11 months old

I think I've been in denial about writing this one. His last update before turning one year old. I feel sadness that my little baby is growing up but I'm so so so excited for the very same reason. He is just more and more amazing everyday and there is so much to look forward to.

This past month has been very eventful. He seems to be developing so quickly now. Everyday it seems like there is something new that he's doing. Just a few days before turning 11 months old he pulled himself up to his feet. Now that is all he does. He is so active, just moving and pulling himself up on everything. He does his own version of crawling; army combined with traditional. I think it just depends on the surface he's one and if he has clothes on or not. He seems to enjoy just hanging out in his diaper, and he is also able to do more of a traditional crawl that way. He's take a few good falls but quickly calms down and is right back to it. He's still not really sitting up on his own very often, but he seems like he can do it, just doesn't see a need for it when he could be standing up on the table or something.

He points at everything, all the time. He is making more "ma-ma-ma" and "ba-ba" and "da-da" sounds but doesn't seem to direct them at anything. He likes clapping. Oh and he's learning to make sounds by putting his hand over his mouth repeatedly. 

I keep thinking his other tooth is going to come soon, but nothing yet. His top tooth is really starting to show now, so while I don't look forward to the process of the next tooth coming in, I do look forward to him having another tooth up there to balance things out.

Sleeping continues to go pretty well. He sleeps 11-12 hours a night with a 45 minute nap in the morning and a 1-2 hour nap in the afternoon.

Eating has been a little challenging. He still tends to prefer pureed foods but sometimes doesn't want to eat them. We are trying to offer him more finger foods at each meal. He seems only interested in eating puffs and cheerios, everything else, not so much. He's nursing 4-5 times a day or bottling it up when I'm at work.

I think that's it for now!

busy couple of weeks

It's been a busy and eventful few weeks for us! Danny has had a couple bad colds and was just so miserable. He had a really yucky cough and was really only content being held or sleeping off and on in his swing. After a big cough, he projectile vomited all over me, twice. Ugh. I guess I earned my mommy wings. We took him to the doctor and found out he had the early beginnings of two ear infections. After a few days of antibiotics he was feeling better, so he decided to cut a tooth! Top one! Then yesterday, he started crawling on all fours! He isn't quite there all the time, but he's getting there. Oh and he's pulling himself up on his knees. Lots of newness!

10 months old

I've been putting off writing this update for some reason. Maybe because little D has been super sick and not sleeping or maybe it's because I'm a little bit in denial that my little man is 10 months old! Holy crap batman!

He's doing lots of cool stuff now. He's doing what we still call the "advanced army crawl" where he scoots around on his belly. He is spending more and more time on all fours, rocking back and forth but when he wants to move, it's belly to the ground and boy is he quick! He's also getting much better with his fine motor skills like picking up super-tiny-invisible-to-the-adult-eye-random pieces of stuff from the floor. Just in the past couple of days he's spending more time on just his knees and pulling himself up onto things. He's still not a professional sitter yet, but is much more stable. He doesn't seem to like spending much time sitting as he normally just pushes himself forward and takes off crawling.

He's still a good, and much more efficient eater. He nurses 4-5 times a day for about 10-15 minutes and is now eating 3 meals a day. About 3 oz in the morning, 2 oz for lunch and 4 oz for dinner. He's also started eating puffs now and seems to like hanging out in his high chair eating puffs.

Sleeping has continued to go well for the most part. He normally goes to bed between 7 and 7:30 and is up around the same time in the morning. Naps have been better too. Usually 2 in the morning/early afternoon and sometimes a late afternoon one, all usually in his crib.

Unfortunately I feel like he spent most of January with a runny nose or a cold. Poor guy. Just this week has been especially yucky. He got a pretty nasty cough and we caught a ear infections in both ears pretty early. Oh and I officially earned my parent wings when he projectile vomited on me twice. Like real throw up. Ick ick ick! He was so miserable. But after a few days of antibiotics he seems to be getting better finally!

We've also made a decision to transition him into a new daycare center but for the time being, Randy is taking his 6 weeks of Paid Family Leave and will be staying home with him. Love it!

We also left him for the first time overnight and we took a much needed night away. D stayed with grandma and seemed to do great! Glad we overcame that first hurdle of leaving him overnight.

That's all I can think of for now!

9 months old

So I'm a few days late writing this update but D just had his 9 month well baby visit today and I like to include all the stats on our growing little man. Today he weighed 19 lbs 11.8 oz and is 28 inches tall. I was thinking he would weigh more than that but am relieved that he's still going to fit in his infant car seat a little bit longer! I don't remember exact percentiles, but I do remember that his head is in the 98th percentile..whoa!

