Talking: Well, I stopped tracking words this month; I could have kept it up a bit longer I suppose, but it was getting hard to know which words Ant was just repeating vs. which ones he really knows. Although now for the most part anything he repeats he often will use again in the right context very quickly. The two major changes this month were starting to call us "daddy" and "mommy" instead of "dada" and "mama", and saying "S"s properly (F has now also been replaced with S in a lot of cases, so 'fan', which used to be "han", is now "san". And washing machine has gone from "heen" to "sheen". Some of my favorite words this month have been that Santa says "ho ho ho", mixer (maser), beater (beatah), food processor (pasah), oregano!, climbing, coaster (coaser), flashing (hashi), bannister (bansa), and thermometer (mahtah). He's got almost all the animal sounds now, and when we tell him a new one he picks it up quite quickly. He w as also walking around saying "ay BEE see" for a few days. Occasionally "dee" was thrown in there as well, but mostly it was just abc. Couldn't ever figure out what the trigger for that was, it seemed to be quite random. Finally, he's just starting to put together three word phrases - the other day he said "mommy's car keys", Mark's dad says that Ant said "papa hold bansta", and there have been a few other things that pop out from time to time. He's also started using "it" - as in 'open it' (open-ah), 'dropped it' (dop it), 'find it' (hind it). Okay not quite finally - he's also started saying more and more when we read his books with him. The Elmo lift the flaps book is really cute, he'll say "Oh no!" which is what Elmo says when he can't find his blanket, as well as "hewwo" for the lady talking on the phone, "sinky" (stinky) for the lady holding her nose in the car with Oscar, "dump" for the dump truck, and "cuckoo" for the clock.
Movement: Not too much new here. We've seen lots of walking on tiptoes in the last week or so, which is quite cute. Also he twists his hand back and forth, and says "tatah" (as in the agitator in the washing machine), both when we're down looking at the machine, as well as just randomly. He also has started doing that for the 'wheels on the bus' song.
Mental: One of the things that really astonished me this month was that Ant seems to have memorized at least one of his books. We have the Boynton book "moo ba lalala", and after he learned some of the animal sounds, I started reading to him, leaving spaces for him to fill in the sounds. He got the first two no problem; "A cow says Moo, a sheep says Ba". With no added prompting, he then contined filling them in: "Three singing pigs say La la la"... "little dogs say Ruff Ruff Ruff", "Some other dogs say Bow Wow Wow". He mostly says that dogs say 'woof', so the fact that he filled in the ruff and bow wow, was amazing! Another fun discovery was that one day he was holding the triple paste which goes on his bum, and said "paysht....bum!" again with no prompting whatsoever. He's also started calling himself a baby when he sees pictures or himself in the mirror - although at Mom and Roy's house the other day he pointed to the pictures o f himself and said what I thought sounded very much like Antony. The last big change this month is that he finally seemed to start paying attention to the music playing in the car. We've been having his kids CDs on for a long time, but this was the first month he gave any indication he was listening - after each song ended, at first, he would say "mowah, mowah!". I would respond "more coming, more coming". Now, at the end of each song, he says "coming!". And was incredibly angry when I tried to take him out of the car when we got home the last two nights. I have never ever seen him so upset before! He and Sami seem very enamoured of each other, talking about each other all the time. And they were so excited at Christmas to see the other again, and are really starting to play well, almost together. (The absolute best was when they gave each other a mutual, unprompted hug).
Toys and games: Bowls, pots, pans, thermometers, spoons, wisks were the big favorite this month. Taking them out of the cupboards and putting them into the living room; stacking and unstacking them, and mixing inside them. Also very very happy with the trucks, cars and trains he got for Christmas. As well as the coaster from Mom and Roy! He also is drawing a little bit, and mostly just on the paper. Right handed.
Teeth: Nothing to report.
Feeding: Ant has become a bit more fussy as far as feeding goes. Doesn't seem to like chunks (and spits them out immediately). The beans in minestrone, for example - no way! If I put them through the food processor they go down just fine, so perhaps he has my texture issues. I kinda hope not! He went through a few days of eating very very little, during and after a stomach bug he had, but seems to mostly have improved.
Sleeping: We're mostly on one nap these days, although still two on occasion, especially when he gets up early. We have had a number of days where wake up time has been closer to 7 than 6, which is nice!
Daycare: We went for a transition visit this past week, spent 1.5 hours there. Ant seemed to enjoy himself, particularly liking the windows that let him see into the rooms next door, with the infants and older toddlers. He was saying "hi" to them quite a bit. He also sat at the table with the other kids and had a snack while they had lunch; I was a bit nervous that he wouldn't sit still for long as we're still strapping him into the high chair for meals at home. He starts for real next Thursday.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Saturday, December 1, 2007
Ant diary: Fifteen months
Growth check: Ant is still a weed! At his doctor's appt today they measured him as 33.25 inches and 23lb3oz. 94th and 32nd percentiles, respectively. Head at 47cm, 46th percentile. I can't quite believe he's grown two inches in three months, although he lay nice and still for the measuring, so I'm pretty sure it's right.
Talking: Oodles more words this month, approximately 143. And he's very good at repeating things we say, although I don't count them as words until he's used them on his own, for the most part. We were reading a book the other day and I said "the lion is leaving - he's packed his bags to go on vacation", and Ant repeated "vacation" exactly right! Didn't repeat that, but I was impressed that he said it perfectly that one time! Also lots more two word combos, including "baby cwying" at the doctor's office today at various times when we heard that. Some of my other favorite combos includ "heen open" when he wants to open the washing machine (heen), "hone hinging" when the phone rings, and "mama/dada home!". Some other words I'm impressed by include "tainer" for container, empty, home, basement, broken, cooler, dark, fluff (huff), 'geen bean', monkey, oatmeal, pom-pom, power, raisins (hay-in), shower (hower), salmon (hamon), stuck (huck), and waffle. All of which he clearly understands the meaning of. My absolute favorite word though - happy. It has been said to me a couple of times totally out of the blue when we're snuggling on the chair in his room in the morning. SO sweet! He also says snuggle (huggle) although that one isn't official yet.
Movement: For a few days, Ant was practicing walking backwards, but I haven't seen that again for a while. He also really seems to enjoy turning around in circles. Lots of stomping for a while, but that also seems to have stopped for now. He's also learned to throw things a bit, and will say "trow" when he does. Cute! He's 'running' on occasion - not full blown running just yet, but definitely more than walking. Also likes to dance to the radio in his room.
