7 Months Old!

Man this past month flew by! It feels like we were just celebrating Ayden's half birthday in Nashville and now here we are at the end of August already and our sweetie is 7 months old.

6 months, 5 months, 4 months, 3 months, 2 months, 1 month

 I suppose maybe Ayden's 7th month flew by because so much happened in that time frame! We figured our how to get rid of his micro naps, are feeling more rested because we made a final decision on our sleeping arrangements, he is not only crawling but pulling up on everything and it has been a blast! He even pulled to standing and let go three times this morning! He plopped down as soon as he let go but still, it seems like crawling and the beginnings of walking all happened at the same time. I tried to catch it on video but he didn't let go again.  I did catch an impressive attempt to reach down and pick up a spoon that he was playing with while standing.

We are so very proud of his determination, persistence and perseverance. When he falls we try to make light of it by clapping and cheering (if it wasn't serious, obviously). If it wasn't too bad of a spill this method usually makes him forget about what happened pretty quickly. If it was a bad fall, he'll cry and no amount of cheering will make him forget about it. That is when we swoop him up, snuggle him and kiss/rub wherever we think might hurt. These controlled responses to his spills have worked out great for us because he's surprised us lately. He'll fall and it'll look semi-bad then we'll get ready for the cry but he just kind of frowns and may whine a little and then he's back at it again. Such a tough little guy!  In my experience as a teacher, if you start to rush to them every time they fall or cry a little they start to exaggerate it or do it on purpose.  We are hoping this will help Ayden reserve the crying for when it really does hurt.  He's a little young to be "crying wolf" but the time is near so it's best to encourage our desired behavior before it's too late. So far, so good!

As I have done in the past here I shall insert a couple of screenshots of the milestone App that we use to track progress:

We only follow this for fun since we understand that all babies are unique and deserve to develop at their own rate. It is still interesting to see where he falls in comparison to the "norm."

In the Physical Development area, Ayden is doing everything listed above except for clapping.  He LOVES clapping, though, so I'd imagine he'll be doing it on his own soon enough.  He is also doing everything on the list in all other areas.  Peek-a-boo and come-and-get-me games are a new favorite!  He giggles and giggles!  Objecting to a toy being taken away is a new development just over the past week or so.  Lucky for us he is still easily re-directable and he'll calm down quickly once we replace the original object with something equally as awesome.  We have found that a good tool is to go ahead and have the equally as awesome item ready for a quick switcharoo.  His favorite items at the moment are powercords (or anything string-like) and plastic grocery bags.  Pretty much any suffocation or strangulation hazard so we are having to make swticharoos pretty often around here.

House work has gotten much easier because he is pretty content to just follow me around and either play with me while I work or play by himself.  He is super interested in the stairs now, though, so we've busted out our tension gates.  We actually had two given to us years ago and we always used them for Maverick upon occasion and always knew we'd save them for our baby and the time has finally come!

I'd also like to report that Ayden has been making regular "deposits" in his diapers for the past couple of days (3 yesterday to be exact!) and it's looking more and more like big kid poop though it still doesn't smell.  Turns out that when you start Baby Led Weaning at the 6 month mark, it takes about a month for their bellies to regulate and for the breastfed poop to phase out.  So long EBF poo, oh how I shall miss you... (Ha!)  It's so nice that he's gotten so good at raking items and getting them to his mouth.  I have started cutting his food into little pieces and he's doing great with it!

No longer just "exploration!"

Today we were actually home for his afternoon nap ( a first since we re-vamped his nap routine) and I wasn't sure how it would go.  As it turns out, he's been asleep in his crib for almost an hour now and I have been able to clean up the kitchen and write this post.  The fact that he now gets two solid naps, and sometimes a third cat nap, has taken so much stress out of my life! I feel so good knowing that he is getting the rest he needs and I also get some time for me.  Today was doubly wonderful because we napped together for an hour during his morning nap and I got some downtime during his afternoon nap.  I think I'm going to start trying to stay home on Tuesdays again like I used to so that I can enjoy both of his naps to their full potential! 

~Sarah