Six Months

I can't believe it!  Our little boy is already half a year old! Where does the time go?

We went for his 6 month appointment yesterday and he is still doing great.  Developmentally, he's right where he should be, a little ahead, in fact.  For height and weight, he's still lingering in the middle of the pack.  He was 16 lbs, 10.5 oz (45th percentile), 26 3/4 inches tall (50th percentile) and his head circumference was 17 inches (50th percentile).  He jabbered away to the doctor all through the appointment along with trying to eat his stethoscope.  The only minor concern we had for the appointment was that he's had red eyes and a runny nose for a few days.  We were wondering if he had a cold, but the doc suspects it is seasonal allergies.  He told us we could give him 2 mL of Benadryl if the stuffiness is affecting his eating or sleeping.  Considering he has been waking every 40 minutes for the last week, we jumped on the opportunity to give him some Benadryl last night (everyone needed a more restful night of sleep) and he had his first full night of sleep since vacation, save for the 2 a.m. feeding we have to set the alarm clock for.

We were a little nervous about all the vaccinations (he was so mad after his 4 month appointment that he stopped eating to within an ounce of the point that we need to take him to the hospital), but he seems to have done fine this time around.  He even got a flu shot on top of all the other shots and he was still just fine.  Thank goodness!

He is officially crawling.  It started about 3 weeks ago with some partial army crawling, partial frog hopping, partial belly off the ground crawling.  It wasn't pretty, but it got him where he wanted to go with a great deal of effort.  As soon as we returned from vacation (4 days after he turned 6 months old), he had put things together into a respectable crawl -- look out world!

He can sit on his own for long stretches of time.  He's still trying to master getting from sitting to crawling, but he's getting better at it.  While we were on vacation, he tipped forward from sitting to reach for a toy and he forgot to catch himself.  His poor little face hit the hardwood floor and he cried and cried.  By the time he lifted his head from the safe comfort of my shoulder as I comforted him, there was a little trail of blood running from his nostril.  His first bloody nose.  =(  He went right back to playing after a little snuggling with Mommy, but he does seem to be being more careful when he tips forward -- thank goodness!

He's doing very well with eating.  He still takes about 32 ounces of formula per day, but it's starting to be in more 6 oz servings instead of all in 4 oz servings.  He always takes 6 ounces at bedtime, in the middle of the night and first thing in the morning.  He's taking in quite a bit of solid food at dinner, too.  He eats sweet potatoes, squash, apples, bananas and peas (he LOVES peas).  Sometimes, he'll finish an entire container in one meal, but most of the time, he only eats about half.  He also gets a few banana puffs at breakfast (mainly just to keep him busy while we eat), but although he can pick them up, he doesn't seem to want to put them in his mouth.  His older brother tried helping him the other day ("Open wide!"), but the puffs that made it into his mouth that night must not have made much of an impression on his palate because he's still not interested in putting them in his mouth.  He picks them up and throws them off his tray, much to the dog's delight.

He still loves watching his big brother and is fascinated by his red crocs shoes.  Whenever he sees them, he crawls with all his might to touch them.  He also likes his brother's trains and matchbox cars.  He also still spends a lot of time thoughtfully contemplating his opposable thumbs.  He can literally sit and stare at his fist opening and closing, and his thumb appearing and disappearing for 5 minutes at a stretch.

He's starting to be very roly poly on the changing table.  It's sometimes a miracle we can even get a diaper on him as he's tossing and turning and flipping.  He's just too busy sometimes to pause for diaper changes.

He's starting to add more vowel sounds to his babbling.  We get lots of "ahhs" and "eeeees" along with lots of happy squealing and belly laughs, but I'm also staring to hear some D sounds, which probably means this will be our second baby who says Daddy first =)

He still takes the title of the world's best baby.  He is a great sleeper, a great eater, he plays quietly and happily and he is the sweetest little snuggler.  We really are the luckiest parents to have such a good baby.  I love this little munchkin SO much!