couch and other objects, and often earning new bumps, bruises, fat lips, scrapes, etc. when he decides to let go and act like he is a superhero. This week, for example, he: crawled onto the little stage at the Discovery Museum and then fell face-first off the edge onto the (luckily) carpeted floor, resulting in a bloody, fat lip, tried to crawl with Holden's metal truck across the kitchen and landed on the hard floor on his forehead, managed to open the cabinet to the entertainment system and caused an avalanche of DVD's to land on top of him after falling backwards, shook the baby gate hard enough he managed to dislodge it and fell backwards with it on top of him, and attempted to climb the stairs, made it up the first step as I ran across the room, turned, grinned, and fell onto his head, sustaining a rug burn and screaming indignantly as though I had caused it. All of these incidents happened with me in the same room as him. He is lightning quick, extremely ornery, and has NO FEAR. I am really screwed when he starts walking. I bet he will learn to run simultaneously. Maybe I'll burn off some of the calories I've put on during Snowmaggedon by chasing him?!

Here are some pics of him at play. He loves his music table and his baby gloworm. Everything goes into his mouth at some point. He has 5 teeth-two on bottom, three on top-and getting a sixth on top.

See the ornery smile? He is heading for his newest fascination: the cat food and water dishes. I have "hidden" them all the way behind the table, so in order to reach them he has to crawl around it and maneuver around the chairs that I try to scoot out to block him. Nothing stops him. There's a reason my dad calls him, "Tank." If I say, "Hunter James Paul, where are you going??" He will laugh and pick up the speed. He quite often manages to get a fistful of cat food or knock the dishes over before I get to him. He will try to shove it in his mouth as fast as he can and then clamps his mouth shut with his cheeks full like a chipmunk. Can cat food really be THAT good?! Jay and I laugh and say it's probably extra protein for him.

Hunter and his favorite person, his big brother. I thought they looked cute in their stripes even though Holden's smile is very forced! (He was mad because Hunter had just chewed on his pants. Ha!)

10 mo. beanbag pictures. I could eat him up! Love that grin.

I love his expression here. He was watching Holden.

The char pics are getting really hard! He just wants to climb, or lunge face-forward off of the chair. We managed to get through these with no head injuries! Ha!

My handsome little man

There's the nose scrunch! If you could hear him, he blows air out of his nose when he does this, like he's hyperventilating. It is hilarious.

Some tub time pictures, one of his favorite times of the day. It is another time Mommy has to be on her game since he now likes to try to climb over the edge of the tub about every 10 seconds. Good grief!

Love me a wet, clean, lotioned baby with his fingers in his mouth and long, wet eyelashes.

And I had to include one of my handsome almost-4-year-old. He is getting so big as well! Maybe not in size, but just older looking and acting. He is a great big brother and my sweet, sensitive, and cautious boy. (Thank goodness one of them is cautious!) He is really into "Home Alone" and "Home Alone 2" right now. After watching the other night, I found the scene pictured below. He told me he was "setting traps" in case any bad guys came near my room.