Dear Mr. Bean,
Today you are thirteen months old! It’s hard to believes that time didn’t just stop when you turned one. You have had such a mixed bag of a month!
We started out with more and more birthday presents showing up every day!
Captain Alvie attempting the dangerous leap onto his ship
Other things were much less fun. We had the allergist appointment with the skin test and found out that you are crazy/dangerously allergic to egg yolks. That is a bummer. Although it does put bananas and avocados back on the menu! Yay!
Waiting patiently (ha!) at the doctor’s office for the allergist.
Your growth is starting level off a bit – you weigh 23 lbs and are 29 inches tall (as of a month ago, anyway), which means you’re of average weight but a wee bit below average height. Sorry ’bout that. Mama and Daddy are a wee bit below average in that department, too. However, your ginormous head (all the better to house your ginormous brain, I guess) is off the charts. Literally. It’s above the 100th %tile.
You’re using those brains to great advantage (and to my disadvantage, I think). You’ve figured out how to open the safety gate that keeps you out of the downstairs bathrooms (ours & the cats) if Mama and Daddy aren’t careful.
Book club – next month, we’ll do something by Dr. Seuss!
You are getting more and more physical all the time. You love to walk – and now run – and climb. You climb up and down the stairs. You climb on anything you can climb up. You occasionally fall down when your climbing attempts fail. You use your Mama like a jungle gym, and I think you might be part monkey. You only like being held if you’re very tired (or have just whacked your head for the umpteenth time), but do like giving unexpected and strangely violent surprise hugs.
You are so independent, and it is so weird to watch you just walk away.
Just wandering away!
You aren’t talking very much (yet, I’m sure). You definitely know your Mama from your Dada, and you love to say hi! You’ll give us an occasional buh-buh wave, but not very often. You do make a sound that I cannot type every time you see the cats, and I’m pretty sure it’s Alvie-ish for kitty.
We Skype with Grandma (almost) every week, and you definitely stick around longer each time.
Skyping
You are such a wonderful challenge. Keeping up with you is a job of work, and I love (almost) every minute of it. However, between the heat (we’re buying you your own A/C this weekend) and your near-constant teething, your night time sleep has not been what it could be lately. If you could work on it, your tired mama would muchly appreciate it. As much as I love cuddles with you, I’d rather not have 2 AM cuddles. It messes up my ability to get up to work out in the morning! 
Last weekend, we got to celebrate one of your first friend’s birthdays! Your first play date, almost a year ago, looked like this:
Hey baby, I’m wearing a horse
And now you’re both one! (And I don’t have a photo of that from last week, SADFACE!)
I do, however, have a photo of you at the party, all spiffed up in your party gear:
Contemplating Cake
You are such a big boy, now!
I know that you’re just going to get busier and busier, and I am so glad that I’m along for the ride.
I love you, little Bean.
Love,
Mama
