Multiple Mobile Monkeys

We love our summer days at the pool! 

Blake is officially crawling!!!  My (not-so-much of a) baby is 7 and a half months old now (wow!)!  He started moving from laying down to sitting up all on his own over a month ago - subsequently Brian had to lower his crib down to the middle level to avoid having Blake fall out.  After learning to sit up from the lying position, Blake tried to figure out how to go from sitting to crawling.   With his stomach and chest up off the ground, he moved forward both arms and 1 leg, but that other leg still threw him off.  Even before he was technically crawling, Blake had already become “mobile” several weeks ago, scooting, pivoting, and finding other ways to move around the room on his own.  We would put him down on one side of the room and before we knew it, he’s on the other side.  The easy days of putting Blake down for a minute to go do something quickly and returning to find him in the same spot are long gone!  

Playing chase with Dominic FINALLY!

Blake's crawling - and chasing abilities - have made these 2 boys love each other even more!

Dominic has been eager for his little brother to crawl (and really to walk and run) because he wants someone to run around with.  Dominic has even tried to take Blake by his hands to get him up to run with him.  What a disappointment for Dominic when I tried to explain that Blake couldn't chase him (before he started crawling, that is).  Blake finally made his first crawl at my parents' house. We were there for most of the day in an effort to avoid the boys being exposed to the chemicals while our house was having a quarterly pest control treatment. I'm glad that my mom (and Dominic) witnessed Blake's first crawl too. It took about a week after the initial first crawl for him to really take off. Now Blake is literally all over the place and finally can chase Dominic around the house albeit slowly. The two boys are in hysterics as Blake crawls after Dominic. I LOVE it!! There is absolutely nothing better in the world than hearing Dominic and Blake laughing with each other like that! It's one of those parenting moments that I have dreamed about since I became pregnant with Blake and even before that. :)

Still the happiest baby I've ever met.

As he's becoming more mobile, Blake strong opinions. Although he's still my sweet baby who has gone an entire day without crying at all (multiple times), he now has serious likes and dislikes regarding his toys, sounds people make, and other things. Blake has become someone who loves to be around people - constantly - and has to have toys to play with too. Blake is still the happiest baby I know, but he definitely wants things the way he wants them and lets me know that!  He has hit the point where changing his diaper is a challenge because he wants to be constantly moving around, exploring his surroundings instead of sitting still to let me change him. Although I find it easier than it was with Dominic at this age, I'm not sure if that's because I know what I'm doing this time around, if Blake's demeanor is just easier, or if I'm simply used to Dominic's antics making Blake's antics seem less challenging. It's probably all of the above.


Blake continues to LOVE everything Dominic does.  Even the times when Dominic (accidentally or intentionally) roughs Blake up some, Blake bounces back quickly and starts smiling and laughing at his big brother.  Thank God Dominic has become such a good helper because I can’t leave Blake on the floor to run and do something across the room anymore (i.e., unload the groceries or dishwasher).  He went through a couple of weeks where he wanted someone playing with him or at least around him all of the time.  Thankfully, Dominic helped/helps with that and also can press the “on” button on Blake’s toys for him, so he’ll be entertained by that.  Blake loves his toys (Dominic's old toys), and I love watching Dominic show Blake how to use them. Blake catches on pretty quickly with what buttons to press to make noise or light up, but still lacks the dexterity and muscle strength to push some of the buttons.

Not only is Blake progressing with his mobility and personality but also in his size!  At his last appointment which was a while ago, he was 29 inches long/tall, putting him in the 95th percentile and making him an inch too short of the maximum in his current car seat carrier (as a result, we’re currently searching for a good deal on a convertible car seat ugh!).  Blake weighs 20 lbs 4 oz, putting him in the 75th percentile.  He’s lower percentile-wise than he was at his last checkup, dropping from 90th in weight to 75th, but I’m sure it has something to do with the fact that he’s moving around instead of just laying around. Blake is babbling some and squealing quite a bit although I don't think he can get a word in thanks to his big brother constantly talking or making noises.  

