Babies sure do grow up fast. Landon was a baby for the blink of an eye (a blink of an eye in which the days were interminably long) and now he’s technically a toddler, but still always my baby.

He was somewhere around 25 pounds at his 12-month appointment and has probably gained a pound or so since then. He’s comfortably in 18-month clothes, which is hard to believe since he was in newborn clothes for the first three months of his life! He grew like mad once he actually started growing.

Landon loves books and magazines! (Don’t tell him he’s reading Mother Earth News upside down, though; he’s clearly engrossed.)

He is always on the move unless he’s sitting in the grass, which he doesn’t realize he can crawl in. Landon isn’t walking yet, but he cruises well and is such a speedy crawler I’m not sure if he sees the need to walk.

And, ohhh boy, does he have opinions. Like the photo progression below I like to call: “Mama, stop taking my picture.”

He also understands an incredible amount. For example, he loves opening cupboards and drawers. I usually allow him to take items out of the tupperware cupboard, but even then prefer he not go overboard. While at a friend’s house recently he started opening their cupboards (the kid has no concept of privacy) and Brian told him to shut the door … and he did! That trick has worked a few times at home and so far the only cupboard I’ve had to secure is the one under the sink with cleaning chemicals.

There’s a little bird at the top of his walker he tries to eat.

These two buddies were separated by the baby gate so they stared at and talked to each other.

Landon’s food repertoire is ever-expanding. He eats nearly anything we put in front of him. I make him various meatballs with meat (venison, lamb, chicken or beef), veggies (usually greens and peppers since those are harder for him to eat/he doesn’t like as much), spices (turmeric, garlic, pepper, onion, paprika), egg and something like oatmeal, quinoa or lentils. It’s pretty much a meal in a ball.

Landon’s first picnic! He ate carrots and cheese in his stroller.

Landon helped Daddy cut some food up.

He also eats steamed colorful veggies well like squash, carrots, beets, green beans, those mixed frozen vegetables and LOVES any and all fruit. He even loves pickles, which I found out when I needed something extra to pack for his lunch and my fridge was empty-ish. He eats cheese, yogurt, crackers, a small bite of my pizza recently and, like my true child: CEREAL. Eating cereal off the kitchen table also is much more fun than eating it off his high chair tray.

I love cereal and could probably eat it for every meal. A few weeks ago I gave Landon some watermelon before bed and figured he could have a handful of Cheerios, too. When he saw me walking toward him with the box, he threw the piece of watermelon that was almost to his mouth, happy squealed, threw his arms out like he was going to hug the cereal box, kicked his feet and laughed.

Speaking of laughing … I got the hiccups recently and that made him laugh so adorably!