Caed's First Movie-Going Experience

The cinema up at North Hills just began their free summer kids flick series today with the showing of Doogle and we decided to take part.

Up until about a month ago, Caed wouldn't even watch TV for more than a minute at a time, so the thought of taking him to a movie was completely ridiculous. However, within the last month, he's developed a strong liking for his GeoTrax train movie and can sit down on the couch for about 20-minute intervals to enjoy some trains. "Fix track," he says often, and "All board!"

Before we left the house, I stocked my purse with a few granola bars, a bag of Gold Fish, a cup of water and a diet coke for me ... thinking that these snacks would suffice until we returned home for lunch. Well, Caed did make it about 40 minutes into the movie, but that was with the distraction of 2 granola bars, water and several helpings of Gold Fish. He sat enjoyably at several minute intervals and stood in front of me, occasionally trying to get the kid's attention in front of us. He enjoyed verbally identifying all the animals and making the corresponding sounds. (It was a kids' movie specifically designated for kids ... 10am ... so I wasn't concerned about stopping him ... even though the mom to my right gave us a few hard looks.)

Overall, I think it was a positive experience. Heck, the movie was free so there's no better time to get your kid acquainted with the movie-going experience than during times like these. We'll probably try some other movies throughout the season and see how it goes.

Caed's Getting Big

I just realized yesterday that I'm not very good at taking pictures or keeping track of Caed's milestones any more. He's getting big, fast ... in fact, Brad and I think he's grown and hit some big development milestones just within the past week, so I thought I'd try to take some random footage to share with you.


Other fun things that are not on the video include:

• He runs fast! "Fast," he says, as he moves his arms back and forth by his side.
• He counts to 15 pretty well with some assistance. About a month ago, he seemed to have a fear of walking down the stairs with us ... he always wanted to be carried. So, I decided to make a game of it, and we started to count as we went down the stairs. Can you guess how many stairs we have? If you said, 15, you're right. So now every time we go up and down the stairs, we count to 15 and when we hit that number, Caed exclaims "Woo hoo!" It's hilarious when we say 15 out of that context ... he stills says, "Woo hoo!"
• He uses his spoon and fork pretty well now. He'd rather pick up his banana and Cheerios with his hands, in the milk, during breakfast, but most other meals he does pretty well.
• He loves to be outside. He runs around with his wagon and gardening tools. He collects rocks and transfers them from the ground to the wagon to his car and so forth as he yells ROCK. He's a busy guy. He loves to visit our neighbors and help them garden too!
• Saying "hello" is a fun thing for him. He says hello, as many other folks do on our street, but he has definitely perfected the straight-armed wave that he sees so often from frequent passerbies.
• He LOVES Trader Joe's cinnamon alphabet cookies, and thankfully a love for the actually letters has developed as well. "B" is his favorite letter ... he even points it out on signs, but recently has come to like and recall other letters as well. Pretty impressive for a 20-month-old!
• Just this week, he's figured out how to use his frog puppet and say it's name too. We're trying to be careful how we teach him to enunciate this word because it seems to roll off his tongue as "foc" .... "FFFRRROOGGG" is what we're saying now to try to reinforce the correct pronunciation :).
  

So You Think You Can Dance?

Caed does. Check out the latest video:

Caedmon's Dedication at Vintage21 Church

At 14 months, Caed finally had the opportunity to be dedicated at Vintage21 Church today.

For those of you that are not familiar with this process, this means that Brad and I brought Caed before the church to say that we commit to raise him in the ways of the Lord (pray for him, teach him and shepherd him well) and to ask our church family to help us in this process (to love him and us and to be a positive example of Jesus to him).

