Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Independent soul



Preston is such a happy kid lately. He's rarely fussy unless he's tired or frustrated, but what baby isn't? He's so fascinated with all aspects of life. We love watching him figuring out how things work. Especially things he can open and close himself like drawers and doors. (If I haven't mentioned it already, those are his absolute favorites.) He studies them for awhile, reaches for the edge and will stay focused on swinging a door open and closed for a solid 10 minutes. Same with a drawer. Opening it and closing it, make sure we are watching and oohing and ahhhing over his drawer skills is one of his favorite things to do.


His other favorite thing right now is to pull himself up. On ANYTHING. Our legs, the coffee table, the toilet, (yuck.) the couch, the bed, Ruby, the stairs, (yikes!) and pretty much anything else he can get his hands on. It's all about independence right now. His little face beams with pride when he gets to his feet and stands. It's adorable and shocking at the same time. We consistently see him becoming more of his own person, which seems to be an emerging independent and curious sweetheart.


He's also "cruising" more and more everyday now. Cruising is a pre-cursor to walking, which I'm not particularly in a rush to have him do. He holds on to something and shakily moves his cute little legs along and relishes doing it himself. It's amazing to watch him totally "get it" and try even harder to go further and faster.

Another thing he wants to do independently is feed himself. It's difficult because purees are the bulk of calories he gets in regards to solids, even though breastmilk is still about 75% of his whole diet. But since he can't use a spoon, I have resorted to finding healthy and viable finger-foods for him in the way of table food. We haven't tried meat yet, so a lot of his solid-food protein is coming from whole cheeses and yogurt, hummus, beans, etc... However, I did get a great idea from a blog Holli sent me that mentioned adding enough baby cereal to purees so that they are thick enough to rolled into balls and self-fed for little fingers. Brilliant! I've been making these with everything and freezing them. Here he is gobbling them down:





For Memorial Day, we headed to my grandma Joan's house at Lake James and Preston got to swim in the pool for the first time. The lake was freezing, but we did go for a boat ride, which he also enjoyed. (But did NOT enjoy his life vest.) Suffice it to say that he loved the water and this kid is going to be a little fish. He splashed and kicked and had a blast. I can't wait to see him in water again!




We are still attending some mom's groups and he really loves to play with the other kids. Here he is crawling out to the center of the group and making sure I'm watching and also climbing up on the lactation consultant leader. He's such a ham.




Life is busy as ever here- STILL trying to sell our house, work on the new one and get plenty of quality time in with Preston as a family. Kevin and I are loving every second with him right now. I know I say this often, but right now- at 9 and a half months- it's my favorite stage so far. :) He's so much fun and has so much personality. Chatty, outgoing and social, and generally just growing and changing every day.

Monday, May 19, 2008

9 months old!

Our little baby is growing into a big boy! Preston is 9 months old and loving life. His newest thing is to pull himself up on whatever he can reach and also giving kisses. (Although, pretty much only to mommy.) ;)

Here are some recent pics and videos of him...









This video is a perfect example of his current interests. The kid is surrounded by toys (and magazines he can tear apart) but he'd rather have the curtains.


Ah! Life with a 9 month old boy is never boring! :)

Sunday, May 11, 2008

best. mother's day. ever.


Words just can't describe how lucky I feel this year- Mother's Day has a whole new meaning now and will forever. Kevin and Preston have really made it an amazing weekend for me.

Saturday was an awesome day with my two favorite guys. In the morning, we got up, went to our favorite farmer's market, scored tons of fresh veggies and some tomato and herb plants. Then, we headed to the zoo for a couple of hours and enjoyed the sights. Grandma Judy got us a season pass for Christmas and we can't wait to use it all summer. Preston has been a few times, but this was his favorite trip so far. He was enthralled by the Sea Lions, finally was awake to enjoy the petting zoo portion, and especially loved watching the carousel.
Here we are with the goats, which was fascinating to watch. Preston made buddies with one in particular, giggled when it nibbled on his fingers, then got a little freaked out when it became a bit more interested in his hand. Poor thing!




The rest of the afternoon, Preston spent at home with Daddy so that I could go plant and work in the yard over at our new house. They came over to join me later in the afternoon before we all headed home to grill and just relax. It was a fabulous day.



