Vander weighs 21 1/2 pounds and is about 29 1/4 inches long. Not much weight gain, just height. Which seems about right since I didn't really feel like he got any heavier this month, and he only gained about a half pound. At the same time it has been easier to walk him around, and the extra inch or so helps a lot.
One of my favorite additions this last month is that Vander has gotten really good at hugs! When I come home, he has already been home with Dylan for about an hour and he is so excited to see me. He waits for me to set down my stuff and take off my coat and then he gives me a really big hug. Melts my heart every time! I think he has also maybe started giving kisses, but it is hard to tell since he used to be all about eating my face...
Vander also sprouted two more teeth! He had the bottom middle two and now also has the top teeth on either side of the middle. I was thinking it would not be very effective for chewing but he has done pretty good. He is working on the other four (top middle, and bottom sides) at times too. This last round of teething was pretty rough and we had a really grumpy baby on our hands a lot (which means unless he is distracted he was fussy, but you can pretty much always make him smile).
He has added a lot of new foods this month! I realized we have been kind of slacking on veggies, so I will be working to add more of those in this month. He has gotten really into eating what Mom and Dad are eating, or at least eating when we are. So we have been working to add in foods he can eat from us. He tried fish at the beginning of the week without any issues (he probably like it more than I did). He tried eggs yesterday morning (there are mixed reviews on when to try eggs... we decided to go for it). He gets any food we have that is soft enough for him to eat and if we don't really have anything he gets little pieces of turkey and cheese. We still give him the pureed baby food, but he definitely prefers real food.
On a side note, baby food choices are so overwhelming! We had initially stuck with just Gerber food, but then you look at other sections and there are so many different pouch options (yes, most baby foods come in pouches these days, which is actually really convenient). Not only so many brands, but so many more flavors! Part of me thinks there is no way to introduce him to all of these foods if we have to wait four days for each new thing! One step at a time and eventually he will have a vary diverse palate. (He already eats a more varied diet at 8 months old than I did by the time I was 15 years old... so we are on the right track)
Also in regards to foods, he has been less and less a fan of the bottle and formula the last couple weeks. I think part of it is teething, and part of it is he was growing like a weed for so long and now he has finally started to slow down (I think we may actually be in size 12 month clothes for more than three months! But then again it has only been a month...). He will refuse a bottle, but will eat most of a jar of baby food less than 30 minutes later. He also is rarely hungry in the mornings, even after sleeping through the night and will usually not really eat a bottle until after his morning nap. He definitely takes after his Grandma and Super G in that sense (and myself most days).
Other than food and teeth, the biggest advancement has been crawling. Just before eight months, Vander started army crawling. He has gotten pretty good over the last week! We knew he was really close since he would crawl over us all the time, but without the leverage he wouldn't quite do it on his own. One of the daycare ladies help coax him into it. He will tuck his knees under him and think really hard about how to move, but he ends up letting his legs slide back out and army crawling instead. Now we have to get serious about baby proofing... wish us luck with that.
His balance with walking and standing has increased tremendously as well. His favorite activity is holding your hands while he walks around the house from cabinet to cabinet to open them and play with the doors. He is going to be really mad once we put the cabinet locks on. Right now he doesn't go through the cabinet at all, just opens the doors, so we have a little bit of time. I am really thinking walking won't be too far behind. He has started to creep along things a little bit and is getting really close to pulling himself up.
He has gone back to being a good sleeper this month. I would say we are getting close to about 50% sleeping through the night, 50% waking up once (usually to eat). He goes to bed at 7:30/8:00pm and getting up at 6:20 in the morning on the weekdays and usually 7:00 on the weekends. I am surprised at how well he does with sleeping in on the weekends (thank goodness!) considering half the time he wakes up on his own during the weekdays. When I do have to go wake him up it is the cutest thing to watch him stretch and kind of fight waking up, but then he is so awake and smiley.
Vander has been an excellent napper too! He usually takes a solid hour and a half to two hour nap in the morning (around 9am during the week and around 10am on the weekends) and then will take an hour to hour and a half nap in the afternoons (the time varies a lot, but usually around 1pm at day care and will start his nap sometime between 2pm and 4pm on the weekends). A couple times this last week he even took a third hour long nap at like 4pm at daycare. This was even after sleeping through the night!
Vander gets more interactive by the day it seems. He is still very chatty and has no "stranger danger" at all. He started making a "clicking" noise with his tongue, which he finds totally fascinating. He loves playing with his voice too. Dylan and I think there is a good chance Vander will want to go into singing. I turned on the AFC Championship game two weeks ago and he didn't even glance at the TV until they started singing the National Anthem and then he was glued to the screen.
I love tickling him, bouncing him, showing him how to use his toys in new ways, reading with him. He is just so much fun to hang out with all the time :) Looking forward to another great month!
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