Week Forty Eight Pictures...

Week Forty Eight Pictures (Monday, February 18th - Sunday, February 24th)

He was actually walking along holding onto Daddy's legs from the kitchen to the office

Week Forty Eight Glance...

Week Forty Eight Glance (Monday, February 18th - Sunday, February 24th)

• We had a few events this week but Alexander was sick for most of it.
• -Mommy's Birthday
• -Alexander hit the 11 Month Mark (one more to go...)
• Sleeping was fairly usual this week even with being sick.
• Would go to bed around 7/7:30p and would wake up around 6a...a couple nights he had a coughing episode around 4am but stayed in his crib after
• Was off on Monday due to the Holiday so we met Grammie & Grampie for lunch at the Met
• Only went to school one day (Tuesday) because he got sick - cough w/phelgm & fever (ranging from 99.9*-103*)
• Went to see Dr. M on Wednesday - RSV test came back negative but gave us a prescription to continue with neb treatments
• Stayed home with Mommy on her birthday on Thursday and then with Daddy on Friday (which was probably good because we got about 8" of snow)
• Went to Uncle Billy's on Saturday for the annual Flag dinner - and although he wasn't 100% he was very well behaved all day and loved hanging out
• Alexander was pretty much miserable for most of the week
• Sunday was a lowkey day at home...HOWEVER...he was miserable unless he was napping. So he did just that - he napped. We were playing on the floor and at 9am, he crawled over to me, cried a bit, and then cuddled into my chest. He was asleep in maybe 5 minutes.
• He napped from 9a-12p with two small moments of awakening but then went back down and then again from 3p-4:45pm. CRAZY. But again, he was miserable if he wasn't sleeping.
• Food he tried this week: french fries, ketchup, hamburger, bun, ice cream cake, meatball sandwich, swedish meatball, lasagna, ziti
• He continues to hate ANY kind of pasta but LOVES playing with any type of straps
• Started to say "ga" and more babbling

Birthday Invite...

As promised, here is a copy of the invitation I sent out for Alexander's first birthday! We just sent them to close family & friends, and even with that we'll still have a housefull. But it will be nice to have them all here with us to celebrate the big day.

He was quite excited to play with the balloons! There were more, but let's just say they popped prior to the photoshoot.

I can't believe in just 4 short weeks he'll be one year old!

11 Month Photoshoot

Here are a few shots of our Glove photoshoot this evening... he didn't necessarily want to sit IN the glove so this was the closest we could get him into it.
Love his little belly...

11 Months...

11 Month Recap

Developmental:
-Crawling has gotten much faster
-Pulls himself to a stand and is starting to get the hang of cruising along furniture
-Can get himself back down to the floor from the standing position, does this quite frequently in his crib
-Getting really good at walking around the house by holding onto your hands.
-Does a great job of walking as he pushes a toy/ride across the room without one of us holding onto him
-Main words are 'dada', 'nana', 'baba' and occasionally 'mama'. Dan has this trick with him that when he says 'mama' in the hopes that he'll repeat it, but he says 'dada' instead. Grampie gets a huge kick out of it!
-He's starting to do a lot of babbling and telling stories with all sorts of sounds
-Gives kisses & can even blow kisses
-Nodding yes, no, waving and Hi-fives are more frequent and take place at the right times
-Blows rasberries, but those have gotten less common as he's learning to blow bubbles with his drool
-Still No teeth yet
-Does a great job of holding his bottles and getting much better with the sippy cup, with or without handles...if only he'll keep the liquid in his mouth
-Is able to feed himself pieces of food and gets better every day
-Loves water & bathtime - the more splashing the better (we may only use one bottle of shampoo for the entire first year, a weird tidbit I find fascinating)
-Great motorskills (moving objects from one hand to the other & following things with his eyes)
-Still a great cuddler before bed

Sleeping:
-Wakes up around 5:30-6am. Thankfully it's getting a little later as he gets older, he's even slept in til 6:30/7am a few times
-Most days he takes two naps a day (usually an hour to an hour and a half long)
-Bedtime is 7p and he is usually asleep by 7:30pm
-95% of the time he spends the whole night in his crib... it's not 100% because he's been sick this past week