Eating apples for the first time and loving them!

Blake continues to be quite an eater! I just started giving him his 3rd meal of the day (lunch) last week. So, he's taking a bottle around 9:00, breakfast solids at 9:30 (at the same time as Dominic eats breakfast), bottle at 12:15, Lunch solids at 12:30 (with Dominic), bottle at 5:00, dinner solids at 7:00 (with the rest of the family), and then his last bedtime bottle at 7:45/8:00. This kid can eat! He would love to eat 6 oz of solids at a time, but because that causes him not to take his next bottle, I try to keep it at 4 oz. He continues to drink 8 oz of breastmilk in each of his bottles (32 oz of breastmilk total daily). His favorite food is still sweet potatoes, but he also like squash, pears, apples, and carrots. He's liking peas a little more, but strawberries were not been his favorite. Blake is eating Puffs very well, usually not gagging at all. However, he has an extremely hard time picking them up and getting them into his mouth independently. It kind of defeats the purpose of giving him finger foods. Dominic, meanwhile, loves to help Blake eat the Puffs.
 

Curly haired Cutie!

It also looks like Brian and I have a curly haired son.  We fully expected Dominic to have curly hair since some of Brian’s family and all of mine including me have curly hair, but we were pretty surprised when Dominic ended up having straight hair.  Blake, however, is looking curly and cute with that thick, dark, wavy hair.  It’s very cute on him but can be a bit messy if you don’t brush it before it dries, but I have to admit that I think it's pretty adorable when he shows off that huge smile with a messy head of hair on him. It's definitely just one more characteristics that differentiates our two boys from each other.  
 

My sweet boy!

Dominic is busy with his trains, cars, dancing, chasing, cuddling, and of course tantrums.  At the moment, he's on a no-kiss kick, much to my chagrin. He’s talking a lot more these days at least at home although continues to be quiet around other people...he must get his shyness from me (unfortunately).  The funny thing was that I recently came across the babysitting information that I had made up for Stephanie while she stayed with Dominic while I was in the hospital having Blake.  In the information, I had a “translation” section consisting of all of the words/sounds he was using at the time and what he meant by them (i.e., do = dog) since they were pretty indecipherable to people other than Brian and me at the time.  Looking at the way he said his words, it was crazy to see what progress Dominic has made in the last 7 months in his speech!  He says full words instead of just the first sound, pronouns, possessives, and sentences.  Speech is definitely the area where I would like to see the most improvement for Dominic, so seeing the progress from 7 months ago till now like that meant a lot to me.

Dominic’s saying some crazy things these days, but the funniest thing he’s doing at the moment is adding the long sound at the end of a lot of words like George has become Georgie and hug has become huggy.  Dominic and I often call Blake “Blakey” so that may have been how it got started, but I laugh every time Dominic says something with that additional sound on it.  It’s very cute!  When I ask Dominic who his best friend is, he promptly tells me, "Blakey!" now. He also tells me that his name is Dominic Morton (which sounds more like "Domin Morton").  

Crazy boy!

Dominic is doing so well with his preschool "academics." He officially knows his colors (red, blue, green, yellow, orange, purple (his favorite), pink, white, black, and brown) and identifies shapes too (circle, triangle, square, rectangle, star, heart, crescent, oval, and rhombus). He keeps improving with his letter sounds, learning more and more of those (like a makes the /a/ sound). This boy's memory is amazing. He knows words that start with each of the letters with the exception of just a handful (like x since there are few words that he knows/understands that start with that letter). Dominic is counting to 12 now although often omitting 11. At the moment, I'm still working very hard on 1 on 1 correspondence with him, but he seems to be starting to really get it. How amazing it is working with Dominic each day on these concepts and seeing what it does for him and the difference I actually am making in his education.  I think it's especially true because I'm a former teacher and really miss it. It's truly amazing to experience Dominic learning these basic skills instead of just seeing the end result at the end of the day based on other people working with him.  I used to be completely anti-homeschool, but I have to admit that I would almost consider it for the boys to avoid public school and overly expensive private school, but the social interactions especially away from me are too important in my opinion. Being able to experience Dominic's learning first-hand during these vital first 5 years of life is proof to me that Brian and I made the right decision having me stay at home with the boys despite how difficult it often can be on us financially.

