Liam: 12 Months

Likes: Cuddles, crawling, eating, throwing things, 

Dislikes: Being on his back, car seat (still), getting things taken away

Biggest Achievement of the Month: Turning a year

Biggest Challenge of the Month: Eating

Sleep: So he is still a great sleeper.  He sleeps through the night 98% of the time and most of the time when he wakes up he goes right back to sleep and we don't even need to go grab him.  Getting him down can be a struggle sometimes but we have been able to just set him down in his crib awake and he will fuss for a minute or two and then will fall asleep on his own. He has been going to be between 7 and 8 and waking up between 6:30 and 7:30.

He is also napping in his crib now, which for me is amazing because now I can do things while he sleeps. He naps anywhere from an hour to 3 hours in a day which is pretty darn good.

Temperment/Personality: Getting such a personality.  I am now getting told that I am going to have so much fun when he is a toddler.  He does get upset when you take away something he isn't supposed to have still but redirection does wonders if I happen to have something good. He is still so happy and does cute things for the sake of being cute.  He will try and "share" things (aka hand it to us and expect it back within 30 seconds) and loves doing anything to make us smile. He is a major drama king though. At the drop of a hat he will start bawling with big crocodile tears and then seconds later (especially if he gets what he wants) they will be gone.

Eating: So I put this as the biggest challenge and it is mostly because he is wanting to eat normal food and is refusing purees now which makes it more difficult to make sure he is getting adequate fruits and veggies. But he is getting really good at feeding himself which I am grateful for.  We have found out that he likes hamburger (just plain patties) and chicken nuggets.  I have set up a meal plan for him (I will prep the foods ahead of time so I am not cooking all of the time) and we will start this within the next week and hopefully he will like everything we give him.  He loves having what we are having, I think it makes him feel like a big boy.  We are still breastfeeding although pumping has now stopped.  He will take whole milk (on most days) and I just breastfeed him when I am home with him.  Not sure when I am going to wean because the boy does love his boob.

The Superficial: He is still tiny for his age. Barely 20 lbs (now that we have had his 1 year appointment we know he is 19 lb 10 oz) He is getting a lot more hair (mostly in the back) but since it is really blonde it is hard to see in pictures and whatnot. His are definitely going to stay blue which I love and he gets complimented on them all the time. He is still kind of chunky but has lost a bit of it, I am sure to all the moving around he does now.

Milestones & Firsts: He likes to blow raspberries.  His new thing that he just started doing is shaking his head no.  Sometimes it is in context and sometimes it is not but he thinks it is hilarious. 

He also has started putting correct shapes in correct holes (my mom has a toy for that) and he started it completely on his own. He was trying to shove a green ball into the green circle hole and since it didn't go with that toy, it didn't work but when I gave him the right one, he did it with no problem. He doesn't have all of the shapes down yet though, he is great at the circle and decent at the square, the rest he is still working on.  Not only he is putting them in there though, he also knows that if he then hits the button it will give him the shape back so that he can do it again.

For firsts, he had his first night away from both mom and dad. Hubby surprised me with a night out of town and we had our nieces watch Liam and it went just fine.

He also had his first Thanksgiving and his last first holiday, which is a little sad.  He is growing up.... But he loved all the food at Thanksgiving and it went well, not that I remember much, I was sick and not paying too much attention to anything.

And lastly he had his first birthday obviously.  It went great and there will be a post about it soon (it is mostly written, it just need to add the pictures)


So I am not going to be doing weekly pictures anymore.  As much as I have loved them, it was a lot of work and he is not wanting to sit still for them really anymore. I will do monthly ones and still do monthly posts but I am not sure I am going to keep the format that I have now. I guess I will figure it out before his 13 month post.

Liam: Eleven Months

Likes: Eating normal food, his sippie cup, peek a boo

Dislikes: Getting changed, the car seat

Biggest Achievement of the Month: Using his sippie cup

Biggest Challenge of the Month: His health

Sleep: So this month has been on and off.  As long as he is feeling good, he sleeps great.  He normally naps around a total of 3 hours which is great if it is the afternoon nap that is the long one and if he will sleep in his crib, because then I get time to do stuff.  But he hasn't been feeling great all month. He came down with an ear infection which resulted in him needing to sleep in bed with us, which then resulted with hubby going to the couch. But that only lasted a few days and after that he went back to sleeping amazing.  The only other hitch was daylight savings time which did result in his bedtime becoming a bit earlier but he does wake up a bit earlier too so it is a good and a bad thing.  And last night he slept horribly and screamed for over an hour with hubby but I think that was just a fluke. 