For many people, baptism is a traditional step to take a baby through at this age, but we believe that baptism is an outward sign of an inward decision to follow Jesus (Colossians 2:9-15), and we pray that this will be a decision that Caed will make for himself one day when he outwardly professes that he believes in Jesus and wants to use his life to glorify him. That is a day that we've prayed for since the day he was born and will continue to pray for until it comes into fruition.
Until then, we pray that through our own example in his life, through the truth that we teach him in scripture, through our ongoing prayer for him, and the positive example of those around him, that he's able to see Jesus and realize that he desperately needs a savior to save him from his brokenness. This is obviously a lot to comprehend for a one year old, but I believe that as his little mind develops and he begins to understand the difference between right and wrong, he'll be able to comprehend that God did not intend for us to be broken, but because sin entered the world, our hearts are broken and we can't fix them ourselves. We need Jesus, the perfect savior, to redeem our brokenness and give us new life. This is the truth that Brad and I hope to share with Caedmon as he grows, and despite our own brokenness, it is our prayer that Jesus will allow us to be good teachers of His word and be able to love Caedmon well so that he can experience this truth for himself while he is young.

Here's a picture of the new Bible that Caed received today. His buddy Mason already received one a few months ago, and he was already showing him all the cool stories that it tells.

100% Whole Milk

*Sigh*, today marks the first day that Caedmon has not nursed. We've been working toward weaning for a little while now ... we were holding steady at 3 feedings for a few months, but as of last week or so, when we dropped his afternoon feeding, the other 2 (morning & night) seemed to be less important too. When thinking about weaning, I was always concerned that the night feeding would be the most difficult to drop, but none of them lived up to that fear at all ... praise the Lord!

So, even though this is not quite by the book (not many things we do are by the book really), we took the plunge and dropped the night feeding Sunday night (that went well), and when he showed very little interest in his morning feeding the next day, I knew that it was the ideal time to drop that feeding as well. So, we tried it out this morning and it worked like a charm. Caed went straight to his sippy cup, drank his milk and about a half hour later, he ate a hearty sausage, egg and cheese sandwich with a side of kiwi for breakfast. I couldn't ask for anything better. And strangely enough, his milk-drinking skills have improved tremendously over the last few days. It was like pulling teeth to get him to drink much at all before, but now, he's a real champ and will gulp it down like it's nothing!

I feel like there was always a fear in me about weaning -- the fear that it would be difficult physically on Caed and emotionally tough on me -- but now that we've done it, I see that God just worked it out pretty naturally! I didn't really plan that today would be the day ... Caed was just ready. I'm definitely a firm believer in Parent Directed Feeding (PDF) -- do what the parent feels is best by watching your baby's cues -- so I was ready to set a date and say, "ok, we're going to drop this feeding," and give it a try, but at the same time, there is something to be said about giving into the ebb and flow of a baby's natural development and needs as well. God made us and knows exactly what we need, so when the time comes that we don't need mama's milk, He'll make it happen. I definitely need to be on my toes to catch those cues and instill my "wisdom" on how to best meet his needs, but in the big picture, God's the one who works it out. Pretty cool!

And it's funny, pediatricians say that kids shouldn't try cow's milk until their first birthday because their systems can't break down the protein in the milk, even though they can handle the protein in cheese, yogurt, etc. But even with that advice, I didn't think it would make much difference if Caed had whole milk a few weeks before his birthday. How much could your system really change in the matter of a few weeks any way? So, I started giving him a little whole milk here and there in preparation for the Coldplay concert at the beginning of August (he needed to be in a place where mom could put him to bed, and he certainly wasn't nursing enough for me to pre-package the good stuff). He ended up doing pretty well that week, but then a week or so later when Brad's mom, Nana, babysat it didn't go so well. He either couldn't handle the protein or had a bug because his little tummy was not happy. He couldn't go to sleep and when he did, he'd wake up shortly after with terrible gas and a full diaper. This went on for about 24 hours (probably telltale signs of a bug), and so we stopped the milk all together to prevent further pain ... especially since his birthday week was quickly approaching, and we didn't want him to be sick for all the festivities. At that point, I thought that he could very likely have a milk allergy or be lactose intolerant, despite the fact that he could eat all kinds of cheeses and enjoyed yogurt on a daily basis, so I did my share of reading on the topic and explored milk alternatives because I was determined to wean Caed fairly soon to give Brad and I more freedom to go out at night and possibly allow him to have another slumber party at GG's sometime.

