E&L turned eleven months old on Friday. It’s so weird how time keeps passing and every month they’re another month older, isn’t it? Yeah. That. In less than a month, we’ll celebrate their first birthday. Somebody hold me!

They’ve grown so much, I’m constantly amazed. Last week, I swear L’s feet grew so much overnight that his little sneakers no longer fit him. How does that happen?!

This past month they celebrated their first Halloween, to everyone’s great delight. They also had their first trip to the neighborhood playground to play on the swings. As you can see here, they are the perfect age/size to share a swing, and they had a blast. The loved going down the slides (in our laps), too. I’m so thankful for slightly cooler weather, which means we’ll probably be spending plenty of time down at the playground in the coming weeks.

At eleven months, E:

• has learned to clap and will do it pretty consistently whenever we do, and often on her own. She claps during meals a lot, possibly because she’s excited about food. I think we might be related.
• stands up on her own whenever she wants, and can easily sit back down again without falling. She’s taken a step or two, but so far only when one of us is holding her hand.
• “talks” (babbles) all the time. She has said “mama” and “dada” to/about us a couple of times, but I’m not sure if it was intentional or not. She’s getting close, though, I think. The best part is that she’s just always got stuff to say, so I hear her little voice all day long. It’s adorable.
• is holding steady with just her two bottom teeth for now.

At eleven months, L:

• finally got that new top tooth he’d been working on for what felt like months. It popped through a week or two ago. The drool is still coming, though, so either he’s just a drooly baby or the other top tooth is on its way (I can’t tell).
• just learned to clap for the first time yesterday (so, technically after turning 11 months, but whatever). He was SO pleased with himself and wanted to clap along with the rest of us all night. Just darling.
• has figured out how to climb up onto the futon in the nursery if he has something to boost up one leg with — such as a toy or his sister’s back. Danger Baby!
• loves to laugh at his sister and imitate her. She was spitting her food out and blowing raspberries at dinner the other day and he was DYING laughing. Just cracking up. Then he started doing it, too, in between laughs. He just loves her.

We have so much fun with these two. It’s even better than I imagined, you know?