7 Month Must Haves

So this is obviously late but I just can't seem to get my butt in gear! Things have been moving fast here. My office is moving across town so I was working from home this whole week. While Jack still went to daycare, because how else would I get anything done, working from a teeny tiny laptop at the kitchen table instead of my great office setup has been hard. But picking Jack up a tad early and enjoying some extra time home instead of driving in traffic has been the best!

Onto the MUST HAVES! This list might be a little thin but with Christmas coming we have been saving and waiting to buy things so we're making do with what we have until that special morning! :)

7 months was a lot of fun. Jack started "crawling" more, even though it's still army crawling and he started standing when we hold onto his hands. One day after changing his diaper I grabbed his hands to sit up on the changing table and he skipped that and went straight to standing and started walking towards me! I was so excited I screamed for Max. A gigantic proud mama moment :)

#1 Sippy Cup - These sippy cups are amazing. First we tried this one and he loved it but it got to be too small, it's only 4 oz. I wanted to try a small one first to make sure he could hold it but making two bottles because he drinks 6+ oz was getting old fast. So then we switched to these ones and they are great. We are a little biased because we use the same bottle brand so all the parts are interchangeable which is amazing. But truthfully they are great. They have the same "no gas" plasticy piece in them that the bottles have and the spout is in between a hard and soft spout. It also has a nice large opening for the liquid to come out which is great for Jack because he likes to do as little work as possible when he's eatting :). They are not spill proof but more "spill resistant". They don't gush liquid when turned upside down but they do drip some.


 #2 Hooded Towel - We have been using hooded towels ever since Jack was born but now that he's wiggly they are even better. I put the hood over his head and wrap the rest around him and I know it's going to stay in place while he moves and kicks and won't get his whole room and me wet. Seriously how does a tiny baby seem to get stuff everywhere?! I recently tried using a non-hooded towel and I'm sure I looked like an idiot trying to wrestle a tiny slippery baby into dry submission.


#3 Mirror - Again we have had this set up since he was born but only recently has he deemed it the greatest thing since birth ;). We've had the mirror since our first apartment but our closet doors are mirrored now so this one has been recycled in Jack's room. We laid it on it's side on the ground so he could get the full effect of his adorableness. He crawls over to it and slaps his reflection in the face; it's hysterical!


#4 Night Diapers - Jack is a tiny baby we all know this but his pee's are not so. He's just starting to outgrow size 2 diapers. But every night for the last week he has woken up covered in pee. Those little size two diapers were not made for 8-10hrs of 7 month old pee. Enter his night time diapers. These so far have worked wonders. Not a single drop of pee has escaped their soft swaddled grasp!

*UPDATE*

#5 Puffs - I totally forgot about these and if Jack found out he would kill me :). One day I was feeding Jack his purees when he started to get fussy and frustrated. When I looked down he was desperately trying to grab a glob of puree that had fallen off the spoon. It was too slippery and his pincer grasp just wasn't cutting so he got mad and started smashing it. All I could think of in that moment, when his face was beat red, was "HULK SMASH!" So we decided it was time to try some finger foods. But what to try for a baby with no teeth. Enter Puffs. They dissolve easily and he can grasp them no problem. He has never looked back. If I would let him eat the whole container he would, I now simply sneak pureed food into his mouth between puff bites.

Jack's 8 Month Update

 

Weight: ~17 lbs

Length: ~27"

Loves: He LOVES to be on his tummy, ever since he was born. If I sit him up on the floor and give him a toy, as soon as I turn around he's on his belly army crawling all over. He loves bath time just as much as before and probably more now that I took the butt stop out. He wanted it gone a few months ago but I wasn't ready yet :)

Hates: He is starting to be afraid of strangers. When someone he doesn't know comes around he pinches my arm and squeezes his legs around me and whines really low under his breath. He is also a little timid and shy so when he thinks I'm going to put him in a situation he doesn't like; for instance put him down or in his car seat, he'll do the same arm pinching and leg squeezes as with strangers.

Milestones: He's just starting, and I use that loosely, to figure out how to get into the sitting position from his tummy. Because he's an army crawler and not a "regular" crawler it take a little more creative thinking on how to get your butt up and and under you :). But he's getting there.

He can roll, sit, and stand all with ease. It's transitioning between them on his own that he is just now picking up on, sorta :). He can walk while holding onto our hands but DOES NOT like it when we let go to put his hands on the sofa or coffee table, it's us or nothing.