Temperment/Personality: I am pretty sure that he is going to be a big ham.  He sees us smiling from something he did and so he does it again with a huge smile on his face. He is so happy but he also can turn on a dime if he doesn't get what he wants or if he sees you eating and you are not sharing. He loves seeing the people he knows and is starting to warm up to others more easily. He is interested in everything around and is understanding so much more of what we are saying.

Eating: He eats a ton. Still breastfeeding but he is eating parts of what we have for dinner and other meals if he is with us. If we go out, he gets some of what we are having or else he starts to freak out. We have still been giving him purees because we want to make sure he is eating enough but I am not sure those are enough.  On Sunday mornings he gets 2 purees, some boobie and then goes on to have eggs and whatever else we give him at breakfast. One lunch with my mom he had a yogurt, some eggs and then a fat piece of toast. I hoping to start just doing normal food because more of what he eats seems to be ending up in his mouth rather then on the floor.

I noticed after he drank over half of my roommate's smoothie that he can drink out of a straw. So I figured I would try a straw type sippie cup.  I got one and after a few days he loved it. He holds it on his own and he doesn't have to understand gravity to use it. Although he still is horrible at drinking and tends to drool it all over himself, it is not because of the cup.

The Superficial: Still small. compared to lots of other kids around his age he is tiny but he does fit into the 9-12 month clothes so he must be somewhere in the correct range. He is over 19 lbs now, almost 20 (he had to go to the doctor and they weighed him). He is still adorable although he did get a rash all over his body but after we took him to the doctor they said it would go away in a few days and it did.

Milestones & Firsts: So he can stand we have figured out, he just chooses not to, so I am sure in the next month or so he will get around to doing that. He is definitely saying mama to me now (he will say it when I walk away or when he is coming to me) so that makes it better that he said dada first.  I think he might be starting to do that with dada too but I am not 100% yet. He is waving a little bit and did it unprompted for the first time when leaving his great grandparent's house to great grandpa.  

He also started clapping.  The first time he did it, I just looked at him and asked who taught him that because I know I don't clap with him (it was his dad and our roommate) but it is adorable.  He also has started doing the raspberry noise which is fun.  I love that he is doing all these things that he sees other people do and that I don't teach him.

So he had a few firsts this month.  He got to go to his first Renaissance Faire with me and a friend and had a blast. I was shocked how well he did, I had him in his stroller almost the entire time and as long as he had his 6 items with him in it, he was happy.  And when I had to pull him out to eat in a crowded room, he sat on my lap just fine.

He had his first ear infection which wasn't fun.  We had noticed he was cranky and wasn't sleeping well and then on a Saturday I was told by my roommate that babysat him that he had a fever all morning.  I later saw him yanking at his ears later and then it clicked. We brought him into Instacare and sure enough he had an ear infection.  They said we seemed to catch it really fast and they gave us medicine and it went right away. He really only had a few bad days and the fever for only a day and a half but I still felt so bad for him.

He also had his first Halloween.  We had originally planned to stop by my parents house so they could see him in his costume and "trick or treat" at their house but once we got there, we were told by my dad that my mom was at an art meeting and wouldn't be home for awhile.  After that we were supposed to go trick or treating with my sister in law and her daughter but she ended up having to work so we didn't do that either, but it ended up being a good thing because he hated his puppy costume and only wore it for about a total of 30 minutes.  Instead we got some fast food, ice cream and went home and watched Hocus Pocus so it turned out  to be fun.

Liam: Ten Months

Likes: Tickles, people he knows, bathtime, food

Dislikes: Getting things taken away from him, carseat

Biggest Achievement of the Month: Eating on his own

Biggest Challenge of the Month: Sleep

Sleep: So this month has been weird, at the beginning we were fighting him on sleep, he wasn't sleeping through the night anymore and kept ending up in our bed because neither of us could get him down. And then one evening I go to the gym and when I come home, he was already asleep. No boob or mom needed. Since then (which was only last week) he will let dad put him to bed now (which hasn't happened for a couple months now) and he is back to sleeping through the night. OK that is sort of a lie, he does wake up a couple times but he puts himself back to sleep so we don't have to go in there so I count it.

Temperment/Personality: He is so happy. Everyone that meets him comments on what a happy baby he is and he seems to be warming up to people he doesn't know quicker now so that is nice. He loves getting paid attention to and making us laugh. I love when he is tired because he will just sit on your lap quietly and cuddle, it is awesome. He is still getting into everything and putting it all in his mouth but we have gotten better at making sure things that he shouldn't eat, he doesn't.

