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.
