7 Months!

I’ve been a mom for 7 months now and lately it has really hit me how much I love this. How much I love my son. How much I love my husband. How lucky I am to have this amazing family. That all sounds so trite when I put it down to “paper” and I don’t know if it is even possible to explain the feelings of awe, fulfillment and pleasure I get from watching my baby grow and become his own little person. 

He is becoming so aware of everything going on around him and he has such a personality. He giggles because he finds something amusing which is just so cool. He has his own little sense of humor and he is constantly making my husband and I laugh. I mean who doesn’t let out at least a little guffaw when watching a fat little baby play with a plastic bag like it is the coolest most worthwhile thing ever.

He loves the time I spent on decorating his room.  I know this because he can spend 20 minutes (which for him is a looong time) just hanging out in there and taking it all in. Every time he sees the window curtains his eyes go all big and round and he delights in touching them. He also delights in trying to pull the overhead changing table heater down which seems to be a bit of a safety concern but thankfully dad installed that and not me, increasing the safety by a 1000%.  

He loves to eat and tries to use the spoon himself. He isn’t very good at it yet. (Mom speak for he sucks. Seriously that kid has poked his eye and gagged himself multiple times with his baby spoon). But he absolutely delights in “doing it himself” and I don’t mind at all. I’m just thankful dishwashers and washing machines exist.

I see in little ways that slowly but surely my little baby is turning into a toddler. In some ways this is sad as this really is all so wonderful. I mean wonderful in a, I break out in tears often just thinking about him, and how much I love him, and how happy he makes me, wonderful- and it is scary to think about those feelings just expanding as he continues to grow. I mean everyone says it just keeps getting better and I wonder how is that even possible? It is already so, so good. However I also am excited for what is to come. 

I'm especially excited for him to figure out crawling as right now he just does this weird push up movement that pushes himself backwards which really pisses him off. So he spends a lot of the day pushing himself back into a corner/under a table/ against a wall,and crying. This was really getting to me so I ended up buying him a walker which he loves. If he could he would spend the whole day standing (with help obviously) so the walker is pure bliss for him. After two day he has already figured it out enough to get into lots of trouble- keys pulled out of drawers, chairs knocked over, books pulled out of shelves LOL. He only gets about 20 minutes twice a day in the walker so that he doesn't get too lazy about crawling but it is a nice change of pace to hear squeals of amusement instead of cries of frustration.

Feeding habits

I recently purchased the book Child of Mine by Ellyn Satter. It seems to be sort of a feeding bible for many and since it had gotten really good reviews from a lot of different people I thought I would check it out. It was written by a nutritionist and psychotherapist, and has been revised a few times. It is dense but I am really enjoying it so far.

The main idea of it is that we as the parents are responsible for the when, where, and what of feeding whereas Teddy is responsible for how much and whether.

I love this idea as I have never understood food battles and I really want all of my children growing up with healthy food habits.

She goes very in depth with how the transition from breast/formula to table food should go and for the most part we are on the right track. She suggests transitioning over to table foods relatively quickly once purees have been introduced and not getting stuck with purees for too long- she also encourages letting the child feed himself if they show interest, which Teddy definitely has.

So I have started letting Teddy feed himself more for at least one meal a day. It is such a disgusting mess. Thankfully I am not at all sensitive about stuff like that but my husband is definitely not feeding him when he does it himself anytime soon. She also says how important it is for him to eat what we are eating so I have started giving him things like strips of soft bread and anything else I think can easily dissolve in his mouth with a little gum chewing.

On the one hand it is fun to watch Teddy in an area where he seems to be progressing quite quickly but it is also bittersweet to realize he most definitely isn't a little baby anymore. Especially after he drinks a little from his cup, swipes the adult spoon I am holding and shoves it into his mouth with relish. By following his lead he just naturally transitioned to 3 meals a day with snacks so quickly that the days of long breastfeeding sessions are definitively over.

I just hope he holds off on the toddler-hood trait of rejecting different foods to assert independence a little bit longer!

Baby Showers

I'm throwing a baby shower and considering the only baby shower I have ever been to was my own, I'm looking for some tips.

What are your favorite activities at baby showers?

What do you secretly hate?

What is a good order to do things?

Any tips are most welcome.

To keep this post from being the absolute opposite of fun, I've thrown in a nice little nonsensical picture story.

Teddy enjoys a healthy meal of dirty printed paper, which is probably full of cancer causing inks. Mom is just happy to take a break from his other favorite- dirty plastic bags.

Haha just try and take this from my moist chunky little fingers.

Oh no the random take-out menu has been ruined. Someone is in big trouble.

That is right buddy, you're going in the box.

Clearly your sitting skills still leave a lot to be desired :D

We'll stick with standing.

We're back ....

and we have hit some awesome milestones like....
wait for it....

Our first cold!!! Yeah! We all got sick in the U.S. and although Teddy is barely sick with the cold that we all had, his is lasting FOREVER. He is now going on week 3 of being sick. During the day we notice basically nothing but then at night he has a stuffy nose and sleeps terribly, and by terribly I mean up every 1-2 hours the whole darn night, terribly. Needless to say we are all hoping he gets better soon. The doctor checked him out and he doesn't have anything which would need treating like bronchitis, so I will just continue to give him homeopathic medicines (which I honestly believe do absolutely nothing) and hope that someday soon I can have a 5 hour stretch of sleep again.

The States were AWESOME though. We got to see grandma, who Teddy remembered and loved, meet my friends from school time, and spend time with my relatives.

Teddy also got to make some new friends in the form of my mom's cats. He loved them, maybe too much....

Teddy did not start crawling or rolling or anything else of that nature while we were there but he has now become insatiable when it comes to food. I mean the kid is close to getting tears in his eyes when we are eating if he can't have some too, or doesn't have his own food to eat. He was eating Gerbers natural babyfoods like it was some sort of baby crack- and everything else which we let him try; pickles, sno-cone, rolls, etc too bad the kid still doesn't have any teeth as it really limits what I can offer him.

But how could I forget his favorite treat, paper! If there is any sort of paper near him, he is on top of it, quickly shoving it into his mouth. I'm surprised by how quickly he can cause things to dissolve, newspaper is the worst but books, cards, restaurant menus, customs forms (they loved that!) have all been on his meal plan.

We all had a lovely time and the flights were OK. The flight coming in was rough just because some people near us never dimmed their lights so even though Teddy should have been sleeping for at least 4 of the 8 1/2 hours to Minnesota he slept 1 hour which was in 2 30 minute increments. The rest of the time he was wide awake and needed to be entertained. On the way back he slept 6 hours though and it was solely due to the fact that the plane was dark. It was bliss! He was a great traveler though and quite a few people commented on it. Almost no tears were shed and we, the parents, were able to get through it with such aplomb that the next flight is already booked. Although I will be traveling alone with him for that one and I am dreading it just a teeny bit.

Shopping was a big part of our America trip. Teddy is in 18 months, 24 months, or 2T depending on the brand and the clothing article. Unfortunately these clothes are made for older children who are moving of their own accord so they are often much too tight in the waist. Until he slims down a bit he is going to be wearing a lot of fleece pants and overalls. Sigh.

Now we are happy to be back in rainy, cold Germany and looking forward to the next 6 months of Teddy's first year of life.