a thing of wonder and beauty

dane is just a thing of wonder and beauty lately. he cracks us up all the time. i feel like i totally underestimate him and his smarts every day--i'm always surprised by the things he wants to do and what he CAN do. i still expect him to be this tiny baby, and he's rapidly growing up (say it isn't so!). he turns nine months old in a few days--be still my heart!

here are some of his latest antics:

-he used to be alternately unaware or afraid of dogs. now, whenever he sees them, he starts smiling and talking to it and doing this fake little laugh trying to get its attention. it is the funniest thing i think i've ever seen him do--and it is so adorable! good thing we're going to visit our families in a few weeks, and they both have dogs. dane will get his canine fill. he also does this with other little kids he sees walking around.

-lots of times, when he drops something, i'll say "uh oh!" and seriously, he's started imitating me. he'll say "uh uh" right after i do, in the same tone of voice. i know it sounds like a total crazy parent move to think he's imitating me, but he really is--four of our friends witnessed it on friday night and they can verify. and a few days ago, we were in the kroger parking lot, and there was a bird cawing in a tree nearby. dane looked right at where the sound was coming from, grinned, and would make a cawing noise any time after the bird did. look, i even have proof--i couldn't help taking a picture because he was being so funny looking for the bird.

-speaking of which, dane now rides in the grocery cart sans carseat. he could have been doing this for MONTHS, i know, but he was always so happy in his carseat in the cart that i never wanted to change it up. (he would just sit there happily for the entire time i was wandering around kroger, never making a peep!) but i finally just hated the idea of having to lug the carseat around so much that i made the change myself. and he loves it. he thinks he's a big person now.

-he is really close to crawling. he gets onto his hands and knees and moves his hands and then collapses--the rest is going to be coming soon. we were so hoping he wouldn't figure it out until after we'd flown across the country, but it probably won't happen. oh, well. he does manage to scoot himself backwards and end up stuck in random corners like this:

-he is OBSESSED with the baby bjorn. when tommy goes to put it on, he starts screaming and panting and laughing like he just can't WAIT to get those chubby little hands all over it. and this is basically his expression the whole time he's in it. it's too bad he's getting way too big for it--it hurts my back to have him in it for too long.

-we tried to give him a mohawk the other day (see his hair in the above baby bjorn pictures for the next-day result), but his hair was so long it just flopped over and curled magnificently into an elvis look-alike do. but i finally couldn't stand it any longer and decided to trim the top of his hair for the first time--and it only took about 10 minutes and it actually turned out really well! much better than his other haircut i gave him. i got rid of the nasty stringy parts that were maybe 5 inches longer than the rest of his hair and evened it all out. just that little difference made him look so much older.

before:

after:

-and our FAVORITE recent trick of dane's is that he loves sticking his tongue out and licking his chin (or something like that, not really sure what exactly he's doing). he was doing this for HOURS yesterday afternoon/evening, all the time with this silly little look on his face. and then he started laying his head down side to side, still sticking his tongue out--no idea what he was doing, but tommy and i were dying just watching him.

seriously, he is the greatest. even when he drives us crazy.