Mental: More leaps and bounds here. He's started pointing out his own body parts if you ask him - he definitely does his hair, ears, bellybutton, knees, toes, and hands. He throroughly enjoys making towers out of objects, saying "towah" the whole time he's doing it. I'm also extremely impressed by his grasp of some very complex concepts - he's understood 'help' for a while, but he uses 'stuck' appropriately when his foot or hand is stuck in something, 'dark', 'home' and 'power'. He's also now got names for a lot of his books - some the actual name (Tails is Tayah, for example), others are something about the book that he gravitates towards. The ladybug book is 'home', because that's what's on the last page which is his favorite. Blue hat green hat is 'oop' (i.e. oops), because that's what we say when the turkey has his clothes on incorrectly. He also will say please when we ask him to, and just the last few days has started sayin g thank you (something like 'ca ca', but very repeatable) when giving something to us. So he doesn't quite understand that concept just yet, but still - the fact that he's saying it is astonishing. Finally, he's now saying "poop" before / while he's going! The other thing I wanted to mention is that he and Sami seem to be getting a lot better at sharing things.
Toys and games: Ant has started enjoying his stuffed animals more, now knows names for a lot of them. He's more into books this month, often bringing them to us to read, or asking for them by name when we're upstairs on his bed. He really likes containers, opening and closing them.
Teeth: The fourth eye tooth just cut sometime in the last day or two. Finally! I can't believe it's been over a month since the third one cut. Now all we have left is the two year molars. Probably get those in the 18-20 month range would be my guess.
Feeding: Pretty much same old, same old here. One thing that's been added is raisins, which he absolutely LOVES. Whenever he's fussy in the car (we still have him facing the back, btw, he really doesn't seem to mind), I just hand him back some raisins and he's happy as a clam. There's also a veggie/butter/seasoning mix from trader joe's that he really likes.
Sleeping: The daylight savings transition went totally smoothly, thank goodness. Although wakeup time has moved back to around 6:15. 6:45 was so nice! Those extra few minutes of sleep, or time to prepare for hockey/gym were very useful. We've been doing one nap on occasion. Sometimes it works well, other times not so well. I think we'll leave him with two aside from a couple of days a week, to mimic what it might be like when he goes to daycare. I don't think we need to push him to one nap every day until he's ready for it. There have also been a few times now when he's woken up in the middle of the night, we've given him a cup of milk, and then put him back in the crib again - and it's worked! We had been taking him into bed with us when that had happened before (which was fairly infrequent). But I tried that the other day and he was only interested in playing, which I was NOT, so I figured I'd try the crib . And it worked like a charm.
Talking: Oodles more words this month, approximately 143. And he's very good at repeating things we say, although I don't count them as words until he's used them on his own, for the most part. We were reading a book the other day and I said "the lion is leaving - he's packed his bags to go on vacation", and Ant repeated "vacation" exactly right! Didn't repeat that, but I was impressed that he said it perfectly that one time! Also lots more two word combos, including "baby cwying" at the doctor's office today at various times when we heard that. Some of my other favorite combos includ "heen open" when he wants to open the washing machine (heen), "hone hinging" when the phone rings, and "mama/dada home!". Some other words I'm impressed by include "tainer" for container, empty, home, basement, broken, cooler, dark, fluff (huff), 'geen bean', monkey, oatmeal, pom-pom, power, raisins (hay-in), shower (hower), salmon (hamon), stuck (huck), and waffle. All of which he clearly understands the meaning of. My absolute favorite word though - happy. It has been said to me a couple of times totally out of the blue when we're snuggling on the chair in his room in the morning. SO sweet! He also says snuggle (huggle) although that one isn't official yet.
Movement: For a few days, Ant was practicing walking backwards, but I haven't seen that again for a while. He also really seems to enjoy turning around in circles. Lots of stomping for a while, but that also seems to have stopped for now. He's also learned to throw things a bit, and will say "trow" when he does. Cute! He's 'running' on occasion - not full blown running just yet, but definitely more than walking. Also likes to dance to the radio in his room.
Mental: More leaps and bounds here. He's started pointing out his own body parts if you ask him - he definitely does his hair, ears, bellybutton, knees, toes, and hands. He throroughly enjoys making towers out of objects, saying "towah" the whole time he's doing it. I'm also extremely impressed by his grasp of some very complex concepts - he's understood 'help' for a while, but he uses 'stuck' appropriately when his foot or hand is stuck in something, 'dark', 'home' and 'power'. He's also now got names for a lot of his books - some the actual name (Tails is Tayah, for example), others are something about the book that he gravitates towards. The ladybug book is 'home', because that's what's on the last page which is his favorite. Blue hat green hat is 'oop' (i.e. oops), because that's what we say when the turkey has his clothes on incorrectly. He also will say please when we ask him to, and just the last few days has started sayin g thank you (something like 'ca ca', but very repeatable) when giving something to us. So he doesn't quite understand that concept just yet, but still - the fact that he's saying it is astonishing. Finally, he's now saying "poop" before / while he's going! The other thing I wanted to mention is that he and Sami seem to be getting a lot better at sharing things.
Toys and games: Ant has started enjoying his stuffed animals more, now knows names for a lot of them. He's more into books this month, often bringing them to us to read, or asking for them by name when we're upstairs on his bed. He really likes containers, opening and closing them.
Teeth: The fourth eye tooth just cut sometime in the last day or two. Finally! I can't believe it's been over a month since the third one cut. Now all we have left is the two year molars. Probably get those in the 18-20 month range would be my guess.
Feeding: Pretty much same old, same old here. One thing that's been added is raisins, which he absolutely LOVES. Whenever he's fussy in the car (we still have him facing the back, btw, he really doesn't seem to mind), I just hand him back some raisins and he's happy as a clam. There's also a veggie/butter/seasoning mix from trader joe's that he really likes.
Sleeping: The daylight savings transition went totally smoothly, thank goodness. Although wakeup time has moved back to around 6:15. 6:45 was so nice! Those extra few minutes of sleep, or time to prepare for hockey/gym were very useful. We've been doing one nap on occasion. Sometimes it works well, other times not so well. I think we'll leave him with two aside from a couple of days a week, to mimic what it might be like when he goes to daycare. I don't think we need to push him to one nap every day until he's ready for it. There have also been a few times now when he's woken up in the middle of the night, we've given him a cup of milk, and then put him back in the crib again - and it's worked! We had been taking him into bed with us when that had happened before (which was fairly infrequent). But I tried that the other day and he was only interested in playing, which I was NOT, so I figured I'd try the crib . And it worked like a charm.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Ant diary: Fourteen months
Growth check: None this month, I gave the accurate scale to Kate for when Luther is born. About 22lbs according to the differential in my weight holding Ant vs. not. I figure I'll report height/weight when we have our doctor's appointments.