He's doing really well at picking up speech, while he obviously can't say any words on his own, outside of throwing dada and mama around like used rags, he intently watches us talk. He stares at our mouths, even grabs them and traces our lips as we talk. He also whips his head back and forth between Max and I during a conversation. If you say anything to him or ask a question he'll respond with a quick "Da?" or "dododo". He can also pick up tone. So disciplining has become a thing now. We can tell him "no" or "stop" and he'll understand, granted probably only for a few seconds before he does it again but he tries :)

We are now trying to teach him to kiss and wave. We aren't big wavers so it's as much training us as him :). Kisses I think he'll pick up pretty quick ;)

Sleep: He is a great sleeper! I usually put him down around 8:30 and I force him to get up around 6! On the weekends when he doesn't have daycare (or baby work as we call it) he'll sleep until 7 or 8! He's pretty amazing.

Eating: This is our constant struggle. But he's doing well. He still has 4 bottles a day 6 oz each. Then three solids, breakfast, lunch and dinner. He also graduated to a few finger foods, his favorite are the puffs. We've also tried broccoli, peas, and banana. He likes peas but he has a hard time chewing the casings with no teeth. Broccoli was so-so and banana was great except it would smoosh and squish out of his hand too easy. We're learning!

Teething: We're still on the Great Teeth Watch of 2015! At this point I have almost given up on him ever getting teeth :)

Advent Calendar How-To

Here's how I made that spectacular Advent Calendar ;)

What I bought :
1 - 3 Canvas Books
2 - Red and Green paint (I got Brick and Forest)
3 - Brushes
4 - Twine (Similar - I got mine in the $1 section at the front of Target so maybe check their first)
5 - Santa (I got mine in the $1 section at the front of Target)

This all came out to about $35. It wasn't the cheapest project because I had to buy everything and didn't have anything at home to use but I think it was worth it. And it's not that much more expensive than buying one and I get to have it exactly how I want it and that was worth it to me.

1 ) Take the rings out of the books and count out your pages. There are only 8 inner pages to each book which makes 24 so I cut the front/back cover piece in half and used it for the 24th and 25th since they are bigger. This left one inner page and 2 cover pieces.

2) Use one of the left over canvas pieces and practice your numbering.

3) I cut my foam brush to make it smaller so my numbers weren't so crowded. If you use a regular brush instead of a foam brush you may not have to do this. It's all up to you!

4) Paint a number on each canvas piece. I alternated between red and green but you can do it however you want!

5) Let all the paint dry, especially out of reach of tiny baby hands ;)

6) String your twine through each grommet on the canvas page. I did 7 numbers on each string but this can really depend on your space. Smaller spaces might have less across and more down. Large walls might need more across and less down. The great thing about this is that its changeable. Maybe you have a small apartment now and do it one way but in a few years you move into a giant house and you can do it another way!

7) Hang up each line of numbers.

8) Clip you're token on the right number and enjoy!

Christmas Decorating

On my birthday a few weekends ago now I started decorating the house. I put on Christmas movies and got all the boxes out. I got pretty much everything done and put up except for the Christmas tree ornaments because I wanted to do that with the whole family and not by myself, call me sappy.

So this weekend we all finally had enough time to decorate the tree. First we all headed over to the Hallmark store to pick out Jack's first ornament! We got one for our first married Christmas together so we had to get one for his first Christmas too. And I really wanted to pick it out together, Max indulged me and we picked out the cutest Whinne the Pooh ornament. We also needed to pick out a stocking for Jack so we walked over to Target to see what they had. Well they didn't have anything we wanted so that was a bust. But we walked around and enjoyed the time out of the house. I thought maybe we could do some stocking stuffer shopping for Jack but Max couldn't possibly do that with Jack around! I don't think he would have noticed but I guess it's the principal of the thing :). So we just a did a quick lap around the store to see if we needed anything and headed home.

Max was home for one of the first weekends in a long time and Jack was in a GREAT mood, what a Christmas Miracle. So even though football was on instead a Christmas movie we still had fun decorating. Jack "helped" me put his ornament on the tree and enjoyed looking at all the lights.

He wasn't quite sure about it encroaching on his jumparoo space though... :)

Max even helped with a few and picked out some spots for me to place things; for a guy who hates decorating more than anything this was big and it was really nice to do as a family. *Sappy mom alert*

The other thing I really wanted to start this year was an Advent Calendar tradition. My parents had this big book that folded out with doors on it. We would open one each morning to count down to Christmas. It was one of my favorite things. But over time the doors got less and less sturdy, they started to fall apart and wouldn't stay open or shut and it became more of a hassle than fun. So I wanted one that would be different and that would stand the test of time (hopefully). I searched all over the internet and couldn't find one that I liked so I made one!

Yes I'm that person :). A post on how to make this calendar to come! But I think it turned out perfect! It's simple but that makes it great for kids. In years to come they can each have their own trinket to move around the numbers, they can decorate around each number, we can hang it however we want, so many possibilities! I think it will be so much fun. Right now we are just watching Santa get closer and closer.

I hope your decorating went just as well! Feel free to post your wonderful decorations in the comments or link to your site. I would love to see them and maybe glean some inspiration ;)