Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Owen at Eight Months.


Owen is getting so big! Eight months! Here is a little bit about our boy...

The day after he turned seven months, Owen starting crawling up on his knees, instead of army crawling. Now he is so much faster and seems to get from one end of the room to the other at lightening speed. In true baby fashion, he is all about power cords, random bits of fuzz and dust on the ground, and the cat's water dish. Essentially, he wants anything that he's not supposed to have. He's also pulling up on everything in sight, and is starting to cruise around while holding onto furniture. 

Owen is starting to make so many little sounds and is always babbling and squealing. Ma-ma, da-da, ja-ja, etc. are frequent sounds. He's actually starting to say ma-ma a lot more, and I'm wondering whether he is associating it with me at all. It may be too early, but I know that within a few months he will definitely be directing ma-ma toward me. Owen continues to have such a sweet, happy personality. He's still extremely smiley and gives giant open-mouthed kisses. My makeup is never safe, because it seems like as soon as my makeup is done for the day he gives my nose, cheek, or mouth a giant, slobbery kiss. And I don't mind at all- he's just too sweet.

Owen has had a difficult winter so far- he and Dylan both had croup in December and Owen is recovering from his first ear infection. Last week he started getting super fussy, especially during mealtimes and nursing, and he was not sleeping well. I was thinking that he may have been teething, so we were giving him Orajel and teething tablets and wondering why he was still so uncomfortable. My mommy gut was telling me that it might be his ears, and I'm so happy that I listened and took him in to the ped- he had an infection in his left ear. Poor boy! After 12 days on meds he is good as new! 

Owen is still happy, happy, except when you try to do either of these things: change his diaper or get him dressed. Owen does not like to lay on his back, because all he wants to do is roll over and go, go go. He's started doing what Ben and I call "the death spiral." He tries and tries to get off of his back no matter what and gets super angry when you won't let him. Sorry Owen, but you have to be on your back when I change you. There is nothing that we can do to avoid him trying to roll over- we give him fun things to hold (even non-baby items that would normally capture his attention, like hair clips, hand mirrors, etc.) and he still tries to roll. I hope that this is just a phase and he'll realize that his attempts to roll over during diaper change time are futile, and he just needs to suck it up and stay on his back. 

Owen is finally getting back to sleeping through the night- hallelujah! It seems like ever since he had croup a month and a half ago he has gotten into the habit of waking up around 2 or 3 am, but he is finally getting back to waking up around 6ish for a feeding and then going back to bed until around 7-8am. Owen usually take three 60-90 minute naps each day, although sometimes he just takes two if one of his naps is super long. 

Owen doesn't have any teeth yet, which I am perfectly ok with- I love his sweet, gummy smile, and I also enjoy nursing without worrying about teeth. Speaking of nursing, Owen still nurses about 5 times each day- when he wakes up in the morning, after each of his naps, and before bed. I don't think he's drinking as much lately, since some of his nursing sessions have been so short. The milk is there, but it seems like Owen doesn't want to waste time nursing, he just wants to be on the move. Owen is great with baby food and has loved everything that he's tried. He's also started to self feed and gets so excited about Gerber puffs or yogurt melts. I give him little bits of bread, quartered raspberries, peeled and quartered grapes... the boy loves it all. We also started using a food grinder, so that we can grind up whatever we're eating for dinner and feed it to him, as long as dinner isn't too spicy, impractical, etc. 

Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the past month:







Friday, January 17, 2014

Let's just pretend that it's still Christmastime, ok?

 We had such a wonderful December and I'm sad that it has come and gone. After my birthday on the 8th, it was time for the Christmas countdown. We left for Indiana on the 18th for eleven relaxing days with family. A few days before we left, Dylan's preschool had a Christmas party. It was so cute- there was food, Santa, singing, and a little present for parents. Dylan's class made a class recipe book with a recipe that each child shared. It was darling and hilarious. Here is Dylan's favorite recipe:

Dylan has this obsession with ice sculptures (no joke- he wanted one at his birthday party) and I'm so happy that they were included in the recipe. 

