Russell 15 months

The other night Will laid a blanket out flat on our living room rug. Russ seriously thought this was the best. game. ever. to be invented. He would walk off of it, then turn around and race onto it, laughing hysterically, and then face plant onto the blanket and roll around for awhile. The whole family just sat and watched him for about twenty minutes and he just. kept. laughing. 

That same day at dinner Molly laughed above-and-beyond about something and so Russ fake laughed in response. We all laughed at Russ's fake laugh. Which made him fake laugh again. Pretty soon he was laugh/screeching over and over and over again and I was laughing so hard my cheeks hurt. Even after the initial event, Russ would randomly look around, cock his head, and do a little fake laugh--just to see what the reaction was. And then he would laugh hysterically when we laughed at him. He is seriously the best. He always gets everyone in a good mood.

Words: da-da, mama, mmm-ma (for grandma), uh-oh, deese (for cheese!, as in, smiling for the camera), hi, bye-bye, oh. He can sign please and he waves at every single person we pass. It makes walking the kids to school extra fun because he brings a smile to everyone's face! The crossing guard loves him!

He has been walking steady for a solid three weeks now. He was taking steps for a month or so in Utah, but as soon as he learned to push himself back up off the ground without any other support--he was everywhere. His favorite place to walk is on top of our kitchen table. I try to pull out all the chairs so he can't climb from them to the table, but I'm mostly hoping he just grows out of this one real quick. 

I love his white blonde hair. His chubby hands. He has an intense need to be getting into everything. He climbs and opens and reaches and figures out everything. My last two babies were not like this. He is a whirlwind. You can't leave him alone for a second. You can't leave him unstrapped. You can't walk away. You can't leave anything out. It only takes two seconds of people holding him before they say "you have your hands FULL" and it is so much truer for him than it has been for other kids. HAHA. But I love it. My dad recently said "You can't Russ-proof." and that is basically the long and short of it. 

Russell John 15 months. Nothing quite like a boy and his stick.

All the heart eyes.

That blonde hair though!

This is the face he makes when he says "deese!!!"

Oh gosh those big brown eyes.

This one is going to have to be printed.

I remember Ruthie pushing the stroller like this at 18 months old when I had just had Will. Sigh--time stop passing!

She found a coconut and carried part of it around the entire walk.

This girls hair.

AHHHH he makes me so happy!

Brothers!

I wanted to crop this down because I love his smile so much--but I wanted to see his tiny little figure on the big wide sidewalk too, the struggle!

Russell, we are SO GLAD that your lively, crazy, hilarious, wonderfully uplifting spirit is in our family! You make everyone laugh and everyone just adores you!