Talking: Ant is acquiring words at close to an exponential rate. 16 the first month he was talking, 31 the second, and 58 this month. I'll list them all here, but I think this might be the last month I can do that! Ready? apple (ap), boots, bowl, bib, bubbles (buh-buh), brush (dush), baby, boo, beans, chair, control as in remote control (cohn), camera (carya), comb, couch, door, ears, fork (hork), fly (hy), granny (gangy), glasses (gah), gate, hey, hi, hands, hummus (hoom), in, ice, juice, Kate, knee, kiss, lock (ock), more(moh), nose (no), no, out, open (ohp), on, papa (Cup, Pup), pot (cot), Pooh, phone (hone), pizza (peetz), please (pees), puck (pup), rock (gock), spoon (hoon), Sami (hami), shoot, swing, turtle (turt), tissue (shoo), teeth (tooth), toothbrush (tooth), toes, truck (teesh), touch, tower (tow), two (after one), yogurt (gog). Phew! There are also another ten words that I think he might have, but not clear - I'll spare you those! He's also started to put together two word combinations, he's done it about five times now, which leads me to believe that it's a bit more than just coincidence. There are a couple I don't remember, but he has definitely said "key gone" when he can't find one of his favorite (i.e. the BMW) car keys. He said "mama hair" when touching my hair, and just tonight "hy gone" after Mark finally managed to swat the fly that has been haunting us for the last five days. (After which Ant proceeded to say "gone" another hundred times or so!)
Movement: Ant started learning to get off the bed and chair last month, then perfected it this month. Doesn't mean he always does it (like tonight when he basically just walked straight off the edge of the bed - Mark was right there so no worries), but he certainly can, with no prompting. Climbing onto the easy chair that's in his room with the little stool in front of it is also de rigeur. He started 'hopping' (i.e. jumping) this month. Doesn't get much clearance off the ground, if any, but he has the right motion, the knees bending, straightening, and bending again. He also stomps his feet if you ask him nicely. In terms of manual dexterity, he was actually able to get a straw back into a juice box after having pulled it out, with much less difficulty than I would have expected. That's a small hole to get the straw into! He is also starting to make the twisting motion required for screwing and unscrewing cap s - which is going to mean more babyproofing! He still doesn't seem interested in learning how to go down steps on his own. He just wants to walk down with us holding his hands.
Mental: So much going on in there these days. One fun thing is that he's started really imitating us - he likes to 'brush his teeth' (has let me *really* brush them once or twice), brush his hair, and also likes to help us with things - I've been taking my temp in the am to track my cycles which he's seen a few times, so now he enjoys picking up the thermometer and sticking it in my mouth! Also finds it highly amusing to feed us either with his hands or a spoon. I think he's starting to nod 'yes', although it's not 100% clear just yet. One really nice thing is that he does not seem to be in quite so much of a mommy phase. There have been a couple of nights when he has been SO excited to see Mark when he gets home - raising both hands in the air, running around, and squealing with delight. He also finally started holding out his arms to go to Mom when she arrives to babysit, and doesn't cry when I leave anymore. Somewhat bitterswe et ;-) The other things that are new are using the remote control with purpose to turn on the tv, physically turning on the tv (although if we ask him to he'll shut it right off again), turning the clock radio in his room on and off, and in fact just yesterday he really impressed Mark by opening up his closed laptop, then turning it off and on about 47 times. What's funny is that he'll often say "off" or "on" as he's doing it! Over the weekend when Michell, Kevin and Brendan were here, there were a few things that I was surprised by - first, that he wanted to play next to Brendan a lot. He's mostly been off in his own world before. Second, that fairly quickly he was able to understand their names - we could say "touch Kevin", or "touch Michelle", and he would go over to them and touch them, of course, saying "touch" as he did it. Finally, they had a little workbench that counted up, "one, two, three..." all the way to ten. He would push the button to make it say one, and then say "TWO". This went on all weekend, so it was definitely intentional.
Toys and games: More taking things out of containers - my pocketbook and toiletry bag were this month's favorites. The BMW car keys are almost like his lovies - we can give them to him when he's upset and he'll calm right down. Also gets quite upset if he wants one of them and can't find it.
Teeth: This month saw Ant's third eye tooth (bottom right) coming through on 10/17, fourth molar (top left) first cut through on 10/21. The last eye tooth seems to be on it's way with a bit more fussing than these other recent ones. Hopefully it cuts soon. Then all we have left are the two year molars!
Feeding: We are now solely on sippy cups, the bottles have all been washed and put away. No complaints at all, which is nice! We give Ant warm milk first thing in the am and for his bedtime, and cold during the day. Figure he might as well get used to it both ways. Not much else new in the food arena, except that he's starting to eat more veggies that are not pureed. He also likes salmon and scrambled eggs now, but only with ketchup. Definitely his father's son!
Sleeping: Routine is still mostly the same, although recently am wakeup time has moved from 5:45-6 to closer to 7. Which is key with the upcoming daylight savings transition! We're pushing everything back 10 min/day this week to try and make that less difficult. I also think that we're at the point where we could go to one nap at any time - Mom had him nap just once last Friday when I wanted to take Ant to my work halloween party and it worked out just fine. We don't need to fully transition until daycare starts at the beginning of Jan, but will probably do it mid this month, when the Rinaldis are back from FL.
Talking: Ant is acquiring words at close to an exponential rate. 16 the first month he was talking, 31 the second, and 58 this month. I'll list them all here, but I think this might be the last month I can do that! Ready? apple (ap), boots, bowl, bib, bubbles (buh-buh), brush (dush), baby, boo, beans, chair, control as in remote control (cohn), camera (carya), comb, couch, door, ears, fork (hork), fly (hy), granny (gangy), glasses (gah), gate, hey, hi, hands, hummus (hoom), in, ice, juice, Kate, knee, kiss, lock (ock), more(moh), nose (no), no, out, open (ohp), on, papa (Cup, Pup), pot (cot), Pooh, phone (hone), pizza (peetz), please (pees), puck (pup), rock (gock), spoon (hoon), Sami (hami), shoot, swing, turtle (turt), tissue (shoo), teeth (tooth), toothbrush (tooth), toes, truck (teesh), touch, tower (tow), two (after one), yogurt (gog). Phew! There are also another ten words that I think he might have, but not clear - I'll spare you those! He's also started to put together two word combinations, he's done it about five times now, which leads me to believe that it's a bit more than just coincidence. There are a couple I don't remember, but he has definitely said "key gone" when he can't find one of his favorite (i.e. the BMW) car keys. He said "mama hair" when touching my hair, and just tonight "hy gone" after Mark finally managed to swat the fly that has been haunting us for the last five days. (After which Ant proceeded to say "gone" another hundred times or so!)
Movement: Ant started learning to get off the bed and chair last month, then perfected it this month. Doesn't mean he always does it (like tonight when he basically just walked straight off the edge of the bed - Mark was right there so no worries), but he certainly can, with no prompting. Climbing onto the easy chair that's in his room with the little stool in front of it is also de rigeur. He started 'hopping' (i.e. jumping) this month. Doesn't get much clearance off the ground, if any, but he has the right motion, the knees bending, straightening, and bending again. He also stomps his feet if you ask him nicely. In terms of manual dexterity, he was actually able to get a straw back into a juice box after having pulled it out, with much less difficulty than I would have expected. That's a small hole to get the straw into! He is also starting to make the twisting motion required for screwing and unscrewing cap s - which is going to mean more babyproofing! He still doesn't seem interested in learning how to go down steps on his own. He just wants to walk down with us holding his hands.
