More Perfect: Housekeeping at Twelve Months

Dear Milo:
You're changing so fast, it's hard to keep up. This month has had it's ups and downs, but I still wake up every morning excited to see what new thing you'll do today, so that's probably as good as you can hope for in the parent department.

The first thing that needs mentioning this month, without a doubt, is your passionate love affair with brooms. I thoughtlessly swept up some dust near you one day, and told you I was sweeping with the broom, and then let you sweep a little bit, and from then on you were head over heels. You began asking for the broom ("bee", you call it) first thing in the morning, at lunch, at dinner, and generally every twelve seconds. We'd all grown pretty tired of having to lug the broom around the house for you, until thankfully your ever-attentive babysitter bought you your own Milo-sized broom.

You now carry your broom everywhere, and when you see it for the first time in a few hours you always give it a huge smile and coo: "Bee!".

But the oddest thing about your broom obsession is that it's not limited to brooms in the apartment. Like the best of utterly obsessed humans, you see brooms everywhere. We were standing in the bagel store when you started shouting "Bee! Bee!". I turned and saw that sure enough, a woman standing across the store had purchased a mop, and the handle was sticking out of her plastic shopping bag. Your babysitter took you to a sing-a-long the other day, and despite the dozens of singing babies, the general hubub in the place, you managed to locate a broom in the far corner of the room.

And then there was the leaf brigade. We were at the Tot Lot last week when a van pulled up and out came at least ten park service employees weilding rakes and brooms. As they began to sweep up the leaves littering the ground, you stood dumfounded, as though your brain circuits were overloading from TOO MANY BROOMS. You tried to follow one, then the other, and then, finally, you started to cry because it was all too much.

In other news, you took your first steps on Halloween. You're able to walk short distances on your own, though you prefer to have someone's hand there to hold on to. And you've become an amazing mimic. You like to sing intonations like "Goodnight Moon", or answer the cat's cry with your own "meow". You know what a pig says and what a cow says and what a horse says, and very occaisonally when you want more Cheerios you remember to say "mo!" instead of just whining and acting pissy.

You continue to follow in your parents' footsteps by eating everything under the sun. You still love Chinese food, and you think bagels are the bomb. Berries of all sorts - also a favorite. And riccotta cheese too. You've managed to feed yourself once or twice with a spoon, and once (possibly by accident) with a fork, although mostly you just like smashing the fork on your tray.

And as always, still smiling, still outgoing, still a bundle of energy.