Clothes:
-6-9 Months - this is the best size for him right now in almost everything. He can get away with size 6 months onesies and we even have some 3-6 months sweaters that he can wear. But if it's 6-9 months the pants fits perfect and aren't too short.
-Outfits to school have continued mixing up outfits/items to make new outfits to make the most out of all of his clothes
-Diapers: Pampers Size 3 Cruisers

Feeding:
-4-5 Bottles a day of whole milk (24-30 oz)
--First bottle at home before school; and 2-3 bottles at school depending on his nap schedule/mood/hunger; and last bottle before bed
-Solids - The schedule hasn't changed, just adding in some new items: he'll have two-three meals a day:
--Breakfast: oatmeal with applesauce or a waffle w/his sippy cup
--Lunch: Veggies & cheese w/water in sippy cup. Sometimes he'll get a thing of fruit along with the veggies
-- PM Snack: Fruit & a cooke w/water in sippy cup. Puffs or a saltine cracker if he's extra hungry
-- Likes: Carrots, Applesauce, Squash, Prunes, Dutch Apple, Apple Blueberry, Pears, Peaches, Pineapple, Banana, Mixed Veggies, Sweet Potatoes & Corn, Grape Blueberry, Apple Strawberry Banana
-- Dislikes: Garden Vegetable Medley, yogurt, any type of pasta (I think it's the texture he doesn't like)
-We'll give him water or milk in a sippy cup.
-Loves to drink water out of a bottle (a normal adult water bottle)
-Loves arrowroot cookies, graham crackers & saltines
-Lately he's tried: french fries, mashed potatoes, ketchup, hamburger, peas, Italian Wedding soup, pasta, mac & cheese, pizza sauce, bread (loved all of it but the pasta)

Celebrating Mommy's Birthday

As we all know Alexander was under the weather for Mommy's birthday.

This is how he looked after waking up from his morning nap - just a mess. You can see his eye peering over his crib bumper and as soon as he knew I was at the door he stood up as fast as he could - face dripping everywhere.

Then later on after another nap and a bath, we tasted Mommy's cake before bed. He seemed to like it - what's not to like about ice cream cake!

Birthday/Doctor time...

Today is my birthday (Happy Birthday to me!) and I took the day off from work...who wants to work on their birthday to have a quiet me-day! Unfortunately/Fortunately (depending on how you look at it...), Alexander got to spend my birthday with me.

Alexander came down with his virus again. It started Monday night as he was going to bed; he developed a small cough and did not have a good night sleep. Tuesday afternoon, school called me to pick him up because he had a fever of a 102*.

That night he was miserable - coughing, sweating, and genuinely unable to sleep or get comfortable. Finally I brought him in with me so he could be more up right. At one point, he was so hot that neither of us needed blankets. We took him to Dr. M yesterday morning to have him check him out. Fortunately, the RSV test came back negative so it's just a crappy cold with a fever. So he gave us a prescription for albuterol for more neb treatments which will help his breathing/wheezing and we're just to continue with the Motrin for the fever. Hopefully this doesn't last long.

While we were at the the doctor, Dan joked about getting him weighed again. Dr. M's wife went into another room and came back with a scale - yeah! The wee little lad is not even 20 lbs yet - 19lbs and 5 ounces. I have a feeling he'll be just about 20 lbs for his year checkup.

Week Forty Seven Pictures...

Week Forty Seven Pictures (Monday February 11th - Sunday, February 17th)

Week Forty Seven Pictures...

Week Forty Seven Pictures (Monday February 11th - Sunday, February 17th)

Week Forty Seven Glance...