Mental: So much going on in there these days. One fun thing is that he's started really imitating us - he likes to 'brush his teeth' (has let me *really* brush them once or twice), brush his hair, and also likes to help us with things - I've been taking my temp in the am to track my cycles which he's seen a few times, so now he enjoys picking up the thermometer and sticking it in my mouth! Also finds it highly amusing to feed us either with his hands or a spoon. I think he's starting to nod 'yes', although it's not 100% clear just yet. One really nice thing is that he does not seem to be in quite so much of a mommy phase. There have been a couple of nights when he has been SO excited to see Mark when he gets home - raising both hands in the air, running around, and squealing with delight. He also finally started holding out his arms to go to Mom when she arrives to babysit, and doesn't cry when I leave anymore. Somewhat bitterswe et ;-) The other things that are new are using the remote control with purpose to turn on the tv, physically turning on the tv (although if we ask him to he'll shut it right off again), turning the clock radio in his room on and off, and in fact just yesterday he really impressed Mark by opening up his closed laptop, then turning it off and on about 47 times. What's funny is that he'll often say "off" or "on" as he's doing it! Over the weekend when Michell, Kevin and Brendan were here, there were a few things that I was surprised by - first, that he wanted to play next to Brendan a lot. He's mostly been off in his own world before. Second, that fairly quickly he was able to understand their names - we could say "touch Kevin", or "touch Michelle", and he would go over to them and touch them, of course, saying "touch" as he did it. Finally, they had a little workbench that counted up, "one, two, three..." all the way to ten. He would push the button to make it say one, and then say "TWO". This went on all weekend, so it was definitely intentional.
Toys and games: More taking things out of containers - my pocketbook and toiletry bag were this month's favorites. The BMW car keys are almost like his lovies - we can give them to him when he's upset and he'll calm right down. Also gets quite upset if he wants one of them and can't find it.
Teeth: This month saw Ant's third eye tooth (bottom right) coming through on 10/17, fourth molar (top left) first cut through on 10/21. The last eye tooth seems to be on it's way with a bit more fussing than these other recent ones. Hopefully it cuts soon. Then all we have left are the two year molars!
Feeding: We are now solely on sippy cups, the bottles have all been washed and put away. No complaints at all, which is nice! We give Ant warm milk first thing in the am and for his bedtime, and cold during the day. Figure he might as well get used to it both ways. Not much else new in the food arena, except that he's starting to eat more veggies that are not pureed. He also likes salmon and scrambled eggs now, but only with ketchup. Definitely his father's son!
Sleeping: Routine is still mostly the same, although recently am wakeup time has moved from 5:45-6 to closer to 7. Which is key with the upcoming daylight savings transition! We're pushing everything back 10 min/day this week to try and make that less difficult. I also think that we're at the point where we could go to one nap at any time - Mom had him nap just once last Friday when I wanted to take Ant to my work halloween party and it worked out just fine. We don't need to fully transition until daycare starts at the beginning of Jan, but will probably do it mid this month, when the Rinaldis are back from FL.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Ant diary: Thirteen months
Growth check: At his one year appointment, Ant was 31 inches (so my home measurement of 30.75 was pretty good!), and 21lbs 6oz. So a bit heavier than I had thought. He's stepped on the scale the last couple of days and come in at 22.5lb (with clothes on), so think he's still putting on about half a pound a month, which is about right.
Talking: I am absolutely amazed at the rate at which Ant is picking up words. He is definitely well on the precocious side with his verbalization skills! He added somewhere around 30 words this past month. On top of the 16 from the previous month - only high-chair and night-night didn't make much of a reappearance from those first 16. This months words were: balloon, cat (tat), cheese, camera (cac), cake, cord (caw), cup, cute, choo-choo, down, Donald Duck (Don Da), dirty, duck, eyes, Elmo, fish (hish), Freckles (hoc), gone, help, hop, hair, keys, more (mowah), Nicole (cole), off, prunes, shoes, squash, towel, and toast. Freckles is a little bear that came with a bedtime book, you feed Freckles his milk, take off his clothes, bath him, brush his teeth, put on pajamas, read a night time story and then put him to bed. I have *no* idea how one gets "Hoc" from Freckles, but that is clearly what Ant calls him. There are also abou t another 20 words that we heard but weren't sure of. He's clearly enamoured of words that begin with "c", he has twice as many of those as the next closest letters, which are H and D. We're starting to notice a few letter substitutions, but mostly he just skips the letters he can't say. One other thing I thought was funny - he doesn't really do the sign for milk anymore, so I was asking him the other day to say "milk". He kept saying "cup" (which is now how he asks for his milk at night). Me: say 'milk' Ant: cup Me: 'milk' Ant: cup... about three more times :-)
Movement: This month Ant figured out how to get up to standing from sitting in the middle of the floor. He also learned how to kick things this past weekend; spent a good long time kicking his stackable cups up and down the hallway. He really likes it when we "hop" while holding him. Giggles galore. He's also starting to learn how to get off a bed or chair - backwards and feet down. Still not good enough that we'd let him do it on his own, but he's starting to get the hang of turning around, and doing it without our prompting him.
Mental: Ant started balancing things on other things this month; his cup of juice on top of a bowl, his monitor on top of an old hard drive inside its case that Mark has up in the office. His understanding of concepts is phenomenal. He knows what it means when he asks for "help", and will do that when he's unable to do something like getting the lid off a container - or getting his gymini out from behind the couch which he's asked for a few times this month. Points at it and says "help". He also clearly grasps the concepts of hot and cold, particularly hot. There have been a number of occasions when he's put his hand on something and said "hot" - I'll say "I don't think XYZ is hot" - but I touch it, and sure enough, he's right! The other thing he's often right about is he'll look out the back sliding door and say "tat" (i.e. cat), there have been times when I haven't been able to see the animal, but if I look hard enough, one of them i s out there. Although more recently he's been saying it when he wants to go and find the cat too. He knows that his stuffed rabbit "hops", and also said "hop hop hop" to Mark while bringing him his Peter Cottontail book, where Peter hops down the bunny trail, hippity hop.
Toys and games: Taking items out of containers was this month's amusement. Clothes out of the drawer, cupboard, or laundry basket, pots out of the cabinet, toys out of the basket, pens out of the container I keep them in in the office... He enjoys pushing buttons on everything from his new fire truck to the TV to my cell phone.
