8 Months Old

Before I dive into our Christmas pictures from our fabulous trip to Texas, my OCD self needs to post about William at 8 months! We took these pictures on Wednesday at the lake house (1 day after his 8 month "birthday"). As you will see, he will NEVER look at the camera, so these pictures were the best we could do! He is officially on the move and crawling everywhere! However, he's much more interested in pulling up on everything (i.e., my legs, the walls, toilets, trash cans, his crib, chairs, tables, etc...) He will find a way to get into the standing position on anything! Over the past months we've gotten at least 3 phone calls from William's school about little "accidents" that occur from him trying to stand (i.e., fell and bonked his head on crib, hit his cheek on piano while standing, etc...). His teachers say it's very common for parents to get phone calls on a regular basis at this age. It's always minor reasons they call and just part of their safety protocol that they notify parents, but I do cringe every time I see that number on my caller ID!

He's drinking four 7 oz. bottles a day usually around 7, 11, 2, and 5. We usually "night cap him" with a couple of more ounces before bed, which is usually between 7 - 8pm. I'm a huge planner/scheduler but life with a baby doesn't always follow a tidy little schedule. We roll with the punches ;) Speaking of schedules, he is now eating 3 "meals" a day. He usually has bananas/apples for breakfast, banana oatmeal (his favorite) for lunch, and a vegetable (sweet potatoes) for dinner. I'm really trying to introduce more fruits and vegetables but he's very picky! We've tried carrots, squash, green beans, peas,  pears, peaches, apple/strawberry mix, and sweet potato/corn mix with little success. I'm trying to be persistent but it's frustrating when he spits everything out!

My favorite milestone this month is that he CLAPS and WAVES. It may be the cutest things he's done to date! The clapping started when we were on the Polar Express Train Ride in Texas over Christmas. I'll explain more when I post about that.

(a little blurry, but he's waving :)

He's also been a little more clingy to me and Grant lately, which I realize is common at this age. He still hasn't ever cried when I drop him off at school, but when he gets overwhelmed around a lot of people, the clinginess ensues. A couple of weeks ago, we got paged out of church because William was going ballistic in the church nursery and they couldn't calm him down. I think that situation was more teething than separation anxiety, but who knows...

Speaking of those little teeth, William's top 2 teeth are breaking through at the moment. He hasn't been overly fussy but I can tell they are bothering him. We've kept the Tylenol flowing over the past week. I try not to give him too much medicine but it sure does help!

He's doing a lot of giggling these days, but hasn't done too much in the vocal department. He still does a lot of humming ("hmmmm, hmmmm, hmmmm") but not too many other sounds. I'm anxiously awaiting for a "mama" or a "dada." I hear Grant repeating "mama" over and over to him because he knows how much I want him to say it!

William still wears mostly 18 month clothes, size 4 diapers, and he weighs around 22 lbs. He is looking much taller these days and not so chunky anymore but that's probably because he's always on the move! 

He's obsessed with boxes, electrical outlets, and cords. Therefore, we've started baby proofing the house. I really don't want to be one of those people that has their entire house baby proofed but we may just be THOSE people because he is one curious little fellow. Happy 8 months to our baby boy!