Hellooooo....

It's been a ridiculously long time since I've written anything here, and of course there's so much I'd like to write about. I'm mostly sorry that I haven't been keeping up with writing about Ben, because I have also not written a word in his baby book in over a year. Oh well; at least there are plenty of pictures...and Facebook updates! Maybe I'll print them out one day and tuck them into his mostly blank baby book.

I also have lots to report about the band (like, that our CD is out on iTunes!), but that will have to wait. I want to write a birthday letter to Ben like I've always done for George, though it will have to be for his "half-birthday" since he just turned 1 1/2. And yes, I'm even late on that. As I said, Oh well. Anyway... here goes.

Dear Ben,

Happy, happy eighteen months! And happy they have been indeed. In fact, you are such a happy boy that friends routinely tell us that you're the happiest baby they've ever seen.

Ok, so, you're not really a baby anymore, since you've been walking for so long that we barely remember when you didn't, but I'm afraid it is going to take a good long while for you to lose your moniker of Baby Ben. It just suits you so well!

I'm sorry I haven't been chronicling your extraordinary babyhood/toddlerhood very well. I've really been insanely busy with work and, well, with you! When I'm *not* working, I'm spending the time with you (and the other kids, of course), and while I've gotten pretty good at multi-tasking, I haven't yet figured out how to give you my full attention and blog or write in your baby book at the same time. The real kids in front of me win out over the chronicling... (Right now, btw, you are napping, and I should be doing the same, or grading papers... but I have really, really been wanting to write this!)

A few things about you. Though we call you Baby Ben, no one can convince you that you're not one of the big kids. You always want to be right there, in the middle of the action, with everyone. My favorite example was over the summer. We were all in the pool and we were playing beach-ball-tag, where we have about 10 or more beach balls of various sizes that we throw at each other. (There's no "it"--it's more of a free-for-all.) Anyway, Brad and I had George cornered and were pelting him at very close range (not hard enough to hurt, mind you! But it was pretty rambunctious). You were nearby, wearing your arm floaties (which you took to like a pro from the get-go), playing on the steps. When you saw us laughing and throwing the balls at George, you climbed out of the pool, walked over to the corner where we were, and lowered yourself into the pool in between George and the side, right where we were throwing all of the balls. How pleased with yourself you were! I wouldn't have even thought that there would be room for you in there, and also, I don't think you had ever lowered yourself into the pool like that before. But, like I said, no one was going to convince you that you were just a baby and shouldn't be right smack in the middle of all the rowdy fun we were having!

Let me list at least a few things that I love about you right now (since that's what I usually do in these birthday letters).... I love how happy you are when you wake up, and how usually you look at me and say in this really sleepy and loving and sort of satisfied voice, "Mama." And then you look over at your daddy and say "Bob-Bob" with the same sleepy, loving tone. (You still don't call him Dad!) You used to look for the cats next, and say one or the other of their names, but you have added a new intermediate step. You scooch or crawl over to Bob and kneel over him and say right up in his face, "Rock and roll!" Usually with great insistence and enthusiasm. Yesterday morning when you awoke, you opened your eyes, smiled at me, and said "Mama... Mommy, Bobby, Baby, rock and roll!" As you can imagine, we're quite pleased with this development! (Especially given your early obsession with sh!t-kickin' country music :-)

The next thing you do, after you wake up and do your sweet little roll call, is to get up and head into the bathroom. And if we've forgotten to close the door to the toilet, you go right in and start plunging the toilet. For some reason, this is irresistible fun for you. This morning you went downstairs and I was lagging behind a bit; when you heard me coming down the stairs I could hear you running across the kitchen. When I got down there, there was no sign of you, but when I peeked into the bathroom off of the kitchen, I saw that you had left your calling card--the plunger in the toilet. When I turned around to look for you again, I saw that you had run around the corner into the doorway to the stairs leading down to the basement; you were poking your head around the doorway looking at me with this impossibly adorable, slightly guilty, trying-to-be-nonchalant look on your face, as if to say "What? What's the problem? I haven't been plunging the toilet or anything. I've been right here, by the basement stairs."

