Double Trouble!

So I guess this whole working from home thing really hasn't done much for my upkeep of this blog! I'm sure my boss would be glad to know that!  BUT I have enjoyed being at home....mostly because I get to 'handle' Xander in the mornings now and let Simon just get ready. It used to be both of us trying to get ready at the same time and make sure Xander wasn't throwing himself off the bed, down the stairs, over the tub, etc.

 

 

So YES, he has started pulling up, sorta walking since my last post. It all started with this:

 

and now we're at the walker stage where he pulls up on the wall and scoots to wherever he wants to go. He absolutely loves standing up and is pretty bound and determined never to sit down again.

Luckily he's started to really enjoy books, so he will sit for that. Here you can see his favorite...and his cousin reading it to him.

 

 

We decided to brave holiday traffic again this year and head down to St. Augustine for Labor Day weekend.  It was  super fun to be able to hang out all weekend with my Florida family. Xander's 'Florida cousin' enjoyed pushing him in the stroller too.

And of course the beach was fun as usual.

 

We ended up leaving a day earlier than planned because we also discovered that Xander HATES his pack-n-play and refused to sleep Friday and Saturday nights, and well, I was done. However, it ended up being a blessing in disguise because we had no traffic coming home. Even though he hates the pack-n-play, he didn't seem to mind his car seat all that much - whew! Our only meltdowns came when I would take something away....like this awesome red spoon.

Oh, and he did enjoy some light reading on the way home, which killed all of about 15 seconds of the 8 hour drive!

 

Another fun skill X has picked up...drinking out of a cup. He likes this cup, but his absolute favorite is drinking out of mom and dad's cups.

 

 

Simon and I celebrated our anniversary by stuffing our faces at dinner. I mean really, this one piece of chicken could feed a small village!

Other activities from the month included:

Consignment sale shopping... Luckily we have a fancy, big stroller that can handle all my '$3 steals' and X is a good sport about the whole situation.

 

 

 

A fun run in Downtown Davidson with his cousins. 

 

And the month's final activity included lots of trip to the photographer to get pictures like this one:

 

 

 

Yup, Xander will be a big brother in 2014....February. And yup, it's another boy, so luckily I get to keep all those '$3 steals' I've been finding around town!

So...it's been a while.

In looking back, it seems my last update was the middle of July! Well clearly a lot has happened since then.

We're back from a one-week stay in Canada. Xander did incredibly well on all our flights....sleeping through most of them. And being a "people person" (aka nosey), he also delighted the passengers around us by continually staring at them and smiling.

 

 

Canada was great. Xander's oldest cousin was in love with him, so it was fun to watch them play. Mamina has loads of good toys at her cottage, so I think he enjoyed having new stuff around him.

 

We've survived a mild case of hand, foot and mouth....not to be confused with hoof and mouth disease! Clearly, it just made Xander tired. Our non-napping child all of a sudden began taking 2-3 hour naps twice a day! However, he was definitely bored with mom and dad after a week of no daycare.....

 

 

 

...and became a little bit of a cranky pants for a couple of days...or maybe he didn't like the haircut mom gave him?

 

 

But after being back in school for a mere day, he was back to his normal self again.

He's totally mesmerized by this book. The very last page has a dragon king with a crown that lights up and plays music. I watch him with other books trying to find the singing, light-up page, and he just gets ticked off at them and starts whining. Then I show him this book, and all is well again. So note: don't give Xander any non-noise making, light-producing books in the future!

 

 

We also had his nine-month check up recently. All is well. His head made it back on the charts....down to the 94th percentile, and his height and weight were in the upper 80s (down from mid-90s), so it seems he is slowing down a bit. The doc recommended we start brushing his teeth...and given his parental dental gene pool, I figured we better take her advice. He seems to like the toothbrush, so let's hope that keeps up.

 

 

I start working from home Monday....my building at work is FINALLY getting remodeled, and I am super stoked. I'm hopeful that since people won't be able to see me every day, they won't be able to throw extra work at me and I can do cool stuff like keep up with this blog better. But most of all, I'm hopeful I can do things like laundry while I'm working. Yes, I aim high!

More on feeding the Big Guy

So now that Xander is 8 month old, he has expanded his delicate palate beyond just boring 'ole formula. It's been fun experimenting with food to see what he likes and watching his facial expressions when he tries something new. But in reality, he likes everything...I mean, have you seen his thighs? This boy doesn't say  no to much.

So much like the story here on what type of milk he ate, I decided to break even more "rules" and started attempting to feed him solids around 4 months. I suppose this is one rule that is changing more than the 'breastfeeding is a must' rule, but plenty of people would tell you that starting solids before 6 months will give your kid food allergies.

Whatever...I just decided to let Xander tell me if he wanted to eat some solids. In the beginning, he definitely said NO. I started with bananas, and he would just kinda sit there and look at me like - "you're crazy lady, where's my bottle?"

About 4.5 months, he would actually swallow some bananas, and around 5 months, he'd actively open his mouth for the next bite. To me, this showed me he was ready for solids. So around 5.5 months, I started trying other stuff....mostly the pouch baby foods from the store.

Around 6 months, my friend shared some of the homemade stuff she'd made for her son. She told me how simple (relatively speaking) it was, so I decided to give it a try myself. I've ended up really liking making Xander's food. Now, don't get me wrong, he still eats those pouches .... they're PERFECT for traveling or really eating anywhere  but your own house.