Interestingly enough, we didn't try the whole milk again until last week when I needed to have GG put him to while we went out, and thankfully, this time, Caed had no problems. So, even though it was only about 2 weeks after the first incident and less than a week after his first birthday, there must really be truth in the pediatrician's advice after all. (Who would have thought! :) Or, we just caught him at a bad time when he was getting a bug. Either way, it doesn't make much difference now, I'm just thankful that the weaning process was not difficult for us and like everything else in life, if we trust God with it, it's going to be good.

Caed's Birthday Festivities

I posted briefly yesterday just to make sure that I had a chance to wish Caed a happy birthday on the blog, but now that I have a little more time, I'll share the fun that we've had over the past couple of days celebrating Caed's 1st birthday.

To begin with, we had a birthday party with some of Caed's little friends and our family Saturday. This is when he got his 'Blueberry Studmuffins' and enjoyed some fun in the turtle and hippo pools. What a special day for our special little man!


Then, on Tuesday, on his actual birthday, Brad and I took him to Marbles Kids Museum. (Brad took a half day so that we could enjoy Caed's special day as a family! How special!)

Caed hadn't been to Marbles before our trip yesterday, so it made this trip extra special. We'd thought about going on several occasions, but it never worked out, so in honor of his first birthday, we thought that it would be a fun place to go to celebrate ... and indeed it was! Caed's at just the right age to begin to enjoy all of the fun activities ... especially all of the "vehicles" that he can drive -- the bus, the ambulance, the boat and of course the little red car. Wow did he think they were something special! Take a look at this video:

Then, I would have to say that his next favorite activity was the little splash pool. He loved the funnels and turtles, but especially the water. He splashed and splashed and splashed, and we had to get him out of there quickly so that he didn't drench himself and create a pool around himself on the floor.

Here are some other fun photos of him playing:

(Caed looked strangely at the little baby, but little did he know that he wasn't much bigger than this doll last year at this time :).

What a fun afternoon ... and to top it off, we concluded our afternoon of fun at Crema, where Caed got to try ice cream for the first time. How delicious! He thoroughly enjoyed sharing a vanilla ice cream cone with mango and banana with me. (I think he's a natural ice cream lover, just like his mama.)

I can't believe that Caed is 1 now! It seems like within just a few weeks he's morphed from a baby into a little boy! His hair is filling in, he's growing taller, getting more coordinated in his walking ability, and he's "talking" a whole lot more. *Sigh* I just pray that I can savor each moment, because I'm sure that he'll begin to grow and change even more quickly from here on out and before we know it, he'll be in his next phase of life. Oh, I am so thankful for this little boy!

Proof

Last week I mentioned that Caed is making great strides in the walking department, but since our camera and video camera are on the outs, I didn't have a video to show the proof of his progress. But now, thanks to Brad's phone, we do have the proof! The quality is obviously low, but at least it's something. Enjoy!

A "New" Play Area

So ... I'm not sure if I mentioned it in my previous post or not, but Caed is in to EVERYTHING. The house has been baby proofed for a while now, but there's only so much you can do to keep him away from floor lamps and electrical cords ... especially in our small place! (I even rearranged the living room furniture to barricade off the lamps and cords, but he was still squeezing by!) So, toward the end of last week, I was at my wits end ... it was 7:30pm, Brad and I had just finished dinner and Caed was hanging on our legs to get our attention as we finished eating (between this and chasing him from lamp to lamp and taking him away from the entertainment cabinet) ... I was exhausted! Brad and I came to the conclusion at that moment (thanks to suggestions from my mom) that Caed needed some boundaries, and we couldn't agree more.
Brad immediately scoured the Raleigh Craigslist and Amazon.com for good deals on super play yards. We had priced them out about a month ago, but didn't think they were totally necessary ... so we didn't get one. It may have been a good idea then! As I was on the phone with Erika to get the name of the brand they have (they use theirs outside while they're doing yard work), she mentioned that since they were heading out of town, we were welcome to use theirs for the week ... what a blessing!!! We drove over immediately and picked it up.