He never wants to be on his back (which makes changing diapers fun) and always likes to be exploring everything. I am working on when I take things away from him, I ask him if I can please have it and when he gives it to me (or I take it because he shouldn't have it) I tell him thank you. In my head if I start early he might get it ingrained in his brain. And he seems to get less upset when I make it seem like he has a choice to give things to me, maybe it is just a coincidence but it seems like that.

A funny thing he started doing this month. When he is done eating he likes to just play, well since I don't enjoy that I normally would just pull my shirt back down and he can't play anymore but this month he started doing something new. When I pull my shirt down he looks at me, pulls it back up and contiues playing, it is amazing to see that he now gets that connection. Also, I can ask him to bring me something he is already holding and he is doing that. And if we are moving rooms or something I tell him to like for example, pick up his ball and sometimes he does it, (sometime he needs more encouragement) and then hangs onto it. SO many new things he is getting now. He also reaches for people now, we hold out our arms to him and he will reach out for certain people.

Eating: He is still my big eater. Still on the boob, but sometimes he doesn't eat long because he gets distracted easily. I have been wearing a nursing necklace lately though and it seems to be helping to keep his attention. But sometimes he has long sessions and I think some of it is a comfort thing but he gets so excited when he sees me pulling out the boppy that it is sweet.

He is still on purees because I can't gaurentee enough is getting in his mouth to keep him satisfied with feeding himself. But he doesn't seem to mind and in addition to feeding him fruits and veggies we are also doing the phase 3 foods which are like actual meals.

We let him feed himself pretty much whenever we go out to eat. We order a side that he can eat (like fries or eggs) and just let him grab it and feed it to himself and judging from the mess on the floor, he seems to be doing a lot better. We are trying to let him try lots of new foods and when we cook, I try to just give him some of his own so that he can eat with us too. He doesn't like watching us eat if he isn't getting any.

We are working on getting him to drink out of a sippy cup but so far he doesn't love it that much. He would prefer we hold onto it for him.

The Superficial: He is so so pretty. And he is getting lots more hair although because it is blonde, unless we stick it up, you really can't see it. I am pretty darn sure his eyes are going to stay blue and I hope so because he gets lots of compliments on them. At his last docotor's appointment he was 18 and a half pounds and is 17 in tall. He did drop for his percentage but the doctor said that is normal and she didn't seem worried about it. He is still in 9-12 month clothes.

Milestones & Firsts: He is pulling himself up on everything and will move along the furniture or whatever he is holding onto. But he seems kind of cautious about letting go of anything although he is confident enough he will hold on with only one hand but when we try (and he feels like cooperating) he can stand up on his own and has done it for about half a minute. He is babbling lots now and I am pretty sure, to him, mama means food.

Quite a few firsts this month. He had his first professional photo shoot (we didn't do newborns). Although we do weekly pictures, that is just me and my mom, we actually paid someone to do a nice family shoot and it went really well and the pictures came out amazing.

He showered for the first time with me. I was sitting at home with him on my day off and needed to shower and thought, couldn't I just bring him in there with me? I looked around online and grabbed the stuff to bathe him, put him on the floor in the corner (I have a stand up shower), did my normal shower routine while he sat and played with a shampoo bottle and when I was done, I just held him and bathed him, so much easier and I am not constantly looking outside the shower to make sure he is OK.

He went to his first bonfire. We had our monthly bookclub outside this month and had a nice fire, he didn't seem to interested in it. He also went to his first baby shower (his first one outside of me that is). One of my good friends is due in October and had a coed baby shower to which we brought him to and he provided some entertainment for us.

Liam: Nine Months

Likes: Getting tickled, eating, swimming, standing, crawling, getting into everything

Dislikes: Going to sleep, getting things taken away from him

Biggest Achievement of the Month: Starting finger foods

Sleep: So there were a couple really bad days at the beginning of the month that were on the tail end of his teething (which produced no teeth, just awesome) but once he seemed OK again, he went back to his own bed. He is starting to get more aware of everything going on around him and I am now having to go into his room, turn off the thlight and rock him to get him to sleep, which really isn't that bad but he will only let me do it, which does kind of suck. But he is back to sleeping through the night again so all in all he is doing well

Temperment/Personality: So much more personality now. He gets so delighted when he sees people that he knows or people play with him. You can creep up on him (in plain sight so he can see you) saying I'm going to get you and even before you get to him, he is giggling and squirming, knowing that his is going to get tickled and it is hilarious. There is another, I call it a trick that he will do sometimes for me, I look at him all serious and say "Boobies" and he start smiling at me.