He has been a pretty busy guy lately and his determined and curious personality is coming through. He isn't crawling on all fours yet, but he does an advanced army crawl to get where he wants to go. Usually he is motivated to get to things like cords, strings, drawers with knobs and outlets. Needless to say, we started looking at items for baby proofing the house. We also lowered his crib and are extra sure to keep a hand on him while on the changing table since he is a rolling machine!

He's clapping and raising his arms to do "Touchdown". Although Randy thinks D can improve this skill a bit more :) He is kinda waving, but not really. He says "da-da" indiscriminately and lots of other babbling sounds. He smiles a ton and is overall a pretty happy little guy. He still just has the bottom 2 teeth but the doctor said that his gums look raised up on top so we should be getting new teeth soon I'm sure. He can sit unsupported but still isn't that stable so someone has to be there with him. He gets upset when something he wants gets taken away. He has been very grabby with the dogs too and they have been VERY patient with him. Hilo is constantly trying to lick him and Kona is constantly trying to keep her paws out of his hands :)

Eating is still going well. He nurses 5 times a day and is eating about 4 oz of breakfast (yogurt/fruit/cereal) and 4-5 oz of dinner (veggie combo). He has started "helping" us feed him by grabbing the spoon. Which of course makes it harder to feed him but I guess it's good developmentally. The doctor suggested giving him some chicken or turkey and also introducing lunch soon.

Sleeping also continues to go well. He's been sleeping for 10-12 hours straight at night! Hope that continues! The only issue that has come up there is he is so mobile now that sometimes he gets himself caught in a corner or something of his crib and gets upset. He still naps in the morning about 45 minutes and on a good day, 2 more naps later in the day.

christmas fun

I was just reading through the last entry and I can't believe how much has happened since then. He seems like such a different kid. He is very close to crawling. In the past couple of weeks he has realized he enjoys spending time on his belly and rolls and pivots across the room. A couple of times he has gotten on his toes in push up position and he's working on getting his knees under himself so I'm sure it won't be long now before he's officially mobile.

Christmas was so much fun. Busy, but fun. We spent the night out at my uncle's house and D opened up some pretty cool toys (including a big CAT dump truck he can ride at some point; he liked honking the horn). Then my mom came down and spent the week. As usual, Christmas eve was spent with family but this year we were at the new Drakes house. Then Christmas morning we opened up gifts at home before heading back over to Drakes for more fun. Danny got quite a pile of new toys and some clothes and it seems like his favorite so far is this $8 Baby Einstein music toy that he can just lay back and hold on to.  My dad came over in the afternoon with more presents (we all got the most awesome sweatshirts and they match!). Then it was back out to Randy's family's house for dinner. Whew! Danny did great. He got overwhelmed and overstimulated but seemed to really enjoy seeing all the family. He even showed off his new dance moves and did his best to crawl.

What else? Not much else new really. He is just a moblie-ish guy now moving around on the floor. His personality has really just blossomed. He smiles all the time and makes silly faces. Loves loves loves being scared. Boo! He started clapping earlier this week too. Oh and he's up to eating 3 ice cube servings of veggies at night and enjoying more grains and fruits in the morning. Okay, so I guess there is newness after all.

8 months old!

I know I say this every month, but it's true. I can't believe he is 8 months old already?! Where has the time gone? No seriously, where has it gone? It is amazing to see how much he has changed in such a short period of time. This past month was full of new things.

He now has 2 bottom teeth and I'm sure there's another one trying to come through. At least that's what we and everyone else blames on fussiness. I sure hope I haven't lost my laid back baby to the tooth monster. Some nights he just screams for no apparent reason and no matter what we do it seems like he's not happy. So, we blame it on constipation and/or teething. Things we can't see and can't really seem to do much about other than give Tylenol and teething rings (which he isn't a huge fan of).

I should mention the Tylenol thing..sometimes it seems to have a placebo effect. He will be screaming his head off and nothing else is working and then as soon as that dropper comes near his mouth he's all excited and then happy as a clam (what does that even mean?). Anyway, I digress.