I couldn't advocate more for boundaries now. The "new" play area or cage (ha) is wonderful and Caed does really well with it. He's obviously not in it all the time, but when I'm in the kitchen cleaning up or getting a meal ready, it's perfect. He can just sit down or stand or scale the walls of the play area and play with his toys, and I don't have to worry about the things he's getting in to. Or, even when I'm eating my breakfast or he's finished with his dinner and we're not quite done yet, it's a great place for him to go to have his space. But even last night, we had about an hour to play before he went to bed, and the two of us (Brad's in California for work) just sat in there and played. We'd play together for a bit and then he'd venture off into the corner to play by himself. It's so wonderful and I don't have to constantly pull him away from the things he's not suppose to be in to or be on all-day "NO" patrol. This way, I can save my "no's" for the times when it's really important and as he gains a deeper understanding of what "no" means, and how he's suppose to listen and obey his parents, we'll be able to make greater strides and not get frustrated over the things that he doesn't quite get yet or that we can't figure out how to communicate yet.

Plus, I think the play yard, in addition to his morning reading time, will help him develop a sense of independence and reduce his "clingyness" in this stage of life right now.

By the way, Caed's wearing his new soccer jersey in the picture above that we got him the other day. I think it's sooo cute ... and he and Brad wore their white jerseys to church on Sunday. :)

Happy 11 Months Caed!

Good grief, where has the time gone! As I was filling in the most recent pages of Caed's baby book last night and looking through each month's milestones and pictures from birth to now, I'm amazed at how he's daily transforming from a baby into a little boy. His face is thinning out, he no longer has 3 chins, he's growing taller and his mobility, coordination and baby babble is increasing every day! He can go from laying down to sitting up to crawling to standing in no time ... and then when he wants to reverse, his sitting skills are becoming more refined. (Well, he still just plops right down on his boo-tea, but it's a lot more graceful than it use to be :) ... that's more than I can say for myself sometimes :).

With all that said, I can't believe that Caed's 11 months. (He actually turned 11 months on Saturday, but this is the first time I've had a chance to blog about it since then.) At 11 months, as I said above, his mobility, coordination and babble is increasing all the time. One moment he's sitting right in front of you and then next minute, he's standing up scaling the wall, shouting "ba ba ba" on the opposite side of the room ... and to get there, he either crawled, rode his tractor (which he can get off and on for the most part by himself these days) or pushed his little mail cart. Fortunately, our living space is not too large, so he can't get too far without me realizing where he is ... but because everything is fairly compact, it's very easy for him to try and pull the floor lamps down, yank the hanging blinds down, try to climb Aslan's perch or "sneak" into the entertainment cabinet and pull out all kinds of surprises (cables, batteries, who knows what else ... it's kind of a catch-all cabinet right now), so he definitely keeps us busy ALL the time!

One fun thing that we like to do now, is to sit in the hall, close all the doors and roll or throw the ball back and forth. His coordination is getting much better ... he even threw the ball with one bounce yesterday ... and we can keep that up for a few minutes consectively. He gets so excited when he sees the ball and if I grab it and crawl toward him, he crawls toward me in full force and laughs the whole way until he bonks you in the head (Brad taught him that ... it's cute now, but just wait until preschool or something when all he does is bonk kids in the head with his noggin!)

As far as what he's eating these days ... it's become a lot more fun because up until now, he hasn't had any food allergy issues, so we bend the 4-day wait rule a bit and give him new things a little more often. Let's see, he's eatting black beans and kidney beans, apple sauce, cashew butter or tahini toast in the mornings and leftovers for snack, prunes, blueberries (he LOVES these), pieces of fresh cherry, sweet potato cupcakes (thanks to Mason's 1st birthday ... see picture to the left), whole wheat, blueberry pancakes (don't ask Brad about these ... they didn't taste so great on our end), cheese quesadillas ... oh and sweet potato & spinach quesadillas, and he tried a few bites of my vegan oatmeal raison cookie yesterday at Whole Foods (I don't think Caed will have a problem with sweets).


And finally, in the middle of all his babble, he has finally associated "ma ma" with me (yay!), as well as communicate "all done", "more", and maybe "please" through the sign language that we've been teaching him. I think we confused him on the "all done" sign though, because we realized that he associated "all done" with taking off his bib ... that's why we taught him that sign to begin with because he would just rip off his bib any time throughout the course of a meal. So, we tried to teach him that he could take off his bib when he was all done, but after a while, we realized that when we said, "all done", he would rip his bib off. Over the last week, we've made progress to correct it, but at least he understands the concept, and he's much better at keeping his bib on throughout the duration of a meal.