Week Forty Seven Glance (Monday February 11th - Sunday, February 17th)

• Overall did very well with sleeping this week. Slept thru the night each night; Woke up closer to 6am almost every morning; took good naps at school; and even slept a bit later on the weekend
• Went down to bed well all week
• Good week at school - played well and still doesn't like babies in his personal space
• Wore all new outfits this week (minus his valentine's day onesie)
• Celebrated his first Valentine's Day & got 2 valentines at school
• He is hypnotized by the MASH TV theme - will stop whatever he is doing and just stare at the tv
• Crawling is getting quite fast & he's good at pulling himself up and getting back down
• He's not a fan of his new carseat...I spent most of each driving singing the ABCs to him to keep him occupied. Otherwise, he would cry and get upset. And unfortunately I can't reach him to give him his pacifier due to the size & position of the carseat
• Ate well this week: oatmeal, waffles, puffs, cookie, cheese & Miss Jaritza's croissant.
• Friday, Alyson & Grammie came over to babysit so Mommy & Daddy could have a date.
• Went shopping & then came home and had a bath with Alyson & Grammie
• Went over Grammie & Grampie's on Saturday - played with blocks & the fridge farm
• Went out to eat on Saturday and he LOVED Grampie's Italian Wedding soup. He couldn't get enough of it and kept gulping it down, he also enjoyed Daddy's peas. I was pleasantly surprised at how well behaved he was, especially considering it was very near his bedtime.
• We also tried mac & cheese but he doesn't seem to like the texture of pasta as this is now the 3rd time I've given him pasta and he wanted no part of it.
• Still loves bathtime (See previous post about bathtime Friday night with the babysitters)
• Dada, nana & mama are pretty much the main words. Cute story: Dan will say 'mama' to him and he answers with 'dada' and a quick shake of the head.
• I think he's figured out the sign for "eat" as the past two days he'll make the sign when I say "do you want to eat"
• He blows & makes the sounds for kisses - this is almost better than 'mama'
• Lowkey day on Sunday - relaxed at home until playdate in the late afternoon
• Still no teeth...

Birthday Invites...

The invitations are completed and ready to go...I plan to have them in the mail on Tuesday! Hopefully this means I'll be able to post a picture of the invitation by the end of the week.

Alexander's first birthday will be here before you know it! We're not going to go hog-wild but we certainly will celebrate in grand style. We're not going to have a huge blowout just some family & some close friends but big enough to celebrate his first birthday!

And he may be one of the few One year olds who has to gum his own cake...but he'll enjoy every last bite!

Playdate...

Today, Alexander had a little playdate. A friend of ours from work lives right around the corner and he has a little girl that's 3 weeks younger than Alexander. His wife was working and he was looking to get out of the house, so we asked him to come on over. At first Alexander was extremely shy and Avery just wanted to play. Who would have thought that it was Alexander who is in daycare and Avery is at home...

Finally, he warmed up to the idea of playing together and sharing his toys. They were quite cute together and finally even got close enough to feel each other out. Per norm, I blurred out her face as I don't want to put another baby up here without permission.

I think next time we'll have to have Avery come over earlier so both babies are in good moods and not hungry because I think by the time that Avery was getting ready to go home, they were comfortable with each other and the situation.

Gambling Man...

It's a good thing Dan's not a gambling man. Otherwise the dealer would have all his money. Okay, not really.

During Alexander's playdate today, Dan was explaining to our friend just how crazy I am when it comes to taking pictures of Alexander. It started out innocent enough when he mentioned that Alexander is used to camera flashes. Then Dan said that I've probably taken 20,000 pictures of Alexander so far.

I had to stop him. That's just crazy talk. 20,000!? I'm obsessive, but not that bad. So to appease both of our minds, I did a quick calculation.

So far I have taken 8,013 pictures of Alexander, give or take a few. Would you have guessed that??

Bath Time...

Grammie & Alyson were over to babysit Friday night and gave Alexander his bath. As you can see, everyone had fun!

Happy Valentine's Day...

Saturday morning, Alexander & I woke up played for a bit and then set up for his Valentine's Day photoshoot. He was in a really good mood but wanted no part of the hearts on his head - so I had to act fast! And here are the best shots of the morning because then he just started to get annoyed with me for trying to give him props.

Today at school was very cute. I dropped him off and all of the babies had their valentine's day outfits on. One little girl had white tights with hearts - very cute! They were all ready for some valentine love.

Happy Valentine's Day!