Orry turns One!

On the 29th of October, Orry turned one year old.

It is amazing to reflect on how fast the time has gone. It seems like only yesterday that he was like this:

On trying to reflect on the year gone, it strikes us how swiftly time has gone, and how little of it we've stopped to take in. It seems now that we didn't pay enough attention, as looking back it feels that so much has been lost from memory. We cannot now piece together the months end-to-end and make sense of the progression from birth through to now; rather, it seems like he was born, we hunkered down, and soon enough a year had passed... It is almost better not to think of what we've forgotten, or else we'd be too sad at what is now lost to us.
We love our happy lumper of a baby and we almost don't want to admit that time is passing and that he is soon enough going to be a little boy and a baby no longer. He seems too perfect right now, why can time not stop and keep everything just as it is?
Sigh.

But, before getting all Heavy on it, it's probably best to start with an update of where Orry is at 12 months old...

• Teeth: 12 shiny pearls; 8 on the top, and 4 on the bottom. The four on the bottom are the central ones, mirrored on the top, but added to by two canines and two molars towards the back. A lot of teeth for a one year old!
• Crawling: Orry is now a proficient and confident crawler. He will happily crawl off to investigate things or to chase after you or his brother. A half-open door is soon charged down and flung open to see what it is that you're hiding in there. Woe betide all those who try and close the door behind them as they go to the toilet or to shower!
• Pull-ups: He will happily pull himself up on things and has came to be quite good at assisted-standing across October. One of his favourite places to do this, inevitably, is in the bathroom, where he will clatter all the bottles within reach into the bathtub laughing, and then cry in the hope that someone will return them to be crashed in again (we don't so pander!), then he'll race over to the the toilet in the hope that someone's left the seat up so that he can peer in and think about reaching in or finding something to throw in.
• Dexterousness: He shocked us around the time of his birthday by being able to stack three or so blocks on top of each other without help. That's quite something! Especially when we've not "worked on it" with him - it was just something he decided to do one day and he did it. His favourite activity is throwing balls, which he is very good at. If you sit in the right place across the room from him, you can throw a ball back and forth for minutes at a time. He's probably better at throwing a ball like that than Finn is.
• Coordination: He isn't very coordinated, and he certainly isn't close to walking. He is rubbish at getting off things - chairs, beds etc. Generally he will clamber to the edge and then just keep on going until he topples off head-first. It is unclear whether he does so knowing that we're there to catch him, or whether he just doesn't get it. Either way, we've always been there to catch him on his nose-dives.
• Playing with Finn: He loves to play with Finn and his favourite play activity is jumping around on Finn's bed. Loud shouting, laughing, falling over, clambering about - what could be more joyous. If only he could get off again without leaping into the unknown!
• Sleeping: Orry is a very bad sleeper still. He now sleeps for longer periods at the start of the night, but he can be up a number of times between midnight and his being very much awake at 6am. It is hard especially on Cori now that she is working. Thinking of Finn, we try not to recall that this is likely to go on solidly for another year or so, before easing off to negligible only in another two or more years. The prospect of that is too awful to stare at square in the face!
• Allergies: All now mostly under control. Some days are worse than others, such as when at Dad's Club when something sets off a rash (the sausages? beans?), but such things are at a level not to really act on or worry about.

Having just mentioned the manageability of his allergies, here is picture from not long before his birthday, when something mysterious set off a skin rash. It wasn't long-lasting and he wasn't too bothered by it - such is the livable-with even keel that we've now achieved with it.

Note the mobile phone in that picture. One of Orry's favourite games with us is to pick up a phone (or phone toy, or phone-like object), put it to his ear and say "He-llo!" This is sometimes done in a business-like fashion before casting the phone aside and getting on with something else, but sometimes it is done and followed by this sort of lovely smile at us.

Orry's actual birthday day went without too much eventfulness; a day at nursery, following by an evening of Cori only with the two of them, as I was at a work event that I couldn't avoid. Orry did get a special dairy & soya free biscuit (an Oreo, no less) to devour. He liked that:

The cake joy also featured as, probably, Orry's highlight from his birthday party, which had an underwater theme, as is demonstrated by the tasteful decorations on the ceiling of the lounge:

Also knocking about were a heap of blow-up fish, whales and dolphins, here sported by Finn (who took a lot of persuasion to "share" the things with anyone else, even Orry - though, according to Finn, he was just protecting them from Orry's sure destruction!):

We did look into hiring somewhere outside, to break the round-our-flat tradition for parties that we've had ever since Finn's first party. (If only we could go to a pub now, but sadly I don't think that the older toddler sibling would make that very feasible!). As it happened, we were arranging it too late and too many people were unavailable to make it make sense. That and the illnesses making their way around meant that by the time the day finally came our numbers were down to just two other groups of friends: Sevinç and Emin, and Anna and Rob. Orry was wary at first, of all these people coming into his house, but it didn't take a couple of minutes before he was comfortable with everyone.
Orry didn't really get that something special was going on for him, but he still enjoyed himself, and he certainly enjoyed the cake:

He also enjoyed opening the presents, though he was vague about understanding that the unwrapping meant a new toy/book/clothes. He did soon get into the hoard of presents that he amassed, some of which is shown here in the post-party mess:

Not in this picture are two toys which were noteworthy: a small box of wooden dinosaurs, and a stuffed toy of Humpty Dumpty.
They were very nice presents but they perhaps wouldn't warrant special mention but for the fact that when I began to play with Orry with them I realised that I had probably not really played such games with him before. It was just sitting on the floor with him and performing some narrative with him with the dinosaurs (their queueing up to eat the leaves from the wooden tree etc.), or else having the Humpty Dumpty leap around, nibble his toes and kiss him etc. All obvious enough, but remarkable in that I'd not so played with him before.
I think that we try and avoid this sort of playing with Finn, as our patience is so much shorter than his in such play, and he never plays when we join in, instead just telling us how to play or else getting annoyed at our playing wrong. We had probably therefore not thought to play with Orry so.
But, however it came to be, it was nice to engage with him like that - to have a new experience or connection with him.
(In actual fact, the toy was Christened "Humpty Bumpty," as Finn pointed out that Humpty Dumpty was very much broken, so this toy could not be him. So I told Finn that this was his cousin, Humpty Bumpty. Finn thought that that was pretty funny, but he refused to allow the thing to fall or get hurt, presumably because of what become of his poor cousin!)

The end of October (and, to be honest, the start of November) is a time for clouds and rain, which made it hard to get the obligatory pictures of the one-year-old, but we managed it in the end, just about. You will note that there is only the one (slightly grainy) picture taken anywhere but with him held up in full sight of the window:

It is strange now to look at him and wonder that a year ago he wasn't a part of our lives; that we ever lived a life without Orry as a part of it and his smiles as a part of our happiness.
It is as if he completes us as a family and as a complete unit of happiness; that he ever was not a part of us seems silly or mad. Surely, we were not ever without Orry; but just getting everything ready for his arrival. As if everything before was only a long prelude to when he arrived, and it was only at that point that any decent accounting of life could begin.
Such is parenting, I suppose.

Orry is a smiler. He is someone full of joy and someone who evidently enjoys being around the rest of his family every day. He thinks that his parents are wonderful, and his brother wondrous, and that everyone should be smiled at and most things laughed at. It is, honestly, a joy to have him around, and we sometimes catch ourselves feeling sorry for people who have other children (surely no other child could possibly be anything compared to Orry!).

Happy birthday, Orry. We love you very much indeed. We look forward to the rest of our lives, with you and your brother in it.