James, at 12 months:

• took his first steps on the day before his birthday! He walked toward Jim while I was in the other room. All I heard was Jim gasping, each with increasing excitement, as James took 3 teetering steps. "oh. OH! OH!! Sweetie, he just walked!!" After that we spent about 20 minutes cheering him on to a few more steps. Since then, he has stuck to crawling. It's a lot more efficient for his very serious business of playing.
• is beginning to name objects. Ball = a low "doh"; hot = "hhhh-oT"; block = "bock"
• is very fluent in "da-da" language. Also, "Ooo ah, ooo ah" all the time ... still no consistent "mama" (he only said it for about a week). Oh, that will be a sweet day!
• points at everything with his little chubby finger. It's the cutest thing in the whole world.
• loves to flip things over and carefully inspect.
• gives very passionate, open-mouthed kisses :)
• had his first birthday party! He loved his chocolate cupcake with abandon and basked in all the love and attention from his family.
• will forever remain my sweet baby James...

Here are some short videos from his little party: