10 Months Old

Samuel's 10 month birthday was today! We celebrated by going for a long walk to the farmers market and taking Clara to the dog park... which he thought was hilarious!

Some of Sam's new tricks...

- Playing peek-a-boo.

- Waving at himself in the mirror.

- Eating more finger foods and fewer pureed foods.

- A new tooth popped through a couple days ago making our new total 3 on top, 4 on bottom.

- Cruising along the couch and coffee table.

- Giving "kisses"... really just opening his mouth and licking your face, but he does it when you say "give me a kiss."

- Chasing Clara around everywhere... including in her cage, up the stairs, to her food bowl. Then, he catches her and crawls on top of her. She's such a good dog for putting up with his not-so-gentle signs of affection.

- He "talks" more clearly. His repertoire includes "ba-ba," "ga-ga," "ka-ka," and, once, "ma-ma" usually followed by spitting noises. Of course, none of these have any meaning... he's just practicing with sounds.

10 Month reject pictures... he's not as easy to get pictures of now that he's so mobile.

Trip to CoMo

Sam, Clara, and I headed to Columbia, Missouri last week to see some friends while Bud was out on a business trip. Samuel had a great time with his buddies. And, I had a wonderful time catching up with some GREAT friends!

I was a little worried about driving 5 hours each way with the dog and the baby by myself, but they did great... in the car. Clara might not be traveling with us much anymore because she is not easy to deal with away from home, although she did great in the car. She relaxed/slept on the front seat the whole way (yes she got to sit up front :)). Samuel didn't sleep well on the way there, but made up for it by sleeping 4 hours of the trip on the way home.

Here are some pictures from our trip. We also met up with the Wallis clan for lunch while we were there, but I forgot to get my camera out.

Here's Harrison (14 months), Sam (9 months), and Jackson (23 months) on the couch. We had to give them each a remote control to get them to sit still.

Samuel's first bath with a friend.
Harrison sharing his Cozy Coupe with Samuel.

At the St. Louis Zoo with H-man.

Riding the Carousel.

Where's Samuel?

I left Samuel in the living room to play while I stepped out of the room for a second. When I returned, he was nowhere in sight! Here's where I found him...

Swim Class

Bud was able to make it to swim class this week to take a few pictures of Sam in the water. Here's what he captured. Ignore me in this picture... just look at Sam :).

Sam and I look forward to swim class every week. He's getting better at putting his head under water. When water gets in his mouth, he holds his breath or spits the water back out most of the time. He's starting to think about blowing bubbles... he just can't figure out how to do it. But, he loves watching me blow bubbles. Instead of a traditional swim method, Sam jumped right to the butterfly stroke. He's really good at the frog kick and just kind of splashes the water with his arms. His favorite thing to do is "jump" in from the side. He "jumps" to me before I even have a chance to let go of him.

More Giggles

Baby giggles are so contagious! I was throwing a ball up in the air and Sam thought it was hilarious, so I caught it on video. I had to set the camera on the table, thus the strange angle.








His adorable giggle also got me to buy him a ball at Walgreens the other day. It was kind of like a "koosh" ball and when I jiggled it he cracked up. He was giggling all through Walgreens, so I had to buy it. :) Of course when we got home it wasn't nearly as funny.

Funny Noises

Samuel loves to hear the echos in the bathroom. Here's a video of him squealing in the bathtub. Don't worry although it sounds like he's upset, he is actually very happy. You can also hear him "talking" at some point in the video... he says "ba ba ba ba."

9 Month Photo Session

Here are a few of my favorite pics from our 9 month old photo session. You can see the rest in the slideshow to the right.

Ball popper part 2

He is so talented...

Stair Climbing

Here's the promised video of Sam climbing the stairs. I couldn't decide which view was better... so I just posted both of them. This was a few weeks ago, he's actually much faster now (as long as Clara is at the top... she is his target).

Dallas

Last weekend we headed to Dallas for a mini Lutz reunion. Bud's parents headed down there from Iowa and his sisters live there, so we all met up to spend a long weekend together. It was great to see everyone. We spent a lot of time watching Samuel with all his new tricks, played some games together, went shopping (girls) and golfing (boys minus Sam), and watched a football game.

We also spent some time waiting for Ketti's car to get fixed as the brakes went out when we were driving around town... yeah, that was exciting. It was really amazing how God worked everything out to keep us and those around us safe during this potential disaster. For example, we missed our turn to get on the highway and therefore the brakes failed when we were going 30 MPH instead of 70 MPH. And, that's just one example. God is good!

Samuel driving us home.

Hanging out in the hotel room while wearing his really cute outfit.
He loves riding on Daddy's shoulders.

Football game.

This was a favorite hangout at Ketti's house.

9 Month Stats

Weight - 19 lbs 14 ozs... between the 25th and 50th percentile.
Height - 29.25 inches... between the 75th and 90th percentile.

He's still long and lean as he has been since day 1.