Oh, and one last note, Caed has 7 teeth ... yes, 7 and I'm sure that the 8th one will be on it's way soon! The picture above gives you a pretty good view of most of them ... including the soggy Cheerio.

Future Baseball Star?

From the looks of Caed's LEFT-HANDED throwing arm, a future baseball star might be in our midst. It all started a few weeks ago when he and I were sitting on the floor attempting to roll a ball back and forth. Although it seemed as if it were an accident when he pushed the ball back to me ... after several consecutive rolls, I realized that everything he was doing WAS intentional. Now, he can roll several different sized balls back and forth, and has graduated to throwing!


As you can see, he throws smaller balls fairly well, but when it takes two hands to throw, he can't quite get it out of his hands in time to throw forward.

It's funny how impressionable Caed is right now. We were at the pool yesterday, and we were playing with a 3 1/2-year-old girl and she wanted to play catch with Caed's ball. What an arm she had! She would take the ball over her head and launch it forward. I would catch the ball for Caed and then he would do the best he could releasing it from both hands. (The ball was too big for one hand.) Later on that evening at community group, we were playing on the floor and low and behold, guess how Caed was trying to throw the ball? With both hands over his head! Unfortunately, he didn't have the same outcome as the little girl and the ball fell behind him each time. But the look of determination on his face was priceless.

Wow, Look at Caed Go!

In my previous post, I mentioned that Caed is now crawling. It's funny that the day he finally starts moving on his knees is actually the same day he starts making more progress toward walking as well. I guess he just wants to leave his options open when it comes to mobility!




In addition to crawling, Caed is also getting around more quickly on his tractor too. Check it out:


Notice that he's even making the appropriate sound effects too! Way to go buddy!

Trip to Atlanta // Caed at 10 Months

Caed and I were in Atlanta Wednesday through Sunday of this week while Brad, Dad, David and John had their 1st Annual "My Three Sons" Fishing Get-Away in Destin, FL. (Here's David's account of the trip.) We'll have to let Brad give you an update on the fishing trip, but here are some fun details about our trip to Atlanta.

During our trip, Caed hit his 10-month mark and it seemed like just over night that he acquired new skills. Here are his most recent milestones:

• Picks up grapes, in addition to Cheerios, to feed himself
• Transitions from laying, to sitting, to standing in his crib completely unassisted
• Crawls from one point to another (this just happened yesterday)
• Pulls up on furniture and toys and stands while holding on to something
• Takes several steps at once while holding on to something
• Understands "all done" and can make the sign when he's finished eatting
• Does most of the hand motions for "Pattycake" (thanks for the lesson Grandma)
  
• Two more teeth surfaced and a third is on its way, giving Caed a grand total of almost five teeth!
  

(Caed was quite fragile this week mostly due to his teething ... who wouldn't be if you had three teeth coming in at once!) But aside from that, Helen, Grandma, Caed and I enjoyed our time together and thoroughly enjoyed watching Caed hit these new milestones.

The first time I realized that Caed could "walk" was when we were in the dressing room at Dillards waiting for Grandma to try on some blouses, and just as I got Caed out to stand and hold on to the stroller, he started to push the stroller down the hall of the dressing room! Who would have thought? Here's Grandma's reaction:









Caed was so proud of himself!

Then, after we left Dillards, we headed over to Babies 'R' Us and Helen bought Caed his first pair of Pumas. They're awesome! Thanks so much Helen! While we were trying shoes on, I had Caed stand up and hold on to Grandma's wheelchair (we just had her ride in it while we shopped so that she wouldn't overwork herself). While he did this, he decided that since he pushed his stroller earlier, he would try to push Grandma in the wheelchair. He was however unsuccessful, but he certainly had the right idea in mind. What a sweet boy!