He is very cuddly when he is tired, which is awesome but when he is awake, he just wants to be moving and everywhere. He is still very happy in general though. He is definately recognizing people now, and nothing is better when I get off of work and he sees me and just lights up.

Eating: He loves to eat. We are still breastfeeding, on days I am home, around 4 to 5 times a day. He is a big fan of the boobie but I am not sure how much of it is just comfort feeding but I don't mind. He is also still having purees but a lot more of them and we have these squeeze things that have purees in them and he can feed himself with them.(we have used them on car trips and things)

We are working with finger foods, and feeding him more kinds of food. He really likes scrambled eggs and certain fruits but we aren't confident enough that he is eating enough

The Superficial: He is getting more hair now, which I love, someday I might let my mom try to style it for the weekly pictures like she keeps asking me to do but for now I like it laying down but you can definately see bed head and things like that now which is awesome. He is still in 9- 12 month clothes and because they are mixed in, sometimes he gets a 6-9 month one that is a bit tight on him.

I still get lots of compliments on him but I get it from people that I wouldn't expect, like kids and guys. I find it really odd (as a kid I would have never said your baby is cute to someone but maybe that is just me). But I also get told that he seems really small for his age (?!), and someone has even gone so far to ask if he was a preemie. He doesn't seem that small to me but maybe I am just crazy.

Milestones & Firsts: So he is definately babbling. He says mama, dada, lala, hi, and yeah (I realize that I say that to him a lot so it makes sense) but we are now working on attaching meaning to what he is saying. He is standing up lots and almost has stood on his own and can crawl really fast when he wants to. He grabs everything and of course puts it all in his mouth.

So for firsts, first time trying to eat a penny. It really wasn't that bad, it was just blocking the front of his throat in his mouth, not actually his ability to breath but because I didn't want to push it farther so I just took him upsidedown and gave him one shake and out it came.

He managed to get his hand in dad's enchilada sauce and we weren't fast enough to get it off because he promptly rubbed his eyes and then screamed because obviously it stung, and we were out in public, it was embarrissing but we managed to grab a wipe pretty fast and got it out. He had his first sitter that wasn't a close friend of family and he was fine. First night in a hotel which we found out that having other people in the room with us was not a good idea because he slept like crap :(

Liam: Eight Months

Likes: Swimming, being tickled, crawling, pulling himself up, watching iPad

Dislikes: Getting teeth, not getting what he wants

Biggest Achievement of the Month: Actually crawling

Biggest Challenge of the Month: Teething

Sleep: So after last month and having issues with sleeping this month was going so much better. He was going down pretty easy and staying down until Cody woke up (6:30 to 7) and then he started teething at the end of the month. Then it all went to hell.

Apparently if he is in pain the only way he will sleep is if he is with mom so I have had (since it has just started it has only been for 3 nights so there will probably be some in next months post too) 3 nights of falling asleep with him in bed with me, one night of him being there all night and one night of him being there from 4am on.

So he is a bit attached right now, there has been lots of feeding to get him down and some use of baby iboprofun but we are surviving. He won't even take naps without me right now (which means I have up to 3 hours of just sitting there with him in my arms). And just screams when dad tries so it is up to mostly me. Hopefully it will be over soon and we can go back to having a baby that sleeps again.

Temperment/Personality: Very happy although not with everyone anymore. If he doesn't see someone on at least a weekly basis he seems to forget who they are and will just stare at them with a blank expression. No crying, not even if they hold him, he just stares and doesn't smile.

He is starting to get into everything so I am really keeping an eye on him and he is starting to cry when I take things away that he shouldn't be playing with (garbage cans, papers I need, things that he can choke on) but I don't do too much when he does that. It normally makes me laugh and I just give him the binky and tell him that it doesn't matter if he cries, he is still not getting it back (I do talk to him with full sentances because of course he can understand me).

Other then that he loves to play with us now. He grabs our faces and laughs when he pulls my hair (oh yeah he is going to be a fun toddler) and is much more interested in us now. We can intereact with him more now too, he will play peek-a-boo, and a fun game where we put a blanket on his head and he pulls it off. It is getting really fun to play with him.

Eating: He is a boy that loves to eat. We are still doing three main meals a day (breakfast, lunch and bedtime) and he has a variety of vegetables, fruits and cereal. We are starting to try finger foods and he won't eat the cereal puff things at all for some reason but have recently found out that we can get him to eat yogurt melts (and he feeds them to himself).

He is breastfeeding (or having a bottle depending on where he is) 4 to 5 times a day so he is still going strong on that too. And because of the teething thing, it seems to be a comfort thing right now too so there have been nighttime feedings for the first time in a long tim.