Sunday morning, Kevin got up with P and let me sleep in till 8:30!! It was wonderful. If I haven't mentioned it already- Preston is now pretty much STTN (Sleeping Through The Night), so I was able to sleep last night from about 11 to 8:30. I'll post more in detail on this later, but suffice it to say that it's HEAVEN! When I got up, I was greeted with two beautiful and sweet cards and a gift certificate to the spa. (Yippeeeeeeee!) Then, my mother, stepfather, and grandmother came to Fort Wayne for a Mother's Day Brunch at Park Place downtown. One word- YUM. I easily could have had just the desserts and pastries, but fully enjoyed everything, of course. Preston was a little tired, but did great in the high chair with some cheese, melon, and pita slices in front of him. What a big boy eating off the buffet! He was due for a meltdown by the time we had finished up, so we thought it was best to head home and let him nap before venturing over to Grandma Judy's house for a nice visit in honor of the holiday. There, he got to play with his cousins, his grandpa, and also go through some very cool old vintage-y toys that belonged to his father and his aunts and uncles. Fun stuff!




This Mother's Day, perhaps more than any other, I have a great love and respect for my mother, stepmother, mother-in-law, our grandmothers, and all of my amazing friends who are also mothers. I truly believe it's the most special thing a woman can experience and am so thankful that I get to share in this day, too. Happy Mother's Day to all my mamas and mamas-to-be out there!

And Preston- my sweet angel boy- I love you more than you'll ever know. A huge thank you to you and Daddy for making this a Mother's Day I'll never forget.

Tuesday, May 6, 2008

We're still here!



Ok, it's been wayyyyy too long since I've made a blog post, but I have a good excuse: Preston won't let me. He's crazy. CRAZY, I tell you. This child won't sit still for a second. Actually, he won't sit at all anymore, because he's at this point unable to get to his "crawling" position from sitting. I say "at this point" because he's been known to change overnight when it comes to his mobility. Last week, he could only army crawl, while this week, he's up on all fours, rocking back and forth and now even pulling himself up to standing occasionally. To say that he keeps us on our toes is a gross understatement. He's into everything, so we can't turn our backs for a single second. In one recent afternoon, he pulled the iron-grate fireplace screen over on himself and then proceeded to pull my antique table at the bottom of the stairs on himself, smashing it down and breaking one of the legs right off. I guess that is to be expected with boys- but honestly, other babies his age that we know just aren't quite this active! We aren't complaining- we love his curious personality and spunk. Every day there is something new that he's "discovering."

I've been compiling pictures to document and better show what I mean:
Here he is on his way to the bathroom trash can. It's fun for him to pull it over and dig through used kleenex or empty toilet paper rolls. Bathroom play is both educational and sanitary!


He's absolutely fascinated with doors. He pull them open, pushes them closed, smashes his fingers in the cracks, basically anything one can do with a door, Preston has tried. Also, notice that many of the pictures included in this blog are blurry. He moves too fast for my little point and shoot camera!


Here's his handy-work on the table I mentioned above...


He's as social as ever and LOVES other babies and kids. He'll usually go to anyone, but once I'm out of his sight and he remembers that mommy is gone, he'll get a little freaked out. Today, I took him to vote and the check-in volunteer asked if he could hold him. I agreed, but only because he was only standing a good 3 feet from me and I knew it'd take all of 19 seconds to vote. So he let the guy hold him and luckily, he held Preston up to see the lights on the ceiling. Always a good 19 second distraction!
Here he is playing with his little girlfriend, Stella and hanging out with his cousins at a recent family gathering.



His absolute favorite thing is when Daddy picks him up and swings him upside down. Now, before you have a fit, Grandma Joan, I recently heard that parents instinctively play with their children by tossing them up in the air because it helps babies' brains develop a concept of space-relation. Babies who aren't played with in this way are more likely to require physical therapy as older children. So- Kevin indulges this urge often, and the reaction he gets couldn't be cuter.


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He's completely in love with Ruby. Lately, he especially likes pulling her tail and spilling her water bowl. A few days ago, I watched him grab a piece of her food out of her bowl and pop it into his mouth! Thankfully, I was able to fish it out, but I thought for sure we were in for some red drool.



With the spring weather upon us in full-force, we've been outside pretty much every day. I love living so close to Foster Park where they have such gorgeous gardens and a playground that we can use. Preston still loves the swings and I put him on top of the slide recently. It's made for some great pictures!






When Preston isn't busy getting into everything, he's eating! Now that he's nearing 9 months old, he's consuming some small bits of our food and trying new finger foods. I recently made some organic hummus that he wasn't too fond of, but he did love the whole plain yogurt that we gave him last weekend. I mixed it with some fruit and oatmeal and let me tell ya- he loves it. I think he would eat that for every meal. He's really into feeding himself but isn't even close to mastering the art of the spoon, so cheerios and dog food will have to work for now. He's clearly working up an appetite since he's burning calories being so busy.




That's it for now- until next time, be thinking of us chasing around a crazy baby every time you sit down. Ahhhh- someday. :)