Anyway... Next, you generally say "boom-boom-boom", which means you want to go down to the basement to our jam space and start playing the drums. When we get down there, you insist on having us turn on all the colored lights, and then you ask to be set up on the drum throne so you can play. You can't reach the pedals, of course, but you don't let that stop you--you instruct us when it's time to hit them.

Another little story from the time before you had discovered toilet plunging... this was just a couple of days after we had gotten the drum kit, which was about two months ago now, I guess. So you were about 16 months old. We had a routine of going for a walk every morning when you woke up (though now the weather is getting a little chilly, so we usually go later in the day, if at all). You went down the stairs ahead of me, while I was still putting my shoes on (by the way, you've been an extremely adept stair-climber and -descender for months, which is a good thing, since our house is full of so many stairs!). When I got down to the kitchen, I didn't see you, but I figured you must be just hiding around the corner--you never went very far. So I said something like "Ok, Ben, I'm ready; let's Go!" Which *always* made you come running. (You LOVE to "Go!" and are always up for it, wherever we are going.) But, nothing. So I said it again a couple of times, and added that it was time to go for our walk (which also always got you excited), and that I had num-nums for you (again, any one of these things NEVER failed to make you come running). I even went so far as to open and close the door, which up to that point would have made you come running, and might have even made you cry out of fear that someone was going somewhere fun without you. But still, nothing. So I ventured over to the doorway to the basement stairs, fully expecting to see you hiding right there and smiling at me, but no. I went down the stairs and rounded the corner and still didn't see you, but at that point I heard the drums.... I kept going on until I reach the jam space, and there you were--with that same little "What? Who, me?" look on your face--holding the drum sticks but now standing in front of the kit, as you had obviously heard me coming and thought I'd be disapproving. I laughed and smiled and told you to go ahead and play, and you ran right back around to the other side and started banging away. Holding the sticks the right way and hitting the drums pretty much the right way! Unbelievably adorable and awesome. I did actually capture some of it on video, on my phone, which you will have probably seen by the time you are old enough to read this....

So, anyway, we usually have a little drumming session, and then we have a little breakfast and go for a walk if it's warm or we go up to the man cave which we have sort of Ben-proofed, although that is a constant work-in-progress, since you're constantly growing and also thinking up new ways to reach things... (Like pulling big cushions off of chairs, or moving chairs around....)

Another really sweet memory of you from very early in the summer... We were all at the back of the yard, putting together the trampoline that Maga and Grandma Jane had gotten us for Christmas. You were over closer to the house, but then decided to come see what we were doing. It's a pretty long walk for a little guy (you weren't much over a year old at that point), but you were undaunted. About halfway across, you spotted Coco, curled up (or stretched out--I can't quite recall) next to the edge of the fence around the pool. You deviated slightly from your path so that you would go right by him and when you got to him you bent down and "kissed" him right on his fluffy body. I put "kiss" in quotation marks because your kisses at that point were more like just putting your mouth up to the designated kiss-recipient. Anyway, then you proceeded on your way across the rest of the yard to us. Soooo sweet.

You love the kitties and, thank goodness, they are very tolerant and patient with you! I mean you really adore them, and you like to show your love by yes, kissing them, and sometimes petting them gently, but also by grabbing and pulling their tails/paws/a handful of fur.... You used to like to lie down right on top of them! Or crawl right over them when you were in your crawling phase. You don't do that so much anymore, but you're still big into the grabbing and pulling thing. They are unbelievably patient. Except for Lucy, who hisses at you from time to time, which you hate. Sometimes you hiss back at her, which is so funny and sad--sad because you just don't understand why she would behave that way when all you want to do is love her!

You love your siblings and light up when you see them. You have been great at saying Lindsey's name from very early on (it was one of your first words, and you say it quite clearly), but you have nicknames for your brothers. George is A-duh and Brad is Ung, which evolved from what was at first Ugh. As I said, you adore them, and you love repeating their names over and over whenever you see them or whenever you even hear us talking about them.