Love each other so much

Like I mentioned before, Dominic has become extremely helpful especially in terms of Blake.  If I’m feeding Blake and need something like a wipe, Dominic is great about getting it for me too.  In general, I would say Dominic has become MUCH better about following directions, which is very refreshing and appreciated by me and definitely something that exhibits Dominic's language development.  Last week I started implementing a new clean up routine as I would like for him to take more responsibility in cleaning up and putting away his toys.  Before he washes his hands for lunch and dinner, I let Dominic know that it’s time to cleanup, usually giving him a warning a minute or two before that too to help with the transition.  Dominic is definitely old enough to be picking up his toys and I know I've let this go on long enough. He LOVES singing the cleanup song as we pick up his and Blake’s toys. Now if I could just get Blake to pitch in too! 

Our boys!!

I’m still amazed at how well Dominic is dealing with having a little boy to share his toys with.  I'm very biased, but he’s honestly one of the least possessive toddler I know (unless there’s only 1 toy with wheels in the room around and then the claws come out). If I ask Dominic to share a car with Blake, my sweet toddler does it happily and sweetly. However, I’m observing that the more mobile Blake becomes, the more he grabs Dominic’s toys (of course), and as a result the increasingly annoyed Dominic becomes - although not nearly as annoyed as I would be or would expect Dominic to be. I'm also noticing Dominic will sometimes grab whatever Blake is playing with and immediately look at me to see my reaction. Of course, I immediately say Dominic's name, and he promptly returns the toy to Blake, obviously showing that he was just trying to get a reaction from me and understand where the limits are.  When Dominic really wants the toy that Blake is playing with (usually Dominic's trains), many times Dominic will just hand Blake another one of his toys to occupy him, which I find to be pretty impressive of Dominic (a modeled behavior I’m sure).  Other times, he’ll take a toy, think about it for about 30 seconds, and then end up handing the toy back over to Blake.  I know that the fights over toys are going to be increasingly bad between them, so I’m just glad that so far things have gone (for the most part) smoothly.

Play-Doh and Numbers

The last month or so have been very exhausting, stressful, and difficult for me. I've been sick with mastitis, a bad summer cold (along with both boys), and other bugs all while dealing with a toddler and a newly mobile baby. Being sick has left me without much energy, as a result, very behind with laundry and the rest of our housework.  Every time I start to catch up, I've gotten sick with something else. Poor Brian had to help a lot with that, but things have been in complete disarray.  Moms should not be allowed to get sick!  Oh, and then there’s been a few (yes, more than 1) fecal-related incidents.  I thought we were going to have to rent or buy a steam-cleaner but luckily the stains came out (ew).


The hardest part was that after the mastitis my milk supply became extremely low, and I was very depressed and discouraged thinking that Blake might have to start drinking formula for the next 5 months instead of breastmilk. I had to supplement with a few bottles, but thankfully my supply finally started increasing again and is almost back to normal! I started using some herbal drops that are reminiscent of taking a shot of Jager. The stuff is so disgusting even when I mix them in other drinks. It's worth it though to get my milk supply back. I'm just glad that it looks like Blake can continue drinking breastmilk and hopefully I'll be able to produce for our next child(ren). I'm just crossing my fingers that it continues!

Blake and Brian :)

On top of all of the slack Brian had to pick up around here as a result of me being sick, he’s been extremely busy with his side business, working late almost every night last week. Things seem to be running a little more smoothly at the moment...at least until the next “speed bump.”  Sometimes it seems like a constant game of catch up for me.  I am left feeling like as soon as I get into a routine and have things under control, another challenge pops up to throw me off again. I'm finally feeling like myself again as things are becoming more manageable for me again. Hopefully, it stays that way!