what means the most to me

Hugh "motors"...
as our neighbor would put it. aka... he is walking like a champ.
In fact yesterday during dinner with some friends, he was busy walking laps here & there, back & forth...and ended up red faced and sweaty. He has essentially said adieu to crawling. It is fun to have a little shadow chasing after me. (Although he does get easily distracted along his path with any number of things...a rock, a stick (favorite!), a clump of grass, stairs to climb up) We have yet to make it to the dumpster. (our daily outing...exciting..I know)

His latest lOvEs are:

fitting objects into small containers.
example: he loves the tennis ball cannister. He seriously plays with it for half the day. He tries to fit everything into it. Dinosaurs, tennis ball, spoons. He gets really frustrated if the object he is holding won't fit! He also loves to put the lid on & off.

He puts everything in "the hoop"
as devin would like to put it. {I received a pep talk yesterday on how i need to use the right terminology when I am encouraging hugh such as, "nice throw"&"good shot" etc. (sports lingo) }
he loves to put whatever he is playing with in a bag, a basket, a small crack in the couch, a drawer, the garbage can (ugggh)

eating.
this boy can pound food. If I start dropping pounds or looking too thin...it is because hugh is eating all mY food! Even after he eats a big meal if he catches a whiff or spies me eating something...he has to have a bite, too. Really I am not complaining. He is a great eater. He will eat just about anything.

grooving to music.
whenever we go to a restaurant that has upbeat background music hugh is loving life. He is so calmed & happy when he can rock & groove to a beat. Lately I have been putting Jack Johnson on for him and he immediately stops, looks in the direction of the music, and does a little bounce bounce with his knees. Or rocks side to side. He lOvEd the hymns during general conference.
hugh gets this from devin. devin can't help but groove to a hip hop song, can't help but join in singing on a song he's never heard, & can't help but say an outloud "aohh" when he hears a fabulous harmony or when someone reaches a beautiful note. It is something i have always loved about devin.

And I think hugh has found his first word.
Of course he babbles the 'mama, dada' and for sure knows what they mean, but tends to use "dada" for almost everything. He does turn to look for devin every morning and says "da" and tends to only say "a mamama" only in a whining/crying tone. (fabulous).
But we noticed just the other day when we ask him, "hugh, where is jack?" He immediately gets this serious look on his face, looks around, & repeats, "yah" (which translate to mean 'jack' minus the "k" noise). It is too cute. Jack is his little buddy from next door.