He's still practicing sitting up and seems to enjoy this new way to play with the same old toys (thank goodness Christmas is coming..he is just SO bored of his current toys. well, not really, I'm just sayin'). He is not a fan of falling back. When we are in the living room where there is hardwood floor, I usually try to guide his fall so he isn't really falling. But when we are on carpet I've let him lose his balance a few times and he "hits" his head on the carpet. Boy screams louder (after he stops breathing for a few seconds because of how upset he is) than when he gets shots. I think it just scares him. Although, last night he rolled from his belly to his back and his head kinda landed loud on the hardwood floor and he started to get upset but when we didn't react, he was fine!

Eating is going well. He still nurses 5-6x a day. Sometimes on both sides, sometimes just on one, but in either case he has gotten much more efficient. He usually finishes up in 10-15 minutes. And he's really enjoying solids, especially vegetables. He's up to eating 2 ice cube servings of veggies now. Sweet Potatoes and Peas are his favorites.

He is no where near crawling yet. This is most likely because he hates being on his stomach and so doesn't spend much time practicing that development. He does love to stand though. Loves being in his exersaucer and being carried around in the ergo. We recently put him on my back so that it would be easier for me to do stuff around the house and he liked it so much he fell asleep!

He continues to sleep 10-11 hours at night. Naps are going okay. When I'm home he usually (not always, last week was a nightmare) goes down once in the morning and then late morning/early afternoon and sleeps for about 30-40 minutes in his crib. The rest of the day is hit or miss. Sometimes he'll nap in the car if we are out. The late evening is his toughest time though. He wakes from his last nap around 4ish and doesn't go to bed until 8:30ish, so there should be a nap in between there, but instead, he'd rather have us carry him around or cry and fuss which makes dinner time a little stressful.

He doesn't say any words yet but does say a lot of "ooohhh" which is cute. And he babbles a lot, but he's always been pretty chatty. He gets that from his Daddy.

Other than that we are just getting ready for Christmas! We'll be going shopping next weekend and I hope to get things wrapped and done so I'm not out running around at the last minute like I am every year.

sitting on a tooth?

I can't believe it's been almost a month since I wrote the last entry! Lots of cool newness this past month.

Danny turned 7 months on 11/7 and just a few days shy of that he sat up on his own! Just all of a sudden..BAM! Look at me! Of course this was about 4 days after we just took family pictures and he couldn't yet sit up for those. Oh well! So anyways, the sitting up. We were hanging in his room and I sat him down to practice and I let go and there he sat, for a good 10 seconds. Kona was right there and D was reaching out to touch her..cute!

For Halloween he was a monkey! So freaking cute! I took some time off that night and we hung out. Nothing exciting, but I enjoy being home on a Saturday night and hanging with my boys.

Then almost a week ago D got his first tooth! He had been super fussy the previous days but it was nothing noteworthy, just normal evening fuss bus. Then the next morning (I think Wednesday) I reached in his mouth and there was a tooth! At least for all that pain he has something to show for it now! Since he cut that tooth, he's been in a more pleasant mood. I was starting to think I was losing my mild mannered child forever since teething goes on forever.

Hmmm..let's see, what else? I'm making D's baby food which I'm pretty proud of. It's way easier than I thought it would be and he really seems to like it (well, except for green beans). He even likes peas! So far he's had applesauce, pears, bananas, peas, sweet potatoes, avocado, butternut squash and green beans. He's only had green beans once and he about gagged himself so I'm guessing he's not so much a fan. We'll keep trying though! He's now eating about 2tsp of oatmeal mixed with about 1-2 tbs of fruit in the morning and then 2 ice cube sized portions of veggie.

Nursing is going okay. I've been having what I thought were supply issues this month. The problem seems to be that my pump had a problem which then led to a supply problem which I'm hopeful is improving. When I'm home he nurses 5-6x a day. Still both sides in the AM and PM and usually just one side for about 5-10 minutes the rest of the time. He has really become more efficient. It used to take me 40-60 minutes sometimes in the morning for one feeding. I'm loving all the extra time I have now!

He continues to sleep about 10-11 hours per night and he handled the time change surprisingly well. Although some nights he is ready to pass out at 7:30 and then other nights, like tonight (it's 8:48) he's chatting up a storm in there. He usually wakes up about 6:30. Naps have gone well this week, although I wish they were longer. The good news is that he's been taking them in his crib! WooHoo!

So that's the latest and greatest. Of course he continues to be the cutest baby in the world and is just doing so many new little things all the time. He talks talks talks all the time. No words or anything that sound like words but boy does he babble and sing. He smiles a TON but makes us work kinda hard for laughs. He loves standing. He can pull himself up while just holding on to our fingers. Not a fan of tummy time so my guess is he may skip the crawling all together. Who knows?!