Tuesday, March 26, 2013

11 Months Old

Oh my goodness - only a month until William is ONE! My baby is one step closer to being a toddler, literally! The biggest news around the Davis house is William is eating table food (Hallelujah!) I give my mom, Juju, a lot of credit for this. My parents had William in Dothan this past weekend so Grant and I could enjoy a weekend with friends while everyone was in town for the baby shower and engagement party. This was only the second time we've left him overnight, and I'm proud to say I didn't shed a tear when I handed him over to my parents in Montgomery on Friday. I definitely missed him a lot, but I didn't realize how bad I needed a break until I had some time to myself.

{All of these pictures were taken this evening. I tried getting some pictures in the glider like I do every month, but Grant wasn't here to catch William as he tried to dive off head first, so I decided that wasn't very smart.}

Anyway, William tried french fries, turkey, and ate 3/4 of a cooked sweet potato while he was in Dothan. Then, yesterday, on his actual 11 month birthday, his teachers fed him pancakes & applesauce for breakfast; lima beans, bites of a sloppy joe (gross!) & oranges for lunch; and he had cookies at snack time. I couldn't believe it! To top off the day, he ate an adult size portion of lasagna for dinner. He's still not great at picking up food and putting it in his mouth, but he'll get there. We are so relieved. Grant and I were beginning to think he'd go to kindergarten still eating baby food :) Of course both of us are absolutely PARANOID about him choking on food, so we are still quite careful.


I'm also thrilled that he tried a lot of vegetables over the past month, and I think he actually likes them. His favorite veggie is spinach, which is funny because apparently I ate a ton of spinach as a baby. Even though he'll probably switch to all table food soon, I'm still going to continue to give him the organic veggie pouches because that's an easy way for him to get a nutritious balance. He still drinks about four 7oz bottles a day, and hasn't mastered the sippy cup yet, so that is our next big goal. I can't wait for him to be off formula because that stuff isn't cheap!

His sleep schedule is a little more predictable these days. He goes down every night at 7pm. Before bed he drinks a 7oz bottle in our bed with Grant, and then we immediately put him in the crib. Sometimes he'll cry but never more than a couple of minutes. He's sleeping through the night most nights. He'll occasionally wake up in the middle of the night, and we give him a bottle. He wakes up between 7-7:30 for the day. On school days, he takes 1 nap from 11:30-1pm. On his off days, he usually still takes a morning and afternoon nap. I dread the day he drops the morning nap. I cherish that time :) 

He's still wearing size 4 diapers and mostly 18-24 month clothes. His weight seems to have plateaued, but we don't have another check-up until his 12 month well visit. As you can tell, his favorite "hobby" is pulling every single book off his bookshelf.
  If I could describe William in one word I'd say CURIOUS.
 Still keeping my fingers crossed for the curls to stay!

Another big milestone over this past month is that he is pretty much walking! Towards the beginning of the month he was taking 1-2 steps and over the past couple of days he has taken up to 6 steps. He still prefers crawling because it's much faster, but I think he'll be solely walking by the time his first birthday rolls around. He can also get from the sitting to standing position without having to hold onto a prop.

 I know I'm an evil mommy for taking a picture of him screaming but I couldn't help myself. He was in there for 30 seconds while I cleaned up the books and had a complete meltdown.
He's not saying any new words that I can remember, but he does have this little high pitched squeal he does WAY too often. I think he does it to get our attention. He doesn't say "mama" nearly as much as he says "dada." When he's in a good mood or enjoys something he's eating, he still hums and rocks back and forth. Some mornings he cries when I leave him at school but never more than a couple of seconds. Thank goodness! It's never easy to leave him when he's upset. On another note, William was a little hesitant to come back to Mommy and Daddy on Sunday when we met my parents in Montgomery to pick him up. He turned towards Juju and I had to BRIBE him with a cookie to come to me. Of course Juju secretly LOVED that...haha! 
 Where's William?! There he is!
 He LOVES playing peek-a-boo. He will hide behind anything and everything to get us to play peek-a-boo. 
 Every night I get to witness this sweet boy giggling, squealing, and kicking his legs with delight when his Daddy gets home. This is by far the highlight of my day! 