Teeth: Well, after 4.5 months of no new teeth (longest since he was born), Ant cut five teeth in the last two weeks! His bottom left molar was felt by Ann (Mark's mom) on 9/13, I noticed the top and bottom on the right on 9/23, and then to my complete astonishment when I was at Kate's on Friday I saw that the top right eye tooth was through, with the top left close behind. That is also definitely through now, so I'm going to call that 9/30, although these are all plus/minus a few days. He has been surprisingly sanguine through the pain of getting FIVE teeth at once - definitely more emotionally fragile than usual, but otherwise not much difference. Sleeping and eating just fine. Thank goodness!!! (And yes, I DO know how lucky we are!!!)
Feeding: We switched over to whole milk pretty quickly. I gave Ant an ounce about a week before he turned one, and he threw up three times that day. So I was a little leery. But at his birthday party, he apparently drank 3oz of Sami's milk and was just fine, so I figured it was something else that caused the spitting up the previous time. So we switched completely to whole milk over the next week or so, using up the last of the formula in the process. He's also drinking totally out of a sippy cup except for his bedtime bottle, which I anticipate transitioning to a sippy cup very shortly. He really doesn't seem to mind the cups, so we might as well get rid of the bottle sooner than later.
Sleeping: Still about the same routine - bedtime around 7:15-7:30, am wakeup at 5:45-6 (although he'll usually doze / be happy in his crib by himself until about 6:45), two naps of either 40 min or 1h20min at 9:30 and 2:30. He has had a few days when he's only taken one nap though, and despite my hopes, that's usually not more than an hour long. Hoping he's not going to transition to that just yet, or when he does move to one nap that it gets longer!
Talking: I am absolutely amazed at the rate at which Ant is picking up words. He is definitely well on the precocious side with his verbalization skills! He added somewhere around 30 words this past month. On top of the 16 from the previous month - only high-chair and night-night didn't make much of a reappearance from those first 16. This months words were: balloon, cat (tat), cheese, camera (cac), cake, cord (caw), cup, cute, choo-choo, down, Donald Duck (Don Da), dirty, duck, eyes, Elmo, fish (hish), Freckles (hoc), gone, help, hop, hair, keys, more (mowah), Nicole (cole), off, prunes, shoes, squash, towel, and toast. Freckles is a little bear that came with a bedtime book, you feed Freckles his milk, take off his clothes, bath him, brush his teeth, put on pajamas, read a night time story and then put him to bed. I have *no* idea how one gets "Hoc" from Freckles, but that is clearly what Ant calls him. There are also abou t another 20 words that we heard but weren't sure of. He's clearly enamoured of words that begin with "c", he has twice as many of those as the next closest letters, which are H and D. We're starting to notice a few letter substitutions, but mostly he just skips the letters he can't say. One other thing I thought was funny - he doesn't really do the sign for milk anymore, so I was asking him the other day to say "milk". He kept saying "cup" (which is now how he asks for his milk at night). Me: say 'milk' Ant: cup Me: 'milk' Ant: cup... about three more times :-)
Movement: This month Ant figured out how to get up to standing from sitting in the middle of the floor. He also learned how to kick things this past weekend; spent a good long time kicking his stackable cups up and down the hallway. He really likes it when we "hop" while holding him. Giggles galore. He's also starting to learn how to get off a bed or chair - backwards and feet down. Still not good enough that we'd let him do it on his own, but he's starting to get the hang of turning around, and doing it without our prompting him.
Mental: Ant started balancing things on other things this month; his cup of juice on top of a bowl, his monitor on top of an old hard drive inside its case that Mark has up in the office. His understanding of concepts is phenomenal. He knows what it means when he asks for "help", and will do that when he's unable to do something like getting the lid off a container - or getting his gymini out from behind the couch which he's asked for a few times this month. Points at it and says "help". He also clearly grasps the concepts of hot and cold, particularly hot. There have been a number of occasions when he's put his hand on something and said "hot" - I'll say "I don't think XYZ is hot" - but I touch it, and sure enough, he's right! The other thing he's often right about is he'll look out the back sliding door and say "tat" (i.e. cat), there have been times when I haven't been able to see the animal, but if I look hard enough, one of them i s out there. Although more recently he's been saying it when he wants to go and find the cat too. He knows that his stuffed rabbit "hops", and also said "hop hop hop" to Mark while bringing him his Peter Cottontail book, where Peter hops down the bunny trail, hippity hop.
Toys and games: Taking items out of containers was this month's amusement. Clothes out of the drawer, cupboard, or laundry basket, pots out of the cabinet, toys out of the basket, pens out of the container I keep them in in the office... He enjoys pushing buttons on everything from his new fire truck to the TV to my cell phone.
Teeth: Well, after 4.5 months of no new teeth (longest since he was born), Ant cut five teeth in the last two weeks! His bottom left molar was felt by Ann (Mark's mom) on 9/13, I noticed the top and bottom on the right on 9/23, and then to my complete astonishment when I was at Kate's on Friday I saw that the top right eye tooth was through, with the top left close behind. That is also definitely through now, so I'm going to call that 9/30, although these are all plus/minus a few days. He has been surprisingly sanguine through the pain of getting FIVE teeth at once - definitely more emotionally fragile than usual, but otherwise not much difference. Sleeping and eating just fine. Thank goodness!!! (And yes, I DO know how lucky we are!!!)
Feeding: We switched over to whole milk pretty quickly. I gave Ant an ounce about a week before he turned one, and he threw up three times that day. So I was a little leery. But at his birthday party, he apparently drank 3oz of Sami's milk and was just fine, so I figured it was something else that caused the spitting up the previous time. So we switched completely to whole milk over the next week or so, using up the last of the formula in the process. He's also drinking totally out of a sippy cup except for his bedtime bottle, which I anticipate transitioning to a sippy cup very shortly. He really doesn't seem to mind the cups, so we might as well get rid of the bottle sooner than later.
Sleeping: Still about the same routine - bedtime around 7:15-7:30, am wakeup at 5:45-6 (although he'll usually doze / be happy in his crib by himself until about 6:45), two naps of either 40 min or 1h20min at 9:30 and 2:30. He has had a few days when he's only taken one nap though, and despite my hopes, that's usually not more than an hour long. Hoping he's not going to transition to that just yet, or when he does move to one nap that it gets longer!
Friday, August 31, 2007
Ant diary: Twelve months
Growth check: Weighed Ant twice today and got the same result - 20lb 10oz, exactly what he was last month. He hasn't been eating quite as well, and I also realized that I may be feeding him more of a low fat diet than I should (I tend to eat low fat things, so that's what I'm feeding him. Need to start putting butter on his waffles, things like that). Also measured his length at 30.75 inches. Still around 30% for weight and 90% for height.
