Dear Wes,
Congratulations! You are officially two thirds of the way done with your first year of life.
More than ever, I wish I could be Ms. Frizzle and travel into your brain. Every day you seem to become less like a baby and more like a little human. Though I do miss the days when your eyes were closed for 75% of the day (which meant lots of cuddles all day long) this new eight month you is so much fun.
(I was taking these pictures on my own that day hence the un-portraity look we got here. #thisis8months)
The days when you would generously smile for no reason are long gone. Your brain realized that smiling requires work on your end and in turn should require some measure of effort on us to earn those smiles. This month turned your dad and me into groveling jesters. We will deny this to any other living soul, but we may or may not have engaged in strange behaviors such as booty popping dancing, operatic singing and violent raspberry blowing in order to get a laugh from you. I would go as far as to say that I would give up my first-born son to see you laugh but then that would be self-defeating.
We have been calling you Puppy lately because we will find you chewing on wires (woops), nibbling our toes (gross), and our couch looking like this (ugh):
Your dad and I held off on getting a dog because we knew it was a lot of work and we just thought we would just have kids instead. I guess we get the best of both worlds in you!
Love,
Mama
Ps. Yes this newsletter is short. No it is not because we don’t love you. One day when you have a 8 month old, you will understand why.
Milestones
Since your debut, you have grown about 10 inches and more than tripled your weight. For any adult, this would be horrifying. But this is totally acceptable (and even commendable) for you. Live it up son because take it from me, there will come a day when people won’t think that having chubby cheeks, muffin tops and thigh rolls is essential to being cute. What is worse, one that day you may have to wear pants that aren’t elastic. (I know, it’s a cruel, cruel world).
- Size 3 Diapers. This happened many weeks ago, but I don’t think I have mentioned this officially. We are most comfortable wearing 9-12 month clothes.
- Weight: Actual weight – 18 lbs 4oz; feels like 25 lbs.
- New foods: chicken, greek yogurt, parsnips, mom’s leftover penne with meat sauce, apricots, baby mum mum rice crackers, raspberries, happy baby puffs in green apple, sweet potato and purple carrot + blueberries
- Drinking: Wes is really good at getting water out of the sippy cup. Wes is not so good at knowing when to swallow. He often gets too much water in his mouth and gags and drools water. During mealtimes, I feel like the cautious goodie goodie cautioning a frat boy at a party, “Okay Wes, that’s enough drinking. You don’t want to puke!”
- Chewing: I have nothing remarkable to say here except that it’s happening. Hurray!
- Hand to mouth coordination. This was a struggle for Wes for a long time. I would place a puff in the palm of my hand and either he would face plant into my hand in hopes of reaching the puff or push my hand up into his mouth. Wes quickly realized that his pincer grasp was not his forte and would result in only a 30% mouth retention rate. Thankfully with more practice (read: 2 cans of puffs later), he can now grab multiple puffs at a time and bring them to his mouth. The hope is that upon releasing his grasp, one of the four puffs will make into his mouth. This has been relatively successful.
- Crawling: For the first 2 weeks of crawling, Wes would do the worm in which he would face plant and thrust his hips into the air and inch his way toward us. (This kid will be awesome at dance parties) Though lots of fun to watch, this method of locomotion is exhausting and he was not inclined to crawl unless the reward was really good (like our phones). Now that he is army crawling, he is more willing to move for mundane items like name tag stickers, paper, puffs and sometimes a parent.
- Our current sleep thing: Bedtime around 6:30pm, pre-dawn milk guzzling around 4:30 am and then back to bed until 7:00 am. The Tiger Mom in me says this is not perfect but the realist mama underneath says I am SO GRATEFUL.
Likes
- Tags are still a hit, but this new toy has been fun for him (Thanks Uncle Y and Auntie C!)
- Undivided attention. Unless you are going to share your computer, phone or ipad with him during play time, Wesley would like to say “Give your alllllll to me… give me allllllll of you”
Gripes
- Being asked to stay still during diaper changing times. Wesley will stay still all the way up until the final wipe and then he starts flipping and arching his back. “HOW DARE YOU put a diaper on me!! Clothing is an abomination of my freedom!!!” Newest Future Nudist Colony Resident?(This was taken after Wesley was put in his first time out for an especially rebellious changing session. As you can see below, it went over a little too well.)
Summer Candy 