We stayed pretty busy the five days we were there, and it was nice because Helen only had to work until about noon every day, so the four of us were able to do quite a bit together. We took Caed swimming at the neighborhood pool, visited Pop at the National Cemetery, went shopping -- twice, rode the carosel at the mall and enjoyed a couple of nice meals out. Grandma even took Caed and I on a grand tour of Chambrel and ate lunch with her neighbors. Thanks for a great trip, Helen & Grandma. Caed and I had a really nice time!

Here are some more fun pictures from our trip:

Caed's New Tricks ...

It's funny when you have a little kid and when you go visit friends or family you're always trying to show off the new 'tricks' your kid can do. It's like they're your pet or something. But either way, it's fun to show off the new things that Caed is learning. It seems like he unveils his new tricks all at once. Within the last week and a half, Caed has begun to perfect his clapping skills, he wrinkles up his little nose when he laughs (like his mommy), he's standing somewhat unassisted as he holds on to his crib/footstool/exersaucer and as of yesterday, he can successfully feed himself Cheerios! He's fed himself a Cheerio or two in the past, but it was never very consistent. Yesterday, as we were playing on the floor, he was getting a bit fussy, so I busted out the Cheerio box (who would have thought Cheerios could make a kid so happy!) and low and behold, instead of just moving them around with his fingers and throwing the ones that stuck to his hands, he actually used his pincher grasp to successfully get them in his mouth -- one after the other -- and before long, he had eaten the entire little pile that I left for him on the footstool! Good work, buddy! We'll have to see if this skill follows him to the highchair and the car seat. We'll be in business if it does!!

Here's a video of Caed and his new clapping skills from the beach last week:

Farmer Caed

Well, he's not really a farmer, but he does love his little green John Deere tractor that the Mayhews got for him before he was born. He has grown in his interest for it over the past month or so. It all started with his fascination for the black wheels. He would just sit beside it and spin the wheels round and round with his fingers. Then, he got to the point where he could tip the tractor over sideways as if he we inspecting it for needed mechanic work. He's still very much interested in the black wheels and turning it sideways ... but he has progressed to be able to sit on it and move backward ... yes, backward, not forward. (That's what all farmers need to know how to do when they plow their fields, right?)

Here's a video of his talent from last week ... he was trying to show off for Ms. Pam:

Caedmon is 9 Months!

In the midst of our Asheville news, I forgot to mention that our little Caed turned 9 months on Sunday!
We have his 9-month well check-up tomorrow, so I'll update his stats then. But for now (before I forget), here are some of his 9-month milestones:

Weight: 23 lbs., 3 oz. (85 percentile)
Length: 29.5 in. (85 percentile)

New Foods: Kiwi, Grapes, Tofu, Apple Juice (mixed in his morning cereal, not in the sippy cup unfortunately), Broccoli and Tahini

New Activities: Caed's main mode of transportation these days is the ROLL, but there's definitely the occasional army scoot that I think will morph into a crawl very soon (we said that last month, but we'll see :). He's very content with rolling though, because he can go just about any where he wants to go. (He even made his way under the coffee table at community group a few weeks ago.)

Here's a shot of him in Asheville this past weekend:


Caed also pulled up for the first time on the footstool two days ago, which was pretty exciting. And you can see from the picture above that he is beginning to enjoy his little tractor. (Thanks Lewis & Toccoa!) He can sit on it and "steer" and occasional move backward as he scoots his feet. We can't be too far away from him though, because after a few minutes he'll begin to teeter off.

In addition to his mobility progression, Caed is also very interested in his plastic books these days, particularly Hello Bee, Hello Me and Baby's Peak-a-Boo. He loves to flip the pages and suck on them as he goes. They're great carseat and stroller entertainers!

Caed is also becoming skilled in his high-fives. If you hold your hand out to give him five, he'll give one right back.

New "Words": About two weeks ago, he started his "Ba, ba, ba" chants and as of this weekend, he progressed into, "Ma, Ma, Ma." I would like to believe that he's refering to me, but I know better ... one day!

While Brad, Caed and I were waiting for mom to try on clothes in Asheville this weekend, Brad and Caed were sitting in the rockers out front and Brad would say, "What does the turtle say?" and Caed would follow by pulling in his lips and smacking them. Here's a video:

Caedmon is 8 Months!