Monday, March 25, 2013

Hannah and Andrew's Shower

After the baby shower Saturday morning, we geared up for party #2 to shower Hannah and Andrew with lots of love before their wedding on May 4th! Hannah is such a loyal, dear friend, and Andrew treats her like the princess that she is :) This party was at Jenny and George's house...only Jenny could pull off a party 28 weeks pregnant. 

I love fresh flowers. 
 Hannah is going to be a GORGEOUS bride!!
 We had more fabulous food. 
YUM.
 The Nelson's house is great for entertaining!
I love these girls so much! We were all pretty delirious by the time this picture was taken after a hectic, yet fun-filled day! Our little pledge class is now split up all over the country so we don't get to see each other too often, but when we do, we pick up just like old times. We missed the rest of our clan!

Sunday, March 24, 2013

Showering Baby Quinn

Saturday morning, I hosted my first "grown-up" party for Jenny, future mommy-to-be, and baby Quinn, future buddy of William. I couldn't have done it without the direction and creativity from Kori and my grandmother Juleann's guidance to turn my home into a functional, yet charming place for friends to gather and celebrate the upcoming arrival of a precious baby boy. I finally used my fine china and silver that I've collected since I was a little girl from Juleann. I couldn't help but think back to the many Christmases when I would apathetically open up that "silver stuff" and then nonchalantly hand it over to my mom to be put away in a drawer. If only I knew how special and fun it was going to be 20 years later to talk to my grandmother on the phone about pulling out that "silver stuff" before my first party. It's quite funny how one's taste can change over the years! I'll let the pictures speak for the rest...

 Baby Quinn's nursery has a fish theme so the decorations were inspired from that. All creativity credit goes to Kori. The adorable invitation was designed by Rachel Herring, a talented high-school friend whose art business is taking off!
It's amazing what fresh flowers can do to a house!
 I stumbled across this fish soap and couldn't resist. 

 The spread.
 Kori finishing up last minute details the morning of the shower. Notice there's no fire place screen in the picture above. I sent Grant on a mission that morning and he delivered!
 The great thing about hosting a party at your house is that it forces you to finish projects that would never have been completed otherwise. For instance, we've lived here since August and finally bought a fireplace screen. Our yard has desperately needed some TLC for quite a while, and it finally got a mini, budget friendly makeover.

 The food was delicious! We had chicken salad tea sandwiches, fruit dip & cinnamon pita chips, mini quiches, baked brie with crackers, mini muffins, and petit-fores. I obviously had nothing to do with the food unless it was store bought ;)
 Thank goodness the rain held up for a couple of hours and people could mingle outside even though it was pretty chilly!

 Jenny definitely has the pregnancy glow. 

 This is George's mother's gown she wore as a baby - now that's a family heirloom!

 Dothan crew.
 Birmingham-Southern crew plus Baby Styles
 Jenny and the grandmothers-to-be!
 Baby Quinn's loot...he racked up!!
Childhood friends

We cannot wait to meet baby Quinn in June! That sweet baby has more clothes than any child I've ever known. He's going to be quite the stylish one with a mommy like Jenny! I'm too tired to edit this post so I apologize for any grammatical errors or duplicate pictures! 

Saturday, March 16, 2013

A Taste of Spring

We enjoyed an afternoon in the sun. I couldn't wait to put William in this cute little spring bubble my mom made. It's a 12 month so I knew he needed to wear it soon :) His new favorite spot is in his swing that Granny gave him for Christmas. I know he will make many memories monkeyin' around on his swing set.

 He's very curious and loves pine straw, leaves, and grass. 
 On the move...
 This is what happens when you take him out of the swing. After this moment, he went down for an hour nap and then we came back outside for more fun!

 He's very into my jewelry these days. I found one of my bracelets under his crib and he snuck out the door with my watch!

 It was not easy prying that watch from those chunky hands. 
 He was in a funny mood today and started bear crawling everywhere...hilarious! I LOVE fat baby thighs, hence the excessive amount of pictures. 
Lately, I've been told by several people that William continues to look a lot like his Daddy but has a lot of my expressions. Some of the many faces of William...




 Bear crawlin' back towards the swing set!
 I can't wait until the dress up days when he'll dress up like a pirate and pretend he's steering a ship or run around the yard in a cape of some sort. 


 Could not love him any more! He clearly got mine and Grant's extremely pale skin. Look at those long legs too!

 Happy baby! He has a hard time keeping his eyes open on the swing because of the bright sun and wind, but it's definitely his happy place.