Jack is Eight Months

These days Jack thinks that fake sneezes are incredibly funny but generally most loud noises make him cry. He also thinks it's very funny when his daddy rubs his soft beard on his cheek.

Jack has now gone through a screeching phase, a roaring phase, a buzzing lips phase, etc. He has also learned how to make a fish face. The first time I did it for him he look at me intently and I could see his mind trying to work out how I made my lips do what they were doing. The next day I spied him doing it. And now he will mimic us when we do it {though not every time... kiddo doesn't do too many things on demand}.

He has been making great efforts to talk. Lots of babbling going on in our home. Two back to back visits with friends with older kids probably encouraged this little spurt of "talking."

Efforts at crawling: He started out by sticking his butt in the air and his head on the ground... he must have felt more secure having 5 points of contact with the ground. He then progressed to getting himself into a plank position. He will also get up on his hands and knees and rock back and forth while trying to lunge at things. Toward the end of the month he was trying to bear crawl and getting closer to actually moving in the crawl position.

Jack continues to love story time. He now flips pages when we read and will generally still sit still for an entire book.

Bed time has progressed to "get riled up" time. Even when he is exhausted, when we get out "Goodnight Moon" and start reading, he starts clapping and bouncing in an excited manner. When we sing our goodnight songs he really gets into it. Thankfully he still goes to sleep without too much of a hitch, so we will be sticking with our routine. 

Jack wears 9-12 month clothes now. Partly to fit over his head, but the 12 month stuff actually fits pretty well.

We upgraded our carseat. You can read all about why we picked what we picked here.

Newest food experiences: a taste of a pickle – surprisingly he didn't make a sour face at this. However plain Greek Yogurt did receive a sour face. Then Daniel tasted it and he made a sour face too. So after that we went with Vanilla Greek Yogurt (which has the same amount of sugar as "baby" yogurt without all of the preservatives. He is really intrigued by pizza crust – probably because it was right off of Mommy's plate. Other new foods this month include strawberries, Cheerios, red bell pepper, refried beans, carrots, mashed cauliflower, squash, blueberries, scrambled eggs and tomatoes.

Jack has been in the process of teething all month. The drool has come on with a vengeance and every once in awhile, our happy little guy cries big tears for no apparent reason. Still no actual teeth though. As of today there is evidence of an actual tooth getting ready to push through.

This month marked Jack's first father's day and first 4th of July, though we didn't do much since everyone in our household had been under the weather. Daddy and Mommy stayed up and watched the neighbors shoot fireworks from the comfort of the bonus room and then watched a movie. Jack woke up briefly and saw a little bit of the show, but preferred nursing to watching the sky light up.

Jack and Sophie are continuing to get to know each other. Sophie has progressed past tolerating Jack's "love pats" and will come and intentionally sit close enough for Jack to pet/grab her fur. She is smart enough to keep her face and tail out of his reach {generally anyways}.

End of month stats:

Eye Color: I think at this point we can say that his blue eyes are for keeps.

Hair Color: Sandy blond, with a bit of copper tint. It really depends on the light.

Height: Don't have numbers but he is getting long.

Weight: We weighed him today and he was 20.5 lbs.

Foods: We have introduced lots of different foods over the last two months. Thankfully no allergies.

Words: Lots of different sounds, but no actual words.

Movement: Lots of effort to get in the crawling position, but no serious movement. Thank goodness for this, we are not ready for a mobile baby!!!

Teeth: Zero, but there is at least one in the works. 

*I will be writing monthly updates of Jack with pictures of Jack and the Tonka truck on the 11th of each month. One Month Old. Two Months Old. Three Months Old. Four Months Old. Five Months Old. Six Months Old. Seven Months Old.