You continue to have an amazing, special relationship with your daddy, who takes care of you every day. (I take care of you every day, too! But you two really do spend a lot of time together.) You still love napping on him, and your latest thing is to rough-house with him, which he clearly loves every bit as much as you do, if not more! You also love watching football with him (you call out "football!" any time you get even a glimpse of a game), and you two call your rough-housing "tackling".

Another truly extraordinary thing about you that your daddy and I really love is that you are very fond of the concept "back"--not just as in people coming back, but as in putting things back! You love to put pretty much anything back, and most of the time we don't even have to prompt you. You'll pick something up, walk around with it, show it to us, and then, in your adorable little voice, with great pride and decisiveness, you'll say "Back!" as you put it back. I've never seen anything like it. You obviously got this trait from your dad. We're hoping it might rub off on your older siblings and, ahem, your mom.

You and swimming.... I've already talked a little about it, but you really took to the water this summer like a little fish. From pretty early on in the summer you loved your arm floaties, and were swimming around the entire pool like a pro with them. You were so tiny! To see your little head floating above water as your arms and legs propelled you all over... it was really something to see. But as much as you loved the freedom the arm floaties afforded you, you eventually concluded that they were for babies, as no one else was wearing them, and you took them off and actually started swimming a little bit on your own toward the end of the summer. We're pretty sure you'll keep it up over the winter in the hot tub, though you're now tall enough to stand in it, so you're not swimming quite as much these days!

And also filed under the category of I'm-not-a-baby is the way you are bound and determined to go down the stairs the way we all do. At first, you would crawl, and it was so cute--you'd get down in the crawling position at the top of the man cave stairs, and then you'd back up toward the top step, except sometimes you'd miscalculate and end up with one leg on the wrong side of the railing, so you'd have to crawl forward and then come around again for another pass. Really, it was unbelievably adorable. And kind of amazing that such a little guy could handle the stairs so well! But it's not enough for you. You will now wait at the top of the stairs for us to come hold your hand so you can go down the grown-up way. Or you'll try to reach up and grab the railing, which is just a bit out of reach, but surely won't be for long....

You LOVE the Itsy-Bitsy spider song and for months have been putting your thumbs together trying to decipher how to do the spider-motion. You also love Patty-Cake and you especially associate it with Grandma Jane, with whom you also have a very special and close relationship. And you've also developed a great bond with Maga, despite the fact that she lives across the country.... She adores you and can't ever stay away for too terribly long!

You love your Duplo Legos and are even learning some of the letters on them (we got you the alphabet ones). And you're working on your colors as well. One of the few books that you haven't torn apart is Spot's Colors and you love to read that with us. I can't wait until you get over your book-destroying-thing and we can bring out more books to read with you!

Oh yeah, that reminds me... I do have one book that I keep in the car and read to you either before or after our walk (yes, we drive to the park to take our walks most of the time!). It's Llama, Llama, Red Pajama. You LOVE it and never seem to tire of having me read it to you. I keep it in the car because when you're there you're strapped in and you can't destroy it!

You also LOVE spoons. You love to hold them and play with them, but you haven't quite worked out the details of feeding yourself with them just yet. Oh yes, and you also love the piano, which unfortunately no one besides you ever really plays. Basically, you are just crazy about music. The other day George practiced his recorder in front of you (which he doesn't usually do) and you ran right up to him and put your face up next to his, getting as close as you possibly could so that you could see exactly what it was that he was doing. You were utterly enthralled. I can't wait until you're old enough to take up an instrument in earnest. I have a feeling it won't be all that long.

But I take it back; I can wait! I love you so much, just as you are. I am savoring pretty much every moment of your babyhood/toddlerhood. Your face... your eyes... your smile... your walk/run... your hugs and kisses... your voice... You bring me boundless joy, each and every day. So much love and happiness, and all of it so unexpected at this point in my life! Thanks for being you, Ben. I love you.

Love,

Mom