Talking: Just a day or two after his 11 month birthday, Ant said Mama for real, for sure. His next word was "clock" (or as he would say it, 'caw' or sometimes 'cawc'). He loved playing with the digital clock that was on our headboard; one afternoon we were playing with it and it seemed to me that he was saying 'caw' 'caw' too often for it to just be coincidence. So I asked him to say clock, and he repeated it! When he did it again when Mark got home, I knew it was for real. Since then, he's added an astonishing number of words - he definitely says boom (when he drops something or falls over), clock, car, closed, cold, dada, dog, eight, hat, hot, light, mama, nana, night-night, poop, and up. Words that we think he might say, or that grandparents have suggested as possibilities but that we haven't confirmed yet include balloon, circle, duck, diaper, hi, letter, papa, prunes, red and truck. Finally, just today he started saying high chair!!! I am amazed. He doesn't quite get it right, he says "highch", but he said it a bunch of times through the day and again when I got home, and when we asked him where his highchair was, he walked right over to it, and said "highch" a few more times!!
Movement: Lots and lots of walking. Everywhere. Inside, outside, bare feet, shoes... the only time Ant crawls these days is when he sits down in the middle of the floor and doesn't have anything to pull himself up on to get back to standing. He also started climbing the stairs this month, going all the way up about ten times the day he really figured out he could do it. We therefore now have the gate at the bottom of the stairs in addition to the top.
Mental: Talk about communication. Ant is so pleased with himself when he learns a new word. He'll use it over and over again for a little while, until it becomes part of his lexicon. He also says it over and over when he's excited - like when he was playing with the clock (not so much fun anymore), or inside a car. Or when he sees a bunch of cars, like in a parking lot. He also figured out how to stack things and put blocks together. With the walker from Kate's family, he also knows to back up when he runs it into something. Much more squawking when we denied him something he wanted.
Toys and games: The favorite things to do this month were carrying toys or other items around while walking in circles around the first floor, and getting into cars and pushing all the buttons and levers. This included desperately wanting to get into all the neighbor's cars!
Teeth: We've now gone longer with no new teeth than we had since he was born. Four months and counting, still no real indication of those molars.
Feeding: Ant is fully weaned as of last Thursday (the last time I nursed him). He had the last of the frozen breastmilk for his bedtime bottle tonight. So I'm counting that as having nursed him for a year. Yay me :-) We haven't added much in the way of new foods over the past month, except lots of the jarred fruit halves or quarters. Peaches, pears, mango and pineapple. All big hits. We're still on the pureed veggies as he doesn't seem to eat much of the real thing. Although he had a decent amount of green beans I flavored with Newman's dressing.
Sleeping: Same as last month - bedtime around 7:15-7:30, am wakeup at 5:45-6, two naps of either 40 min or 1h20min at 9:30 and 2:30.
Talking: Just a day or two after his 11 month birthday, Ant said Mama for real, for sure. His next word was "clock" (or as he would say it, 'caw' or sometimes 'cawc'). He loved playing with the digital clock that was on our headboard; one afternoon we were playing with it and it seemed to me that he was saying 'caw' 'caw' too often for it to just be coincidence. So I asked him to say clock, and he repeated it! When he did it again when Mark got home, I knew it was for real. Since then, he's added an astonishing number of words - he definitely says boom (when he drops something or falls over), clock, car, closed, cold, dada, dog, eight, hat, hot, light, mama, nana, night-night, poop, and up. Words that we think he might say, or that grandparents have suggested as possibilities but that we haven't confirmed yet include balloon, circle, duck, diaper, hi, letter, papa, prunes, red and truck. Finally, just today he started saying high chair!!! I am amazed. He doesn't quite get it right, he says "highch", but he said it a bunch of times through the day and again when I got home, and when we asked him where his highchair was, he walked right over to it, and said "highch" a few more times!!
Movement: Lots and lots of walking. Everywhere. Inside, outside, bare feet, shoes... the only time Ant crawls these days is when he sits down in the middle of the floor and doesn't have anything to pull himself up on to get back to standing. He also started climbing the stairs this month, going all the way up about ten times the day he really figured out he could do it. We therefore now have the gate at the bottom of the stairs in addition to the top.
Mental: Talk about communication. Ant is so pleased with himself when he learns a new word. He'll use it over and over again for a little while, until it becomes part of his lexicon. He also says it over and over when he's excited - like when he was playing with the clock (not so much fun anymore), or inside a car. Or when he sees a bunch of cars, like in a parking lot. He also figured out how to stack things and put blocks together. With the walker from Kate's family, he also knows to back up when he runs it into something. Much more squawking when we denied him something he wanted.
Toys and games: The favorite things to do this month were carrying toys or other items around while walking in circles around the first floor, and getting into cars and pushing all the buttons and levers. This included desperately wanting to get into all the neighbor's cars!
Teeth: We've now gone longer with no new teeth than we had since he was born. Four months and counting, still no real indication of those molars.
Feeding: Ant is fully weaned as of last Thursday (the last time I nursed him). He had the last of the frozen breastmilk for his bedtime bottle tonight. So I'm counting that as having nursed him for a year. Yay me :-) We haven't added much in the way of new foods over the past month, except lots of the jarred fruit halves or quarters. Peaches, pears, mango and pineapple. All big hits. We're still on the pureed veggies as he doesn't seem to eat much of the real thing. Although he had a decent amount of green beans I flavored with Newman's dressing.
Sleeping: Same as last month - bedtime around 7:15-7:30, am wakeup at 5:45-6, two naps of either 40 min or 1h20min at 9:30 and 2:30.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Ant diary: Eleven months
Growth check: 20lb 10 oz. Up a whole pound from last month!
Talking: Ant likes to say something like 'hogahdah hogahdah' - although it's hard to copy! He sometimes says dada in a context where he seems like he means Mark but other times just says it randomly, so not sure if we can count that just yet. Yesterday at the Rinaldi's Ant seemed to say Mama referring to me, then apparently after I left this morning he was crying and said it a couple of times. So I think even if we can't count Dada and Mama as real words just yet, they'll be for real soon. He's doing a lot of rolling his R's. Other than that not much new from last month.
Movement: Walking! Ant took his first steps, walking between Mark and me, on 7/7. We were out on the deck, and just decided to give it a shot and see what would happen, if we tried to encourage him to go from one of us to the other. Sure enough, he did, taking as many as five steps. Sometimes it was a headlong rush into our arms, others it was very controlled (giggling the whole time as if this was the best thing in the world - which it probably was). He stayed at about that rate of steps for the next two weeks. The second weekend after his first steps we were up in NH, and he did quite a bit of running from his new gear toy into our arms to get away from the gear noise. Up to eight steps between us. Then this past weekend down at Kate's house he just took off - lots of running room in their basement. I counted 20-30 steps at a time. Sunday at the Rinaldi's he barely crawled at all, just walking everywh ere. They had some guests over, who were very impressed with him - he stepped on one of the boys' feet, and just kept right on going, didn't lose his balance at all! In general his balance is very good, he often will seem as if he's going to fall over, but manages to hold onto something or just steady himself so that he doesn't have too bad an oops.
