7 months

Dear Kaeden,

It's been another big month for you. Happy 7 months, little one!

This month has been full of lots of changes and firsts for you - it's been a busy one! I guess you refused to get overshadowed by big brother's birthday month. Good thinking ;-)

enjoying one of Ryan's new birthday presents

Along with Ryan's birthday, you had your first trip to the zoo. I'm not sure how much you got out of it, but you didn't mind spending a lot of time in the carrier. You are my little snuggle bug, after all.


This month you mastered sitting up, and embarked on a long journey of learning to crawl. And at the very very end, you figured out how to sit up from a crawling position - it's wonderful! You were nothing like Ryan in learning to crawl. He spent a lot of time on his hands and knees, went through a very brief period of scooting to try to get somewhere, and then one day just started crawling. Oh, and he was almost 9 months old. You were much much more gradual yet determined to figure this thing out as soon as possible.


You had your first trip to the beach this month - there's a whole post coming on that soon, but in general, you did great! You slept well in a new place, and didn't mind being on the beach much at all. You didn't really even mind eating the sand, but Mommy definitely did!

G-R-O-S-S!

While at the beach, you also had your first time in a pool. It was pretty chilly, so you screamed when I first put you in, but after a few minutes you got used to it and really seemed to enjoy it. You splashed and watched Ryan and twirled around in your float.


You also "painted" for the first time. You did pretty well for a not quite 7 month old. It didn't last long, but you did swirl the paint around on the paper some, and you didn't eat too much of it! Your belly sure did get covered, though, which lead to an exciting bath in the sink!

And finally, it was your first Mother's Day. I am so blessed to have you boys in my life. There is no job in the world I would rather have than taking care of you!

You are continuing to expand your repertoire of "solid" foods. So far, you've had green beans, carrots, peas, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, prunes, and apples. You haven't tried anything that you didn't like. In fact, we finish most meals with you still seeming to want more, but I also want to be sure that you are still nursing plenty. We're still working on that balance, but clearly, you are not going hungry!

We seem to be entering a phase of stranger anxiety. Some people just don't strike you quite right, and you will just study and study them and then eventually break down hysterically crying (especially if they try to engage you, which adults usually do if you stare at them). The good news is that as long as you are with somebody you know, you haven't started in on any separation anxiety yet. You sure do love your mommy & daddy, though!

You are a sweet sweet snuggler. It's funny, because you don't necessarily like to be hugged or snuggled when you're upset or going to sleep - in fact, I can't remember the last time you let me rock you to sleep - but at any other point during the day, you will gladly snuggle up to me or daddy, and it's just the sweetest thing.


Your schedule these days goes something like this:
wake up around 7 am
nurse
play
eat prunes & barley around 8:45
nap at 9 (anywhere from 30 mins to 2 hours)
play
nurse at 11
play
lunch (2 cubes of veggies) at 12:30
nap either before or after next nursing (around 2:30-3), depending on how long you slept in the morning
play
nurse around 5-5:30
dinner (2 cubes of veggies or fruit) at 6:30
nurse again around 7:15
bed between 7:30-8

and of course there's a lot of driving here and there, entertaining your brother, being carried around by mommy and daddy, etc. in there.


You like:
- anything soft! You are so not like your brother in this. He never cared a bit about a stuffed animal or blanket or lovee or anything like that at this age. If you see something fluffy, you go straight for it, and you are completely attached to your dog lovee that you sleep with - grabbing him is the first thing you do when I set you in your crib. It's great!
- HAIR. I never understood why your Nana cut her hair when Uncle Dain was a baby until you came along. I pretty much have to wear my hair in a ponytail at all times, but even then, if there is one stray hair hanging down, you will inevitably find it and grab it. I guess it goes along with the whole soft stuff thing.
- crawling! You are so happy to just play by yourself and explore now. It's great... until you get into something you shouldn't... like one of Ryan's many creations.
- eating. I think you just might do it all day long if I let you.
- when Ryan pays attention to you
- Mommy & Daddy snuggles


You don't like:
- strangers
- long car rides (unless you're sleeping)
- teething (who does!?!)
- loud/sudden noises, although you are getting much much better about this


And finally, your 7 month photos... definitely more challenging for Mommy now that you know how to crawl.

I tried to distract you with a block and all you did was chew on it.

This is what most of the pictures look like. Just crawling away!

I did manage to distract you with the blanket, though.