The Superficial: He is getting so big. He is probably around 18 lbs now so it is getting fun to carry him around. He is still in 6-9 month clothes and in size 3 diapers (something that I have not been recording but I should have been). He is still getting more hair and depending on the light, it is either blonde or strawberry blonde.

Milestones & Firsts: He is saying dada and mama now. He is crawling and has gone from doing an army crawl to crawling with one leg kind of up, to normal crawling to crawling with his butt in the air. He is pulling himself up on everything, he loves to stand.

He has had his first finger foods and feeding himself. His first falls, once when in his rock and play at night (obviously we are no longer using it) and the other off my mom's bed but it was onto carpet. There were no major injuries from those, just some bumps but since he is so pale, we thing everything shows really easily.

Liam: Seven Months

Likes: Moving around, being tickled, swimming, being held, chickens (he has loved those for quite awhile now but I keep forgetting to mention it)

Dislikes: Green beans, not being able to see people, sleep,

Biggest Achievement of the Month: Almost sort of crawling

Biggest Challenge of the Month: Sleep

Sleep: So sleep has been hard this month.  It started out like normal with him doing well and then it started going downhill.  We were having real problems not only getting him down to sleep but keeping him asleep once he is there, and this isn't only for naps, night is included.  One of the major problems was that he decided that he hated his father at bedtime and wouldn't tolerate even being held by him so either I had to get him down by the time I go to bed (which is decently early because I have to work at 5 in the morning) or let him scream with dad until he passes out from exhaustion. 

Something had to change. The next day I did a bunch of research and found out that the fact that my child barely napped at all had a lot to do with why he slept like crap at night, and that we were thinking that putting him to bed later meant he slept later (like a normal person) which is also wrong.  So I talked to my amazing babysitters and asked them to try and get at least an hour of nap time when they had him (if they can, I get he can be difficult if he wants to be) and then always on the way home from the sitters he falls asleep in the car, so I figured if I could get him out without waking him up, that would be his second nap of the day.

So he has now been napping 2-3 hours a day and is going to bed earlier and is sleeping so much better not only through the night but going down too. Granted sometimes it means napping for an hour and a half on mommy but if that is what it takes for him to sleep at night, I guess I will just have to hold the cute sleeping baby.

Temperment/Personality: He has the best personality. And he is so happy like 90% of the time. All it takes is the right person smiling at him and he is grinning like a maniac.  He still only cries normally when he is tired (he is more on a schedule to eat now so he doesn't really cry much anymore when he is hungry).  He is still so cuddly too, which I adore and I hope it is something that never goes away but he is a boy and I am pretty sure he will outgrow it sadly. He is still sticking everything in his mouth and is so curious about everything.

Eating: He loves food.  It is hard to believe that I had issues getting this kid to start solids because now he loves them so very much. We were having him eat cereal in the morning and then fruit or veggies at night (I read somewhere that is how you are supposed to do it) but when we started having sleep issues hubby suggested we swap it (so that he gets carbs at night and it will make him sleepy) and it really has helped. And then he gets the boob after his food.

I have not gotten my act together yet and am still buying packaged baby food but it is hard to get the time together to even get started.  He is having one 2nd foods size thing of fruit or veggie in the morning and 5 TB of cereal at night now. The only problem with feeding him real food is that it is screwing up my milk supply for when I am pumping (he seems to get plenty when he is eating straight from the source) so that is something that I am trying to work on.

The Superficial: He is still cute.  He is getting more hair and depending on the light, it is either strawberry blonde or just blonde (and it isn't just sunlight it is one color, it depends on the day too, it is really weird).  I am 90% sure his eyes are going to stay blue, yay!  He is still nice and chunky which is awesome.  He is still in the 6-9 month clothes and they seem to be fitting nicely.  I am trying to keep his nails short and keep an eye on them, that way he doesn't always have scratches on his face and I'm not always having to explain to people why they are there.

Milestones & Firsts: He has said dada, he was babbling and so I try saying mama to him a bunch (I was ever hopeful) and then clear as day he said "dada" and I was like, well crap. But he is saying it easily now.  He had a stye on his eye, which isn't that big of a deal except that it seemed to hurt him and it looked weir because one of his eyes looked red when it was closed.  He is sort of crawling.  Well my mom looked it up and apparently crawling now is a generic term and it includes army crawling which seems to pretty much be Liam's style but he is still trying to crawl on all fours but he seems to get bored of it easily and goes back to what works for him.

He got to see his first fireworks and it was way pas his bedtime so he saw about half of them and seemed fascinated and then got tired and fell asleep.  It was adorable.