Noah is 8 Months Old!

Time for another Noah update! First up, his stats. He weighed in this month at 17 lbs, 13 oz (down again to the 10th to 25th percentile), but up 10 ounces from last month! And once again, he didn't grow any taller because he was still measuring up at 27 inches (down again to 25th to 50th percentile). But, go figure his head is still getting bigger as its measured circumference was 46 cm (up to the 75th to 90th percentile). Oh yeah, that's a Frank head! ;)

Below is the pic of Noah at eight months, wearing the 12-month onesie. So angelic. :)

So I guess I jinxed myself by saying last month that Noah was sleep trained. He's not now. Sigh. But, at least there is a reason for it...his first tooth! It cut through the gums this past Friday, so just shy of turning 8 months old. I am hoping that it will stop bothering him soon and he will stop waking up, but only time will tell. I looked back at when Ethan got his first couple of teeth (~ 6.5 to 8 months) to discover that he started waking at night again for an entire month when he started teething! Yikes! :(

He has settled into a solid two-nap routine, continuing to take a longer morning/early afternoon nap of 1 to 2 hours, then a late afternoon nap of another 1 to 2 hours. Unfortunately, this schedule makes it a bit hard for us to get out and do anything during the day. He wakes up between 8 and 8:30 most days, then Ethan doesn't get up until 9 or 10, then Noah is going back to sleep around 10:30. By the time Noah wakes back up, it's time to eat lunch and take a walk, then another hour later around 2:30 or 3, both boys are ready to nap again! Whew! It am fortunate that they normally sleep at the same time in the afternoon, so I can get things done around the apartment.

New foods tried this month:

• Green beans
• Avocados
• Brown rice cereal
• Yogurt
• Snacks! (Mum Mums, Puffs)

He is still doing really well with the food introductions. He did great with the green beans, a much different scenario than when we introduced them to Ethan, if you remember some of those pics! Haha! He gobbled up the avocado the first time he had it, but wasn't so into it the next time. I have started trying to add cereal to his fruits and veggies at breakfast and dinner as a way to get him to eat the cereal. It has worked pretty well. I have also added in a third meal at lunchtime when he eats yogurt and works on feeding himself a snack, like the Mum Mums or Puffs. He continues to nurse every 2-3 hours throughout the day, so I know that is where he is still getting the majority of his nutrition.

New accomplishments this month:

• First doctor's appointment on February 16th (for something besides a well-checkup)
• His first playdate on February 29th (Leap Day!) with a local moms group. There is another little boy, Ben, just a week younger than him! :)
• His first dip in the pool at his big brother's 3rd birthday party at Great Wolf Lodge in Mason, OH
• His first tooth! It broke the surface on March 9th.
• Started babbling, trying to say "da da" I think!

After I came down with something at the beginning of February, the boys both managed to catch it too and both suffered high fevers, runny noses and congestion. :( It hung on forever. I was hoping it would just run its course, but when it didn't seem to want to go away, I finally gave in and took them both to see the doctor. They won a round of antibiotics as a prize. Lovely. It seemed to do the trick quickly, so that was a relief.

Once we were finally all feeling well, I decided to check out one of the local moms groups. I went to a moms night out first, then shortly after that, the boys and I checkout out a playdate at one of the houses. Everyone was very nice and Noah even found a buddy his age! Of course they weren't interested in playing with each other yet, but I'm sure it won't be long before they are. :)

Though he wasn't a big fan of the water at the Great Wolf Lodge, he did enjoy a couple naps on his comfy Grandpas! :) haha! I don't think the water was warm enough for him, so he just wasn't into all that! Hopefully he will change his mind this summer so we can enjoy some time at the pool if we are still living in the apartment. It looks so inviting already, but I am guessing it's still a tad bit cool at this point. ;)

Ah, teething. Oh how I loathe it. :( Noah's first tooth was like a little ninja. It totally snuck up on us and one day it wasn't there and the next it was! His gums never got white or swollen, so there was no indication that it was coming. Funny thing was that just two days prior to its arrival, I had been complaining about the fact that he had woken me up three times the night before and wondered what was wrong with him. People mentioned teething and I thought maybe it could be true, but that I checked and there definitely didn't look like any teeth were coming in. Oh how wrong I was!

He is trying hard now to mimic the sounds I make for him and it really sounds like he is trying to say "da da," but he can't quite get it out. He is definitely babbling though, and starting to use that mouth for more than just eating! ;)

I like to call him my little Magellan. He LOVES exploring anything and everything. The little booger has figured out how to escape the barricade I made for him to keep him contained in our living room and now quickly makes his way out into the rest of the apartment. One of his favorite thing to explore are Daisy's food and water bowls. Major bummer. So, he has definitely been keeping me on my toes anytime he is awake lately! That was definitely a major advantage to our GA house layout. Ethan could roam the upstairs as much as he wanted to without any fear of him getting into something he shouldn't. I could close off the doors to keep him out of some rooms and the safety gate kept him from going down the stairs. The apartment set-up here is much trickier and there is no great way to keep Noah away from some things. I guess that just means more exercise for Mommy, which is probably a good thing! ;)

So I think I totally jinxed myself again from last month. I made the mistake of saying how fortunate we were that the boys were great diners and that we could still go nice places to eat. Um yeah. Noah totally blew that one this past weekend. :( I will chalk it up to the teething that put him in such a foul mood, but he made our dinner out an absolutely miserable experience. It was so bad, in fact, that I finally just took him out to the car and let Josh and Ethan finish up. He wasn't happy sitting in his seat, being held, being fed, eating food by himself. Nothing. And he was not being shy about letting everyone there know how unhappy he was. Sigh. I really hope he will return to normal once the tooth is in!

Here is the pic of both Ethan and Noah at 8 months. It still amuses me to compare and contrast their pics each month! I think that Noah definitely has a better chance of keeping his blue eyes because it looks like Ethan's had turned brown by this point now and Noah's are still holding on to the blue. I don't want to jinx it though, so I better not say anything! ;)