Growing Adventures: July 2008

We're still here, I promise. And as you can see above, we are cuter than ever!

Don't miss Elliott's post below about his new friend, Miss Michigan.

I'll take care of this post, though, because Elliott is too busy these days to tell me what to write in his blog. :)

Busy is the word of the day, month, heck, series of months! Elliott is BUSY! I'll share my favorite new pictures below, but here are some notes.

About Elliott and His Development

At his 9-month appointment on July 9, Elliott was 20 pounds and 29 and 7/8 inches long. He continues to be tall and skinny. 92nd percentile in height and 40th in weight.

He is eating well. Getting the hang of solids and at least tasting the table food we put in front of him before he spits it out. Loves Gerber puffs and eats a HUGE bowl of baby cereal, a whole container of vegetables and almost a whole container of fruit for dinner each night. He eats cereal and fruit for breakfast and will usually snack at lunchtime or have another bit of veg/fruit from Gerber. He still definitely prefers fruit to vegetables, but he is doing well eating both. His favorites are bananas, pear/pineapple and peaches.

Here he is with Aunt Larry's (and her boobs). He does really seem to like sucking on whole fruit.

We call rasberries "spitties"and despite all of our attempts otherwise, spitties are how Elliott tells us he is done eating. It sometimes takes some detective work, because spitties are also a fun way to communicate and get attention, so our litmus test for "done with eating" is when he'll spittie straight fruit.

Here he is doing "spitties" with Uncle Nate and Aunt Meredith at his baptism.

Elliott is babbling up a storm and is quite the talker. My Dad pointed out that he talks mostly to Dave and I, which I hadn't noticed until then. But it's definitely the case. Dadadadada seems to be his favorite sound. He has definitely made the "mamama" connection to yours truly, which just about melted my heart. His other word appears to be "yeah!" which makes a lot of sense considering we say it to him all the time. He's also "oooh" "aaah" "baa" and "oohaah" quite a bit. Overall, Elliott has lots of sounds in his baby repetoire, but is just now starting to connect the words to people and objects. Dave says you can literally see him learning things as he is exploring the world.

From the gesture standpoint, Elliott is doing ok. He will wave at "the baby in the mirror," but isn't likely to wave when you say "bye-bye" like a lot of babies. He will do "clappy-clappy" (our term for patty cake) when he is in the mood for it, but again, not on command. He raises his arms to be picked up and reaches out for someone to hold him, but he's not pointing to things or shaking his head no yet.

Physically, Elliott is definitely focused on cruising the furniture and getting into stuff. He could take his first steps tomorrow, or he could take them in 2 months, and I wouldn't be surprised. He is very adept at cruising and walking behind his scooter, Sasha. He will walk while you hold his hands, and has tried standing up on his own several times, but when you encourage him to take a step he definitely plops down onto his bottom.

Helping Daddy load the dishwasher.

The stairs are one of Elliott's favorite pasttimes, and I now encourage him to head upstairs when he is ready for bathtime and nighttime routine to start. We of course keep the gate up at all times and correct him if he starts up the stairs without one of us right behind him, but he has only faltered a couple of times in all his trips up the stairs. We haven't started working on "down the stairs" yet.

Elliott will also climb just about anything he can. On top of Dave, on top of milk crates, trying to put his foot up to climb up a gate, whatever is in his way, he wants to step up on it. It's very cute, and totally frightening at the same time.

He is definitely into his 12-month wardrobe in tops and one-piece outfits thanks to his monster torso, but the 6/9 month pants and shorts still fit best. We put him in a 9-month sleeper last night and he about busted out the bottom. So those will be packed away this weekend!

No teeth yet, but David didn't get his first until he was 14 months old... so nothing to worry about. Elliott is also biting me when nursing, so I'm in NO rush for him to get teeth.

Yes, biting me. Like, thanks for the perfect nutrition Mom. Thanks for not drinking your nightly margarita, thanks for planning your day around your pumping schedule, thanks for sitting in your office twice a day hooked up to a breastpump, thanks in general for the Mommy Milk, but now I will bite your nipple.

Along with not having any teeth and thus unable to do any real damage, Elliott is just too damn cute to make me truly mad. I thought he was a sweet little suckling when he was born. He got cuter when he smiled. But lately, there seems to be NO limit to how cute he can be.

About What We've Been Doing Lately!

Elliott was baptized at my Grandma Ebig's funeral on July 7. She would have been thrilled. Meredith and Nathan stood up as his godparents, and Melanie has been officially named his fairy godmother.

The summer seems to be flying by for us. Elliott loves to swing and go to the park. Dave likes to take him to Hawk Island to walk the trails and play, but those dates seem few and far between.
Elliott has gotten over his hatred for grass and now not only plays in the grass, he eats it. It's hilarious to watch as he uses his newly-developed pincer grasp to get a piece of grass and put it in his mouth.

Elliott had a playdate with my friend Heather's son, Parker, last weekend. It was so fun! The boys actually played together this time, even if that meant grabbing toys away from each other and Elliott trying to grab Parker's hair and poke him in the eye. It was progress.

Speaking of progress, we have been working hard on "NICE" with Elliott, Mr. Grabby Grabberson. Especially as it relates to our kitty, Runa. She has let him touch her a few times now, and seems to enjoy letting him chase her around the dining room table in the evenings. She has ways to get away from him, but seems to just let him chase her until she tires of it. Last night, specifically, Runa was letting me pet her and Elliott got close enough to get a few swipes of her fur. To my relief (and surprise) he used an open hand and did not "bang bang bang" on her like he likes to do to everything these days.

Dave is back at Pearson this week, sorting papers for a September project. He worked a couple of weeks in July and will work into early next week, but has otherwise been home with Elliott. We are very lucky that our daycare provider, Brenda, continues to be flexible with us and take Elliott on an as-needed basis. He LOVES playing with Logan at Brenda's. He won't eat very well for her, but he definitely isn't going hungry, so we're not worrying about it too much.

After some bloodwork, an ultrasound and a lot of sickness, I've been diagnosed as having gall stones. This means I'll need to have my gall bladder removed sometime in the next few years. Woo-hoo, right? My pancreas is functioning well, though, which means I can avoid surgery if I watch my fat and red meat intakes. My lack of sick or vacation time dictates that I take this under strict advisement.

I've been freelancing for the VFW National Home, which is taking up most of my free time after Elliott is down for the night. Things are also very busy here at work with a new boss and lots of new ideas and initiatives and strategic thinking and growth for me. It feels really good, but boy am I tired!

Pap (my dad) is in China, so we are looking forward to seeing my Mom more often for the next few weeks while she is home alone. Dave's birthday is next week, so we're looking forward to celebrating that with his family the weekend of August 1. We're taking a trip to Mackinac Island the weekend of August 9 with both sets of our parents for a girl scout reunion and recreation. I'm VERY excited about that!
Overall, life is really good. Elliott's laughter is truly music to my soul. Sometimes, Elliott will find his way into our bed during one of my sleep-deprived attempts at getting to rest while nursing him in the middle of the night. One of my favorite things is waking up and seeing "my two guys" sleeping in bed next to each other. I'm very, very lucky.