This is a classic example of Dylan's sweet and sour personality. He was not interested in singing with the other children at the Christmas party- he's in the green shirt. 

Ben didn't come to Indiana until Christmas Eve, but we Face Timed with him multiple times each day. Owen would get so excited for Face Time- I'm not sure if it was because he loved seeing himself on my phone, or if he was excited to see Ben's picture. Either way, his reactions were darling. 

Watching TV at my parent's house was super fun for Dylan, since he was able to watch from his "nest." He wanted to have his backpack on a lot with all of his toys inside. 


On Christmas Eve we had a little Nativity reenactment. Dylan was Joseph, Evvie was Mary, Owen was baby Jesus, and I was the angel 


Another example of Dylan's sweet and sour personality... the boys on Christmas Eve in their matching jammies. 


Ben did some fancy wrapping for my Christmas gifts. I wonder what this one was???

The day after Christmas we went to the Indianapolis Children's Museum... so much fun!


And then on the 27th I was able to meet up with some of my most wonderful childhood friends for dinner. Can't wait to see them again in March for Dr. Lindsey's wedding!

Owen loves his grandma so much!

Seesters!

Cousins!

Aaaaand some airport hilariousness. Love!

It was a wonderful December and I wish we could just do it all again!

Sunday, January 5, 2014

Owen at Seven Months.

This post is definitely overdue, as Owen turns 8 months in just two days! Crazy! Out little boy is growing so quickly, and I'm going to try and remember as much as I can about what he does each month. 

Owen is officially on the move! He began army-crawling at 6 months, and he only got better and quicker each day. He has started rocking back and forth on his hands and knees and so badly wants to crawl that way. He even moves his hands or his knees forward, but he hasn't gotten the coordination of moving everything together. He is also trying to climb on things- we have a table in our living room with a shelf just a few inches off the ground, and it is his mission to climb onto it. He is such a strong boy! He's gotten great at sitting by himself, and I know feel confident sitting him on the ground without anything behind him. 

Owen's favorite thing is to be where Dylan is and play with his toys. Owen loves his big brother and is so curious and interested in big boy things. We are so blessed to have Dylan as the best big brother I could have asked for- he's so sweet to Owen (still calls Owen "my baby" or "brudder") and is always willing to share his toys with him. The only thing that Dylan seems a little territorial over are his Legos, but I think that is mostly because we have drilled it into Dylan's head that Legos are not safe for babies and that Owen cannot have any of his Legos. 

Owen is such a great eater and has starting having more and more solids. He typically has one package of baby food, three times each day. While I'm not one to demand that Owen only eats organic, I try to feed him mostly organic baby food. Ella's Kitchen and Plum Organics are our go-to choices for baby food. He also loves to eat fruit from these mesh feeders:
He gets all excited whenever he sees them, since he knows that he's about to get something good, like bananas or cantaloupe. The only bummer? Cleaning bananas out of these things is a pain! Hate, hate, hate.

As you may remember, Owen was in the 2nd percentile for weight at his 6 month check up. Since he's started eating more solids (I try to push the higher calorie options or add avocado to ones that are low in calories) and still nurses 5-6 times each day, I feel like he's really starting to chunk up. 

Owen is a pretty predictable sleeper- he wakes up around 7:30 or 8 each morning, takes three naps (usually around 10, 1, and 5) and then goes to bed at 8 pm. He sometimes sleeps through the night and sometimes wakes up around 3-4 am for a little snack... I'm not that stressed about it, although I'm really ready for uninterrupted sleep. He's never had to cry it out (Dylan definitely did when he was 5 months old- I was tougher with him)... and I don't really want him to, but we'll see how this sleeping through the night thing plays out in the coming months. We're starting to try naps without the Woombie on occasion. He seems to do ok, although we almost have to rock him to sleep prior to putting him in his crib. 

Happy belated 7 months to our sweet boy!