Eight months!

Weight and height are unknown! This is the first time since Dylan was born that he hasn't needed a weight gain check at the doctor!

My baby boy is eight months old and on his eight month birthday his cousin Scout Catherine Smith was born, weighing 6 pounds 12 ounces. An identical birth weight to Dylan. This has been an exciting year for our family and we are thrilled that Scout has arrived. She is beautiful and precious and has stolen our hearts already.



Month eight was an exciting one. I find that every month I think that this has been the most exciting yet. But truly, the best thing happened this month... wait for it... the puking has finally stopped. Seriously, this is not a milestone that took any skill on Dylan's part but I'm just as proud as if he got up and walked over the stove and cooked Mama some lunch. I could go on and on about the happiness that the up-chuck reflex has died down in that little boy.




Speaking of sleeping through the night, there is not much of a story on this one. Dylan is doing awesome and for the week leading up to our trip, he was put to bed by Daddy. This doesn't sound like much but we'd gotten to a place where bedtime required his Mommy and her boobs (or maybe just the boobs, who knows) to be present and this change feels like someone has removed the chains that have been tying me down to the glider in Dylan's room for eight months.

There is always more to be said about sleeping, however, and this has to do with some other very big milestones this month. In the span of just 7-10 days, Dylan went from one very pathetic crawler to competent crawling and then one day while I was on the phone he grabbed the edge of his exersaucer and pulled himself up to his knees. He promptly got overexcited at the possibilities of his own uprightedness that he let go and fell to the side, bumping his head on the top tray and bottom saucer of the exersaucer. There have been many bumps since that day and I feel like I will be very much to blame when he gets held back in grade 3 and I'll have to explain to him that he pulled himself up on absolutely every. single. object taller than 6 inches off the floor and fell off or tipped over about 40% of the time. He can be a few feet away from some dangerous object and I may even ponder the fact that he might be just a bit too close but conclude that it should be fine and then he'll fall and his body hurls across the room, bouncing his cranium off that one object. I no longer see the items in a room as merely inert things, but rather menacing death traps that my baby will somehow fnd a way to bash his little growing body against while innocently trying to learn to be a mobile human being.

The reason that pulling himself up has affected his sleep is that the crib provides a wonderful place to practice his mad skills; the bars are great for grabbing and the top is the perfect height to look out and wait for Mama to come and see! I can easily spend the first hour of nap time returning to the room to lay the baby down again... and again... and again. I thought I'd outsmart him and put the sleep sack on him, and he can stand up in it... with a bag around his legs. Seriously annoying.

Dylan's solids consumption has increased greatly and we added Cheerios to his daily intake. The first Cheerio was welcomed with panic and his face saying ARE YOU TRYING TO CHOKE ME!? The next few tries came with the frustration that he could pick the Cheerios up in his fist but lacked the coordination to effectively get them into his mouth. We also introduced Arrowroot cookies as a little treat and boy, they are a BIG treat. Of course they are, they make the biggest mess when eaten!

Things are going so fast these days. Meeting Scout this week has reminded me how far we've come and made me realize that I forget how small, helpless and floppy he was just 8 months ago. Before Dylan we wished time away like there was a never ending supply and in Dylan's early days I hoped for milestones to come because some things were just too hard to take one minute longer. Now as I go to bed at night I often wonder what the next day will bring but I always hope that the clock could stop and not let one more second tick until I'm sure that I've soaked in every precious moment.