Mental: This has been a month of burgeoning communication! Ant started using signs himself - "more" and "milk". More started off just being asking for more food, which is the context we taught it to him in, but more recently he's been using it to ask for more of an activity (like going outside with Mom, reading a book with me), and just in general to ask for food. It was so exciting the first time he used it - I could ask him if he was "all done" with his meal, and he would respond with "more" if he wasn't. Being able to have two way communication without crying is fantastic. I was also impressed with his overall comprehension - I asked him to show me the sign for milk, and he did! He also points to go to things he wants. And turns lights on and off himself, as well as pushing the button to open/close the garage door.
Toys and games: Ant has gotten very good at putting lids back on to containers, as well as putting things inside other things (the stackable cups inside each other, coins into other containers, various things into boxes). He also likes putting his pacifiers into the ball popper. We're starting to teach him about the shape sorter, but he doesn't quite get it just yet. Mike and Jill gave him a gear toy for his birthday (early), he has had a lot of fun with that, both just pressing the button to turn it on and running away from the gear noise (although he's over that now), and taking the gears off and putting them back on again. He also enjoys pots and pans, and other things he can manipulate.
Random: Went swimming in a real pool for the first time. Seemed to enjoy the water, but perhaps could take it or leave it.
Teeth: *Still* nothing new. Three months since his last tooth came through. I can't imagine it will be much longer 'till the molars make an appearance.
Feeding: We switched the mid-morning feed over to formula as well, so now I'm only nursing 2x/day. It is SO nice not to have to pump anymore. Not missing lugging that thing around at all! New things we've added include mac-n-cheese (Annie's whole wheat organic - for a little healthier option), tilapia, salmon, the broccoli stuffed chicken breast I like to have for my lunch, bigger pieces of pear, and cheerios with milk (well, formula).
Sleeping: Not much change from last month, except Ant's wake-up time has gotten a bit later, usually he's waking up between 5:30-6, but happy in the crib for at least another half hour, so that's reasonable. He's generally going to sleep between 7-7:15 (although we've had two nights [both away] when he wouldn't go down until 9!). Taking two naps that vary from 40 min to 1hr 20 min on average, at around 9:30 and around 2pm.
Talking: Ant likes to say something like 'hogahdah hogahdah' - although it's hard to copy! He sometimes says dada in a context where he seems like he means Mark but other times just says it randomly, so not sure if we can count that just yet. Yesterday at the Rinaldi's Ant seemed to say Mama referring to me, then apparently after I left this morning he was crying and said it a couple of times. So I think even if we can't count Dada and Mama as real words just yet, they'll be for real soon. He's doing a lot of rolling his R's. Other than that not much new from last month.
Movement: Walking! Ant took his first steps, walking between Mark and me, on 7/7. We were out on the deck, and just decided to give it a shot and see what would happen, if we tried to encourage him to go from one of us to the other. Sure enough, he did, taking as many as five steps. Sometimes it was a headlong rush into our arms, others it was very controlled (giggling the whole time as if this was the best thing in the world - which it probably was). He stayed at about that rate of steps for the next two weeks. The second weekend after his first steps we were up in NH, and he did quite a bit of running from his new gear toy into our arms to get away from the gear noise. Up to eight steps between us. Then this past weekend down at Kate's house he just took off - lots of running room in their basement. I counted 20-30 steps at a time. Sunday at the Rinaldi's he barely crawled at all, just walking everywh ere. They had some guests over, who were very impressed with him - he stepped on one of the boys' feet, and just kept right on going, didn't lose his balance at all! In general his balance is very good, he often will seem as if he's going to fall over, but manages to hold onto something or just steady himself so that he doesn't have too bad an oops.
Mental: This has been a month of burgeoning communication! Ant started using signs himself - "more" and "milk". More started off just being asking for more food, which is the context we taught it to him in, but more recently he's been using it to ask for more of an activity (like going outside with Mom, reading a book with me), and just in general to ask for food. It was so exciting the first time he used it - I could ask him if he was "all done" with his meal, and he would respond with "more" if he wasn't. Being able to have two way communication without crying is fantastic. I was also impressed with his overall comprehension - I asked him to show me the sign for milk, and he did! He also points to go to things he wants. And turns lights on and off himself, as well as pushing the button to open/close the garage door.
Toys and games: Ant has gotten very good at putting lids back on to containers, as well as putting things inside other things (the stackable cups inside each other, coins into other containers, various things into boxes). He also likes putting his pacifiers into the ball popper. We're starting to teach him about the shape sorter, but he doesn't quite get it just yet. Mike and Jill gave him a gear toy for his birthday (early), he has had a lot of fun with that, both just pressing the button to turn it on and running away from the gear noise (although he's over that now), and taking the gears off and putting them back on again. He also enjoys pots and pans, and other things he can manipulate.
Random: Went swimming in a real pool for the first time. Seemed to enjoy the water, but perhaps could take it or leave it.
Teeth: *Still* nothing new. Three months since his last tooth came through. I can't imagine it will be much longer 'till the molars make an appearance.
Feeding: We switched the mid-morning feed over to formula as well, so now I'm only nursing 2x/day. It is SO nice not to have to pump anymore. Not missing lugging that thing around at all! New things we've added include mac-n-cheese (Annie's whole wheat organic - for a little healthier option), tilapia, salmon, the broccoli stuffed chicken breast I like to have for my lunch, bigger pieces of pear, and cheerios with milk (well, formula).
Sleeping: Not much change from last month, except Ant's wake-up time has gotten a bit later, usually he's waking up between 5:30-6, but happy in the crib for at least another half hour, so that's reasonable. He's generally going to sleep between 7-7:15 (although we've had two nights [both away] when he wouldn't go down until 9!). Taking two naps that vary from 40 min to 1hr 20 min on average, at around 9:30 and around 2pm.
Monday, July 2, 2007
Ant diary: Ten months
Growth check: 19lb 10 oz today. So putting on about 1/2 lb a month at the moment. Not much movement height-wise, I don't think.
Talking: We're starting to get combinations of consonants - la da la da is a favorite, as something like 'gocily gocily gocily' although I can't even make the sounds myself so writing them down is pretty tough! Twice yesterday Ant seemed to say "dada" in context, but it may have just been coincidence. The first was when I brought him in to see Mark in the bedroom after nursing - he shrieked "dada" with happiness when he saw Mark in the bed. The second was later in the afternoon when Mark was holding him, and I asked if he wanted to come to me - he clearly held on to Mark and said "dada" again. He's also making smacking noises with his lips, clicking his tongue, and blowing raspberries "bbbbbb".