On the move

Kaeden is officially on the move. His crawl has been slowly developing & becoming more efficient for the past few weeks now, and even though it is still not graceful, I think we can safely say that he is "crawling". It was a bit of a surprise, since Ryan didn't crawl until he was almost 9 months old, but I guess he has to keep up with his big brother! Life at our house has changed drastically, as there is now the added challenge of keeping Kaeden away from whatever Ryan is playing with. On day 2 or so of efficient crawling, I heard Ryan yelling in a panicked voice from the other room, "He's coming! He's coming!" So, we're working on various tactics to help - Ryan moving away, distracting Kaeden with another toy, or just asking Mommy for help. And so far, he's handling it pretty well. Kaeden, meanwhile, is thrilled to be able to explore, and since he has also learned in the last few days how to sit back up from crawling, he is quite happy to play on his own for longer periods of time, which is definitely a bonus.

Anyway, here's some video evidence:

Ryan's birthday, part 3: preschool

On the Monday after Ryan's birthday, I got to assist in his preschool class and we had yet another celebration with his turtle friends. While I was there, I also documented some of Ryan's day at preschool.

Here he is with his friends, playing play dough (one of their arrival activities):

He got to be the "special helper" of the day - one of his responsibilities was helping with morning meeting. Here he is with Miss Pam, counting out the days of the month:

Playground time is one of his favorite parts of the day. Here he's climbing on the train with his friend, Tierney:

The birthday celebrant gets to hold the "birthday bear" who sings "happy birthday" - Ryan must have told me at least a dozen times about this leading up to the day. He was the last birthday in his class, so he had seen everybody else get their turn. Needless to say, he was very excited!

And since it was a beautiful day, we had a picnic snack, complete with cupcakes (with "frosting & sprinkles!" as Ryan says):



Finally, here they are doing "Bop 'til you drop" - Ryan's dancing with his friend, Kyla. Can you tell he likes the girls?


Ryan clearly felt very special & loved, and it was a joy for me to be there to see it! He sure is going to miss his turtle friends this summer. Speaking of which, here he is on the first & last days of his first year of preschool. Hasn't he grown so much?

Ryan's birthday, part 2: family day

Ryan's birthday was on a Saturday this year, and since we had already had his party the day before, I knew we needed to do something special as a family. We gave him some choices and he decided he wanted to go to the zoo (yay! That was my first choice too!) We hadn't been since he was a year and a half, so I was excited to go back now that he is quite a bit older.

We had a great time. The NC Zoo is fabulous for animals (as far as I can tell) - the habitats seem large & comfortable, but that does make it a little less convenient for human visitors... especially when a certain 3-year-old decides his "legs are broken" and he doesn't want to walk at all.

I only took the single stroller, figuring that the boys could trade off and we could have Kaeden in the carrier some of the time and Ryan could walk some of the time. Nope. Ryan spent the vast majority of the day in the stroller or on Daddy's shoulders. Here's Ryan, lounging, (enjoying his birthday boy status) and planning out our visit. He loved the map!


First stop, giraffes:


and then elephants:



(as compared to Oct of 2009:)

One of the highlights for Ryan was the sprinklers they had at various places:



Kaeden got in on the action a bit too :)

Spoiling our birthday boy with some ice cream (in addition to the popcorn, hot dog, etc. - the zoo is not exactly a healthy place to eat!):


... and of course the fake animals that one can climb on are at least as exciting as the real ones...


At least the polar bear decided to play!




The zoo was long & tiring , but we all had a great time and I was so glad to be able to do something special as a family for Ryan's big day.

That night, we got to celebrate some more with Uncle Bret, Auntie, and Atticus. Ryan got to pick what he wanted for dinner (chick-fil-a, of course), we had a special cake for dessert, and he got to open presents.

Here is Ryan's cake:


Last year, he requested an Elmo cake and decided at the time that this year, it would be cookie monster and then big bird and it would just rotate for the rest of his life. So, although he is not really interested in sesame street at all right now, he insisted on keeping with his plan and having a cookie monster cake.

It took a number of tries, but eventually he blew out the candle all by himself:


and then decided to dive right in:


(we did stop him & insist that we cut him a piece first!)

not quite so messy this year:

the answer to how old he is now:

and finally time to open presents:




Birthday, day 2, was a big success - much more so than day 1 :) It was good to see lots of 3-year-old smiles!