Other than that, he's just been improving on his skills! He sprint-crawls around the house and disappears in no time! That boy is speedy! He's also mastered pulling himself up on anything and everything, including my pant leg (and thus, my pants come down....). Sleeping is still pretty good. Most nights, he sleeps from 6:00-4:30 (maybe one wake up around 3:30, but I turn the monitor off and he puts himself back to sleep). At 4:30, I feed him and sometimes he goes back to bed...sometimes he doesn't. As long as I went to bed early enough the night before, I actually like my early mornings with him! I get to spend some sweet time with him before I go to work AND I usually end up getting to work early. It's win-win....although I reaaaalllly don't want 4:30 to be his regular wake up time!!
One funny thing he does alllll the time is carry things around in his mouth. Washcloths, scraps of fabric, toys (his or Emma's...), bath toys, etc. He'll stick it in his mouth and crawl around or do whatever it is he's interested in, all the while with this random object just hanging out of his mouth (there are a few pics at the end of the post of him doing this. The kong in the picture is clean, I promise! I clean all of Emma's toys regularly now that Ben is interested in them...)
He's making more sounds lately and he loves to imitate Joel! Joel is good at making strang noises and Ben loves to play with him and copy him. It's fun to see them so engaged with each other. Ben looks so intently at Joel and looks like he's having so much fun! Right now he says, emma, mama, papa, baba, and occasionally dada and all kinds of variations of those syllables. He doesn't really know what any of those sounds mean, but I have a feeling that "Emma" is going to be the first word that he really uses in the right way.
My mom is taking care of Ben four days a week and it is sooo wonderful. She is so observant of every little thing he does and picks up on his smallest cues, changes, patterns, etc. She pays lots of attention to his teeny little developments that I honestly wouldn't even notice half the time. I love how much she appreciates him. I feel fortunate that Ben has her to foster his growth and development in his first year. If he was at Cheri's all week, no one would really be noticing all these tiny details. Some days at work, I feel panicky that I'm not home more with Ben. I panic that I'm not going to be around for him as he grows up. I know lots and lots of people grow up with both parents working, but I'm not quite sure what that looks like since my mom was always home for us when we were growing up.
Even though Joel and I don't get many hours of time with Ben during the day, we make the most of the time we do have. I love our family time in the evenings. From the time we walk in the door, it's all about Ben. We put our phones away and just play with Ben as a family. My favorite is when we sing songs together and dance around. Cheesy? Maybe. But I love it! At bath time, we put him in our big tub and Joel and I both sit on the side of the tub. It's fun to chat with Joel and play with Ben. This is one of Ben's favorite times to imitate Joel's funny noises. :) Weekends are also very sweet. We usually stay home, although Ben loves going on outings! I sometimes feel like he needs to get out more. He just seems to need more and more stimulation! Today, our outings included a little bit of shopping and playing outside. We put his rain suit on and went and crawled in the wet grass and explored the leaves and twigs and rocks....until I found a pile of dog poop with my shoe.....oops....
For Christmas, we're just getting Ben a "lovie". I've looked far and wide for the perfect stuffed animal/lovie/blankie. I didn't know exactly what I was looking for, but I finallyyyyy found it. Not sure why it's so hard to find a cute, high quality lovie! We're not getting him any other gifts...I thought I would just wrap up some stuff that he needs (new spoons, etc).
One more thing...last night we had our friendsgiving/friendsmas with the Bailey's, Smith's and Dahlhauser's. I was thinking about how much has changed since last year's friendsgiving!! First of all, last year there was only one kiddo. This year, there was lots and lots of noise and commotion and some tears from the little ones. Also, last year, I remember that I was in the thick of my horrible anxiety and emotional mess! I'm so glad that's over! Hope to never experience that again, pregnant or not!
So, apparently I had more updates than I realized! Here are a ton of pics (including one of sweet Eli). I'm able to kinda control myself and not post a gazillion pics on facebook, but I can't control myself here!
2 comments:
Oh my gosh, I love all of those photos! The one of him in the dog bowl! And the one with the shadow of his bum! Love the updates! He is a gem! Give him a squeeze for me!
Just saw the new pictures you added. We are so lucky to have him in our family!!
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