Funny!

Thomas invented a new game. Could be that we are in for it with this little monkey!

Whew!

We can hardly take a breath around here! Thank goodness Tom is here so that I have a chance to write it all down. Thomas is on the go all the time... Here's how he fell asleep the other night - mid crawl :-)


He can pull himself up on furniture completely independently


but needs some help once he's there..landings aren't too graceful yet!


In other big news - Thomas said "Da-Da" for the first time yesterday. He's saying it all the time this morning and you can only imagine that Tom will give him anything he wants now- hahaha!

New Tricks

These new tricks still don't involve sleeping past 6:30 or so in the morning, but at least he didn't wake us up in the middle of the night............

We caught him on camera showing off what he learned to do - stand up on his own!

9 month checkup

Thomas did a great job at his checkup!

weight: 21 1/2 lbs (66th percentile)
height: 30 1/3 inches (96th percentile)

He also had a vision test. It involved me holding him on my lap, having electrodes stuck on his head and a patch over one eye at a time while watching a screen with different patterns and flashing lights. Needless to say he did not enjoy it very much. The good news is that we got it done with the help of the magic pacifier and our wonderful nurse. His vision is fine and he got a good report on all his other development from the pediatrician.

He's growing up so fast!


At 3 weeks


3 months


Today

Mr. Personality

There's plenty of time to write this morning since Thomas graced us with his presence a little after 6. Tom was wonderful as usual and kept the little boy in the dark and calm so he could doze a little more. That meant I could get back in our bed and do the same. This too shall pass :-) I wanted to post these pictures from a few days ago so you could get a taste of Mr. Personality!

This is the area we set up for him...notice all the buttons and sharp corners are protected and plenty of toys are ready and available.


This is where he chose to play...on the cold hard tile with two plastic links!

Nine Months Old

Thomas is nine months old today!
He's very cute and may still be auctioned off in the near future. He's continuing to have sleep problems and we are looking forward to an end of those. Poor guy is not quite his normal charming self since he's often tired, but manages to make us laugh and reminds us that our little family is a really good one!

Sleep Update

Well.....he slept through the night. Unfortunately, he didn't go to sleep until 8 and he woke up at 6:30. This too shall pass, this too shall pass, this too shall pass. It's a good mantra, we think! Thomas is struggling every night to go to bed and of course then wakes up early. We have no idea why, but had to just put him in the crib and leave him last night. It took him 40 minutes of hysterics to get to sleep, but at least he did it. It's been a while since we've had to do this whole cry-it-out thing and it's still no fun. He's working hard on all his new tricks - trying to stand up all the time and getting better at it with some help to stay balanced. He no longer wants to be contained in his walker or exersaucer for very long. We have toys scattered from one end of the house to the other since what he wants to do is crawl all over the place looking for something to get into :-) Keep looking for the auction.......... he is really cute!

So what is a sleep regression?

Sleep Regression (Noun) Several points in an infant's early development, usually around 4, 8, and 18 months of age, in which the child develops sleeping difficulties, wakes frequently and sleeps fitfully, often in erratic spurts.

Welcome to our world. Thomas is mastering all kinds of new skills. He is crawling like crazy and his newest game is to crawl as fast as he can to something dangerous or something we don't want him to play with....all the while giggling! It's funny, but not something we want to encourage (but it's really cute because he's sooooo funny). He's not as cute in the middle of the night or when he won't go to bed, however. For the last several nights he's having a really hard time going to bed. In fact, for the last two nights we've had to go in after he went to bed because he was hysterical. Both times he had dirty diapers. Last night, well, it was actually this morning, we spent from 3:20-5:05 tag teaming him to change a dirty diaper and get him back to sleep. But did he sleep later? NO - playtime began at 6:50 this morning! The next post may be advertising the online auction of a really cute 9 month old.

No more Fever!

I come to you well-rested with a much happier baby! He's feeling more like himself all the time. He slept through the night last night and we're over 24 hours with no fever. He's playing a lot today and has enjoyed exploring his new truck passed down from his cousin Drew. I snapped this picture today and you can tell that he was not so impressed with my request to pose for a picture. Thomas can get himself up to a sitting position and is using toys and pillows to try to climb up on chairs and the couch. In his walker he can open drawers and as I type Tom is installing some childproof latches. I won't type the words he is thinking but trying not to say in front of Thomas :-)

Feeling a Little Better

We had a really rough night last night. Thomas's temperature stayed high for a large part of the night. He couldn't stay asleep and woke up really upset after only about 30 minutes of sleeping. It would take 30 minutes to an hour of soothing to get him back to sleep and then we'd start again. This lasted until about 5:30 this morning and he was then able to sleep until 7:00. We saw the pediatrician at 8:30. She confirmed that it was something viral and that we should keep doing what we are doing. For us, she suggested patience and lots of coffee :-) The good news is that Thomas's temperature has stayed between 98 and 100 since this morning and he has eaten some food and had a good afternoon nap. He's not quite himself, but has been playing and laughing some rather than crying and moaning. We are glad he's feeling better and we plan to go to bed early tonight so that we can be ready for the next round of adventures!

Very Sick Little Boy

Poor Thomas! He's a very sick little boy. Since yesterday, he's been running a temperature of about 102. It went down to 100 for a few hours this morning, but then right back up and was around 103 this afternoon. He's so miserable...crying and very very unhappy. We're seeing the pediatrician in the morning since we're coming up on a weekend, and hopefully he'll be on the road to recovery soon. I was in with him earlier and Tom is with him right now - poor little boy can't stay asleep. This afternoon he took a nap on the floor with me and slept okay. He didn't really sleep last night and we've decided to split the night tonight so one of us will be staying in his room while the other one gets some sleep. Tom was more than great last night and didn't really get a lot of sleep until this morning. Wish us all luck and send good health thoughts to our sweet sad little boy!

Dressed to Impress

We had dinner with some friends tonight and Thomas was on his best behavior (well, until he loudly let us know it was time to take him home to eat!).  He showed off his tricks and tried really hard to impress his girlfriend.  She made sure to play hard to get so that he would work harder...she's a smart girl!

Thomas has learned some new things in the last couple of days.  He can open drawers in the kitchen while he's in his walker, he pulled the air freshener out of the socket, and he's crawling anywhere he wants to go.  He's also decided that baby food is not quite as good as peach cobbler and Cheerios.  So last night as I'm feeding him dinner, he looked me right in the eye and spit his food all over the place.  Though that wasn't the most charming thing he's ever done, he's continuing to make us laugh each and every day!

A Fun Fourth!

We've had a really nice week. We went to our old neighborhood to take a walk and ran into a former neighbor. She was quite surprised to meet Thomas and thought he was very cute! We had a drink and a snack while we were out and snapped a few pictures (of course!). On the fourth, our neighborhood pool finally opened. They have been doing extensive construction and finished it up in time for a 4th of July opening. It was jam packed and we weren't sure what Thomas would do with all those kids splashing around. He was great and loved the pool just as much as he always does. We spent about an hour in the water and then brought our little swimmer home. It's a definite plan to spend more time there with him. At home, Thomas is a crawling machine. He's also trying to get himself into a sitting position from his tummy, but can't get everything working in the same direction at the same time. The unfortunate side effect of all of this is that he wakes himself up during naps and at night trying to practice all of this....luckily for all three of us, he slept better last night and was a little happier about it all this morning!