I started slowly....by doing simple stuff like mixing up a banana with avocado as seen here:

 

 

 Then I decided to get a little adventurous and made a baked pear/banana mix. Started off easy enough: peel and place fruit on baking tray:

 

Bake for 20-30 minutes until they look ooey gooey like this:

 



 

Then throw in food processor for your desired consistency. At the time, this was mine:

 

 

Now that he is 8 months and had several teeth, we've started giving him more whole (soft) foods to try - stuff with more texture. Last night, here's what happened with the avocado:

 

 

 

By the end of dinner, the entire tray was green.....as was his bib and face. A long bath promptly followed!

 

I've been using this site as my guide - anyone know of any other good ones?

Father's Day...and the rest of June

It's been a busy couple of weeks...keeping up with all the spots and stuff. After getting all that cleared up and back on a better sleep schedule,  I realized I missed an important holiday in June....Father's Day! I'm certainly not sure how single parents do it because I know I'd already have lost all my hair if Simon weren't around! To celebrate, we went to lunch and spent the day being lazy. 

 

 

At the end of the month, we hit the beach to visit with Nanny. On the way down, we picked up a cousin and visited with the others....we think they look more like siblings than cousins:

 

When we could tear him away from the sand (eating it), he did seem to enjoy the water.

 

 

And speaking of water....he STILL loves the bath...even when mom plays with his hair:

 

 

The very last weekend, we headed to Canada to visit Mamina and our other family there....more on that trip in a different post.

We're seeing spots

So the sixth month mark was a big mark for us.

First, we began to see the inking of teeth forming on Xander's bottom gumline, and then sure enough - the first one broke through...then the next one!

But I should back up....

Before the sighting of teeth, Xander had his first ear infection. It was right before his six month check up. I was acting all proud: "He's been in daycare for more than three months, and this is the first time we've had to see the doctor!" Haha...little did I know. On a positive note though - he was still the happy-go-lucky Xander we all know and love all during the infection. No complaints.

Then we had his six month check up. The doc said his ear looked "better" but not completely  healed so if he started acting up/differently to bring him back in. Well, hello, has she met him...he's not very good at letting on that he is in pain. Luckily she did mention that if his sleep starts acting up to bring him back in...because that's how we knew something was up. He went from waking up only once a night to waking up twice...and usually pretty miserable at that first wake up.

So back to the doctor...

Yup, this time it was a double ear infection. Great...I got all cocky with the first one, right!? Anywho - the doc prescribed a stronger medicine this time - Augmentin. All seemed to be going well until about day 5 into taking the new medicine....Simon brought him in looking like this:

Luckily I have a baby nurse as a sister and quickly texted her a photo to make sure this wasn't chicken pox. She said it looked more like a reaction...was he taking any medicine or had he eaten anything new/different? BINGO.

So Simon took him to the doctor, and sure enough - textbook penicillin reaction. Doc said it was 'normal' enough and to keep pumping him with Benadryl. So we did. When they looked like this the next day:

we called to ask how long we could give him the Bendryl. Doc said however long we wanted/needed.

So when he looked like this the next day, I called the doctor again....he humored my question and said the spots could be there for up to 10 days!!

But then he woke up the next day, and they were gone...and have been gone since.

It's been a fun week-and-a-half to two weeks in our house! Now we just have to get his sleep back on track! (and await the next tooth breakthrough!)

Lately....

Everyone said it would happen, and well it has....XYZ has grown up! Other than still drooling everywhere and not having any teeth, I feel like he's not really a "BABY" anymore. I'm not sure what I would call him as he's not a toddler either, but he's just too big and independent to be a baby anymore!

Speaking of drool though. Oh my....we've taken to freezing burp cloths and letting him suck on those - as you can see below, he just shoves it in his mouth and lets go. We also gave him some frozen apple in a mesh thingy, which he enjoy and made a mess with...as you can see below. (And then looked like he'd frozen his entire face with!)

We finally got around to hanging some of the photos Annie took for us. Though not entirely straight/centered, here' what the finished product looks like (for now...hey they're on the wall at least, right?!)

 Last weekend, we actually made it to church. This has become a not-so-regular occurrence in our family since Xander arrived, but we do try. They have a lovely family room where we can all sit together and not stress if lil man starts screaming or something.  As you can see here, as long as he has something to put in his mouth, he's pretty happy.

And we also made it to the pool....no words needed here:

 

 And finally - his latest trick....sitting up all by himself!

Half a Year Old

Not to sound redundant, but I can't believe it! Xander is 6 months old now. I have to look back at the 5 month post to remind myself of all the new things he's doing.

• Rolling over consistently from back to front and front to back
• Laughing all the time
• Blowing bubbles
• Allllmmmmooooosssst sitting up on his own
• Putting EVERYthing in his mouth
• Eating mom and dad out of house and home
  

Stats from our 6 month well visit yesterday:

Height: 28 inches (88%)

Weight: 20 lbs, 11 oz (87%)

Head: 46.5 cm (97+%....his little dot was officially OFF the chart)

He still LOVEs the bath....as evidenced below:

He has now been to two birthday parties. Here he is at his cousin's this past weekend....just hanging out in the dino chair....and at Lucinda's party sporting a lion hat:

We also had two visitors this past weekend. "Original" Laura came down from New Hampshire and gave him his first taste of pineapple:

While Callee came to town and gave him a bright, shiny balloon.....which he proceeded to try and eat (unsuccessfully):

He is big enough now to enjoy the baby swings at parks, and of course, he LOVEs them.

And last but not least, I got to celebrate my first Mother's Day. Other than locking ourselves out of the house after breakfast, it was a great day. I will be redeeming my Zen massage later this week!