Months 9 to 12

With crawling now mastered, James ernestly embarked upon the next challenge in his young life: the mission to begin walking. By nine months he was already standing up on furniture and walking in circles around the furniture. Still, we believed he was a long way off from walking until the day in the end of his ninth month when he suddenly released his grip on the furniture and charged toward mama (promptly falling flat on his hands and knees).

We quickly realized that he was ready to be an early walker and sitting a few feet apart from each other, we helped him to walk back and forth between us. By the middle of his 10th month, he was walking independently around the room. And by the middle of his 11th month was already working on running and learning the art of chasing after the dogs and playing chase with daddy.

Going into late July, my wife and I were still in the process of moving some of our possessions from College Station to Houston. It was during this phase when the middle picture above occurred. I had been teasing my wife the previous day that we needed to make sure we remember to pack up the baby. Well, the next day, my wife and I were packing and the James was having fun playing with the boxes. All of the sudden, James does something which caused the box he was playing in, which was laying on its side, to roll upright. Then he stands up, looks at us, and starts giggling. We had to take a picture of the scene because it was just too funny to pass up.

Of course, the third picture is a photo of James playing with Gabby. James discovered the dogs toys soon after he started crawling. Initially, the dogs just let him be if he chose to play with their toys. Soon, however, they learned that if they tried to tug the toy out of his hand, that he would pull back on the toy. Exciting games of tug-o-war soon resulted between the new found playmates.

Every little man needs to get out of the house once in a while. The first picture shows James strolling around the playground at the mall. The second picture shows him with one of his favorite toys, the toy drum. Unfortunately, our little drummer boy isn't too fond of the drum sticks but he has found that other devices such as spatulas and wooden spoons were just as effectively.

Beneath everything, James is an avid outdoors baby. He wants to be outside playing and enjoying the weather. He must get this from his mother or Grandpa Meadows because he definately doesn't get it from his father. Nevertheless, he is already mastering the use of his golf club toys. And when he can't be outside to play, he will stare intently out of the back screen window, waiting for the moment when he can go outside again.