Caedmon turned 8 months this Saturday!
Time is flying by so quickly. It just seems like it was yesterday that I posted his 7-month update and the videos to show you how he was beginning to roll over from front to back and from back to front.

Now, at 8 months, that skill is completely mastered and if we're not careful, he'll roll clear across the room. (He seems to only go in one direction though and once he gets to the far end of the room, he stays there and doesn't come back. This doesn't happen at our house though, since there's not much room to roll. But thanks to mom, we do have nice carpets in the living/dining room and Caed's bedroom so that he can roll and play as he pleases without the worry of hitting his head!) Caedmon hitting his head isn't the only problem now that he's becoming more mobile ... our latest worry is his arms getting stuck in the crib. As his nap was nearing its end last week, Caedmon screamed bloody murder and I rushed in there to see him squirming around to try and get his arm out from between the crib slats. He had tossed his pasi out of the crib and was apparently trying to reach out to get it. Poor guy, I had to pull one of the rungs to the right a little to get his little red arm out! I'm not sure what to do about this ... he's too mobile to use bumper pads any more ... but if he's going to get his arm stuck, that's not good either.

Aside from rolling, Caedmon is a superb sitter-upper now. He can sit on the floor and entertain himself very well. When we were at Ikea last weekend, we bought one of those wooden abacus toys and he loves to just sit and play with the beads. What a great buy ... it was only $7 and the used one I thought about buying at the consignment shop was $8! Glad I waited.

Caedmon's other milestones at 8 months:
Activities: Caedmon loves the remote control and any cell phone (he's loved these two things for quite some time now, but I haven't mentioned it before). He can drop his basketball in the hoop. He's a little fish in the pool and loves to splash and kick his legs. He has learned to belt out this high-pitched scream when we're in the car as he plays with his toys. (There's nothing wrong with him ... he just likes to scream!) He's not crawling yet, but as he rolls over, he's starting to scoot a little bit and reach out to grab things. He also does this from a sitting position, so it shouldn't be too long before he makes his first move. And his most recent accomplishment is his wave. He did this a few times back in March, but not consistently. As of this weekend, he's mastered the skill and enjoys waving to us and himself! Here's a video:


Eating & Drinking: Caed is eating an assortment of food these days, mostly pureed, but occasionally in chunks. His new foods this month include Cheerios, cantaloupe, asparagus, banana star puffs and whole grains of white rice. He tried brussell sprouts last week, but that didn't go over too well. We'll try those again another time. We're going to try tofu this week, I think.

As far as drinking is concerned, up until last week, Caed was only drinking out of his sippy cup when we would tilt the cup up, but now, he's figured out how to actually suck the mouth piece to drink the water!! In addition, we have followed in the Lizotte's footsteps and bought Caed his very own Camelbak 16-oz. water bottle. (Our's is blue so the boys won't get theirs' confused.) He's can't drink from it consistently yet, but he does get water from it from time to time as he bites the mouth piece and it certainly entertains him in the car. This will definitely be a drinking tool that he'll be able to grow into for years to come.

Sleeping: Caedmon is still fairly consistent with his sleeping schedule, except something happened when he turned 7 months. The calm, collected Caedmon that we once new when going to sleep is gone. Now, all we know, for the most part, is the Caedmon who screams and cries for up to 20 or 30 minutes before he falls asleep. It's a lot milder for naps and it's full blown at bedtime. I'm not sure what happened. But luckily, this hasn't affected his overall sleeping habits. Once he goes to sleep, he usually stays asleep and sleeps from 9 or 9:30pm to 8am ... minus the periodic 2 or 3am feedings (I'm not sure how those snuck back into the picture!) and the occasionaly search for paci. Caedmon also currently takes 3 naps a day for 1.5 to 2 hrs. each. I'm afraid, however, that one of the morning naps is going to have to go pretty soon.

Weight and Height: We won't go back to the pediatrician again until his 9-month check-up, so we haven't gotten an official weight or height check, but I would imagine that he weighs about 23 or 24 pounds, and several of his pants are too short these days, so I'm sure that he's gotten taller too (real helpful, I know).

Caedmon is 7 Months!