Movement: Ant is now a proficient cruiser. He can pull himself up on anything from the coffee table to our legs to the side of the island with nothing to hold onto, just pressure! He also sits back down with ease (started 6/12), usually bending his legs nicely but occasionally going the "fall back onto my bum" route. He very easily goes around corner, and can step over or around things with no problem. He doesn't actually look to us to help him walk quite as much now that he can get back down and crawl around, but when he does want us he'll hold out his hand and then look around for us. Especially when he already has the first hand held. I found him standing in the crib for the first time on 6/10 which I was quite impressed by given that he's still sleeping in a sleepsack. He also seems to like pushing something around with his right hand while crawling, mostly books, although I've seen him do it with other objects. ; On a totally different front, he started waving 'bye-bye', clapping his hands, and shaking his head "no" all within the space of about three days.
Mental: It seems as if he's made a lot of new connections this month. He understands his physical limitations - when he was crusing a little while ago he wanted to go from the end table to the music table, but couldn't quite reach. So he immediately went via the big plastic container we have all his toys in. He opens and closes our mailbox, as well as cupboards and drawers, and with the cupboards he will look around the door to see what's inside. (And is very good at keeping his fingers out of the way when he closes them.) We spent quite a long time the other day opening and closing the curtains. We also played peekaboo with the curtain next to his high chair - he grabbed it of his own accord, and was hiding and unhiding himself. That was really fun, we were both laughing. I feel like he also understands a few signs (up and milk) although he doesn't make them himself yet. He also gets "no", and just in the last c ouple of days has started using it himself, actually meaning "no" when he shakes his head . Particularly when eating! He seems to understand the light switch, as he will look from the switch to the light when we're turning it on or off. He also really gets that buttons are supposed to do things now - he can go right over to the ball popper and turn it on, he's very good at pressing buttons on other toys too. Finally, just yesterday on his ten month birthday, he started pointing at things he wanted. While he was eating dinner over at the maguire's he was pointing and pointing at something, we finally figured out that it was Mike's red sox hat. This morning he was pointing up at the valence above the sliding glass door to the deck.
Toys and games: As I said, lots of button pressing going on. And he really loves playing peekaboo, both when we cover his face or when he covers it himself. He is *very* interested in what's inside all the cupboards, which isn't really a good thing because there are lots of things he just can't have. We've gotten a few new toys, but nothing seems to be a particular favorite, except perhaps the driving wheel. He really likes "I'm a little teapot", the tipping part in particular.
Teeth: Still nothing new.
Feeding: Afternoon nursing was switched to formula becuase it was just too iffy with me getting home from work. Plus he had been biting AND I was having trouble with pumping, so I was actually going to stop nursing completely. As soon as I made that decision the biting stopped and pumping got better, so I'm still nursing three times/day (wake up, 10-11 and bedtime). New additions to the repertoire this month include crumpets (made with white whole wheat flour), grown up oatmeal, lasagna, pasta bolognese, half banana slices, zucchini with rice, pieces of strawberries, apricot and pear. Did not like grapes.
Sleeping: We're still on a fairly regular schedule of bedtime at around 7, naps at 9am and 2pm. The wake up time severly regressed for most of this month to between 4:30 and 5am. Fortunately in the last few days it's moved back to the more reasonable hour of 5:45 or later. Whew.
Talking: We're starting to get combinations of consonants - la da la da is a favorite, as something like 'gocily gocily gocily' although I can't even make the sounds myself so writing them down is pretty tough! Twice yesterday Ant seemed to say "dada" in context, but it may have just been coincidence. The first was when I brought him in to see Mark in the bedroom after nursing - he shrieked "dada" with happiness when he saw Mark in the bed. The second was later in the afternoon when Mark was holding him, and I asked if he wanted to come to me - he clearly held on to Mark and said "dada" again. He's also making smacking noises with his lips, clicking his tongue, and blowing raspberries "bbbbbb".
Movement: Ant is now a proficient cruiser. He can pull himself up on anything from the coffee table to our legs to the side of the island with nothing to hold onto, just pressure! He also sits back down with ease (started 6/12), usually bending his legs nicely but occasionally going the "fall back onto my bum" route. He very easily goes around corner, and can step over or around things with no problem. He doesn't actually look to us to help him walk quite as much now that he can get back down and crawl around, but when he does want us he'll hold out his hand and then look around for us. Especially when he already has the first hand held. I found him standing in the crib for the first time on 6/10 which I was quite impressed by given that he's still sleeping in a sleepsack. He also seems to like pushing something around with his right hand while crawling, mostly books, although I've seen him do it with other objects. ; On a totally different front, he started waving 'bye-bye', clapping his hands, and shaking his head "no" all within the space of about three days.
Mental: It seems as if he's made a lot of new connections this month. He understands his physical limitations - when he was crusing a little while ago he wanted to go from the end table to the music table, but couldn't quite reach. So he immediately went via the big plastic container we have all his toys in. He opens and closes our mailbox, as well as cupboards and drawers, and with the cupboards he will look around the door to see what's inside. (And is very good at keeping his fingers out of the way when he closes them.) We spent quite a long time the other day opening and closing the curtains. We also played peekaboo with the curtain next to his high chair - he grabbed it of his own accord, and was hiding and unhiding himself. That was really fun, we were both laughing. I feel like he also understands a few signs (up and milk) although he doesn't make them himself yet. He also gets "no", and just in the last c ouple of days has started using it himself, actually meaning "no" when he shakes his head . Particularly when eating! He seems to understand the light switch, as he will look from the switch to the light when we're turning it on or off. He also really gets that buttons are supposed to do things now - he can go right over to the ball popper and turn it on, he's very good at pressing buttons on other toys too. Finally, just yesterday on his ten month birthday, he started pointing at things he wanted. While he was eating dinner over at the maguire's he was pointing and pointing at something, we finally figured out that it was Mike's red sox hat. This morning he was pointing up at the valence above the sliding glass door to the deck.
Toys and games: As I said, lots of button pressing going on. And he really loves playing peekaboo, both when we cover his face or when he covers it himself. He is *very* interested in what's inside all the cupboards, which isn't really a good thing because there are lots of things he just can't have. We've gotten a few new toys, but nothing seems to be a particular favorite, except perhaps the driving wheel. He really likes "I'm a little teapot", the tipping part in particular.
Teeth: Still nothing new.
Feeding: Afternoon nursing was switched to formula becuase it was just too iffy with me getting home from work. Plus he had been biting AND I was having trouble with pumping, so I was actually going to stop nursing completely. As soon as I made that decision the biting stopped and pumping got better, so I'm still nursing three times/day (wake up, 10-11 and bedtime). New additions to the repertoire this month include crumpets (made with white whole wheat flour), grown up oatmeal, lasagna, pasta bolognese, half banana slices, zucchini with rice, pieces of strawberries, apricot and pear. Did not like grapes.
Sleeping: We're still on a fairly regular schedule of bedtime at around 7, naps at 9am and 2pm. The wake up time severly regressed for most of this month to between 4:30 and 5am. Fortunately in the last few days it's moved back to the more reasonable hour of 5:45 or later. Whew.
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