Fun in the Sun (and more!)

We've had quite a week! Walker loved his first trip to the ocean! This post has picture overload...but I couldn't pick just a few because there were so many I loved. I tried to post a video of Walker crawling all over the beach and with the waves coming up to him but it was too long and blogger refused to cooperate. It was quite adorable though!
He LOVED the sand! The first day I was so nervous about the sand but I got over it and let him just waddle all over it, and that he did. He had a field day. He crawled all over the place squealing, sipping the water, eating sand and having a good old time. He's quite the typical little boy...
He absolutely LOVED the water and all the fun pools our resort had. To say the least, he was in baby paradise! He also took WONDERFUL naps...I'm talking 3 hour naps...this was so different than at home. He stayed up later which worked out well with our schedule and was a real champ on his altered "vacation schedule" which basically meant no schedule at all. :) My stepmom was great to sit in the room during his naps since she's not a huge fan of the beach so we had lots of adult play time as well as lots of Walker play time. Oh...and some of the best news of the week is that he officially has Cliff's skin tone...he is one tan baby now! Woo hoo! (this was a real concern from a pale mama...) Now...on to the pics...


The girls on our first night "out" ...to dinner in our resort...

Walker's first full day at the beach. He loved the waves. We couldn't take him in too far b/c they were crazy strong waves. I've never seen waves like these before.

The waves took my legs this way...I promise I am not striking a pose for this picture!

And, the rest...

Walker seems to have hit what I have deemed a "developmental growth spurt" this past week and a half or so. He's done so many new or rather, improved things...

He is talking alot now. He is really repeating words. He's said all sorts of things this week...to name a few of the newer ones: Papa, Puff, Bye Bye, Pablo, (YES...he really said this-I have 3 other witnesses!), Bus and Boo Boo.
He tries to repeat almost everything that you say directly to him with one exception-mama. He refuses. :) In time...

He's really starting to stand on his own and can even clap his hands while free standing. THIS was quite a big deal in our family this week. He also started clapping before we left but now he responds to "clap your hands, clap your hands" and he immediately starts clapping his hands when he hears that...unless he has something in them and then he won't be bothered with it.

He climbed clear out of his walker the first day we were at the beach. He went into crazy hyper mode when we entered the condo...I'm assuming a result of the 5 hour car ride that he did excellent in. He was crawling 90 miles an hour all over the place and screeching so we put him in the walker as we loaded stuff in. Well, for the 15 millionth time he showed us who was in charge...and out he came. None of us even knew how to respond to that.

He also hid the remote control this week and we couldn't find it for 2 days. He is really into "driving" things around on the carpet and uses anything he can find to be a "truck". He was driving the remote around and before we knew it, it was nowhere in sight. All 8 of us looked for 2 solid days before my Dad (Papa) finally found it in the box of diet cokes. Interesting...

He continues his fascination with feeding people and insists that I have a bite of everything he's feeding himself. Since he's eating finger foods out the wazoo, this is not good for my diet. He basically eats almost everything we eat. I'm pretty much over being scared of letting him try new things. He's eaten it all this week, and then some...
He really likes the chunks of ham that you put on a salad and also loves pasta. Go figure...

He's really starting to recognize people by name. He would hit my dad on the head in the mornings and say "PAPA" over and over until Dad woke up and acknowledged him. He looks at who you ask him about and continues to be the social little booger that he's been since birth.

Cliff and I got quite a treat this week as Grammie and Papa got up with Walker every morning and let us sleep in. I really, really enjoyed and appreciated it but I am definitely ready to wake up with him in the morning...it's such a sweet time.

We had such a great time on vacation that we all decided to stay another night. Walker did great on the ride home as well as the ride there and all the time in between. The picture of him climbing in the fridge above was this morning when we were packing up. Kathy had put the cooler in front of the fridge thinking it would keep Walker out and we were packing up all the things in the kitchen. We turned around to find him on the cooler and then into the fridge as I snapped this picture. After I took pictures, he proceeded to climb onto the door and hold himself there. He's really a monkey. He has always been a climber, basically since he's been mobile but here recently he's climing on, in and out of everything. I'm learning to not be shocked by anything...