Can you believe it? Caedmon turned 7 months last Wednesday ... he's getting so old!

And it seems that just within the week he's growing, changing and making more advances toward crawling. I'm not exactly sure how much he weighs right now ... probably around 21 or 22 pounds, but here are some other milestones that he's achieved:

Sitting Up: Caedmon's a rock star when it comes to sitting up these days - very little weeble wobble effect. He can even reach for things to his right and left and still stay pretty stable.

Early Crawling Phase: Now, when Caedmon sits up and begins to lunge for toys, especially when they're in front of him, he has managed to maneuver himself back on to his stomach and wedge his knees and feet up.

Rolling Over: Caedmon perfected the "rolling from stomach to back" a while ago but just recently, he's started to lunge for toys and other things while he's on his back, which causes him to hang out on his left or right side a lot. And occasionally, he'll find himself on his stomach after all that effort, but it's the norm yet.

Foods: Caedmon enjoys a variety of foods these days including sweet potato, banana, peaches, peas, spinach, pear, carrots, rice cereal, oatmeal, egg yolk, and yogurt. Notice that I didn't mention avocado. Although he can eat it every once in a while, it's not a food that I would say he "enjoys." Maybe some day!

New Activities: Caedmon loves to swing at the park now and as of Saturday, he really enjoys "swimming" in the pool.

Caed's 6-Month Well Check-Up

Caedmon went in for his 6-month well check-up yesterday. According to the doctor, he's exactly where he needs to be developmentally and he's doing great. One thing that she asked me though was if we're starting to see him make any movements toward crawling. "Well," I said. "He doesn't like to stay on his stomach very long. The moment he get's there, he's like 'Oh, I know what to do,' and rolls right over on to his back." The doctor said that's nothing to be worried about. Some babies who don't like to spend time on their stomach will begin crawling from a sitting-up position. When the doctor said that, I think that's what Caed will do. Now that he can sit up pretty well on his own, with little rocking, he's beginning to lunged forward and to the side for things, so I can see how that will transition into a forward crawl. Yikes, watch out world!

Here are his 6-month stats:

• Weight: 20 pounds, 80th percentile
• Height: 28 inches, 90th percentile
• Head Circumference: 46 centimeters, 90th percentile

And one more note, Caed's second tooth is now breaking ground!

Diaper Changing Conversation

Caedmon loves to "talk" as I change his diaper ... so please excuse the unsnapped onesie. We don't want to be too scandalous on Hodgson Tales. Here's a quick snapshot of our diaper changing conversations.

Disguise is Key

I'm happy to say that Caedmon tried avocado again today and he ate it well. I can't say that he had a smile on his face the entire meal like he does when he's eating bananas or sweet potatoes, but he did finish. They were not plain of course ... I mixed them up in his rice cereal and it worked like a charm. Not that rice cereal has an overpowering taste to cover up avocado, but it seemed to fool Caedmon. Congratulations buddy, you're developing more than just a sweet tooth!

Speaking of disguises, I was trying for the past 2 weeks to get Caedmon to drink his water -- only a Tbsp or two -- and I wasn't having much success. I even added a hint of prune juice so give the water a little flavor, but he wasn't very interested. Then, Nana and Papa Tony came for a visit this weekend and everything changed. Nana fed Caed Friday night and helped him tilt his head back to drink the water and it worked like a charm. The water was still spiked with prune juice, but he was at least drinking it and not making sour faces. And then I tried the unthinkable .... I gave Caed water without the prune juice and believe it or not, he drank it. There's still a little fighting, but he's coming around. Thanks Nana for your help!

On another note, we have some exciting news ... Caedmon is getting his first tooth in. It wasn't so exciting last night when he cried hysterically and wouldn't go to bed, but after a little Tylenol and baby oral gel (Brad had to run to Rite Aid at 10pm), we all fell asleep. Caedmon did fuss periodically throughout the night though and I had to give him an extra dose of oral gel about 1:30am, but it wasn't too crazy of a night. It probably helped that I was able to take a nap during Caed's first nap this morning ... poor Brad wasn't so lucky. He woke up at 5:45am to go play basketball with the guys. Sorry honey!