Happy Eight Months Jayden!

Dear Jayden,

Today is March 8^th, 2011 and you are 8 Months Old! This past month has been a month of big CHANGES! Wow are you growing up! The past few weeks you have rejected anything that makes you a little baby. You want to be a big boy so bad. We are so amazed at what you can do now. I’m so proud of how hard you are working to grow big.

You stopped nursing 3 weeks ago. One day you just turned away and sat up and that was that. You wanted nothing to do with it anymore. Now you drink formula from a bottle. Later that same day you started to refuse baby food. Now you no longer accept any pureed food. In fact you will ONLY eat chunky food. (Except for yogurt which you love) You are eating what we eat. We just cut it up into tiny little pieces and you LOVE it. Casseroles are your favorite. One of the most exciting things you have done this month was feed yourself. You’ve got the pincher grip down and you can pick up little pieces and put them straight in your mouth. You are getting so fast at feeding yourself. Today we met Daddy for lunch at Olive Garden. You were so excited to sit in the high chair and feed yourself. You LOVE restaurants! You are also drinking from a sippy cup all by yourself. You put it in your mouth and tip your head way back and gulp, gulp, gulp. We give you water, pedialyte, and juice in it. You are soooo cute and happy in your highchair.

Every day Daddy and I go back and forth on whether you will crawl or walk first. Right now its walk. You learned to pull yourself up to a push walker and you can walk with it. I was shocked the first time I saw you stand up and step across the room. Woah. Your absolute favorite thing to do right now is walk. You are constantly grabbing for our hands and pulling yourself up to walk. You think it’s so funny to chase Maya around the house. You like to stand at your play table and I’ve seen you turn away from it and take a step. So we’ll see if walking is weeks or months in your future. As for crawling, you really don’t like to. You crawl about two times and then you just fall down and cry for us to come get you. For some reason you think it’s much more work than walking. You do like to crawl in a circle which is pretty funny. Again, we’ll see if you are hours or days away from happily crawling. You’re so close, we don’t know why you won’t just crawl, crawl, crawl!

You have two bottom teeth and you love to use them to bite. YIKES! Your favorite books have two little teeth marks on them. You learned to click your tongue and you love to do it when people talk to you. You also say “huh, huh” constantly. It’s cute. When music is played and you are standing, you bounce your little bottom. I had been trying to teach you to “dance” and was so excited the first time you did this. One thing I’m not so excited about is the little temper you are starting to get. You clinch your little fists and “growl” when you don’t like something. Hopefully it is just a stage.

A big part of this past month was sickness. You had an ear infection and then got the Rota/NoroVirus. You were SO sick. You became dehydrated and needed to go to the hospital. Unfortunately Daddy and I were too sick to take you but that night you started to improve. We were so thankful Grammy drove through the night to care for you. She really loves you and does an awesome job of spoiling you. You really missed her when she left. We chat with Grammy and Grandpa on i-chat and you smile when you see them and squeal. So cute.

At the doctor last week you lost weight because of being sick. You weighed 18lb 4oz but I think you have gained a whole pound since then! You are eating so much lately. You wear 9 month or 6-12 month clothes and size 3 diapers. You drink about 4 bottles a day and eat whenever we will feed you. You sleep well but still wake up once during the night. Dad and I take turns giving you a bottle then.

Well, that is just a quick review of the big and exciting things you are accomplishing. We’re proud of you and we love you so much little man.

Forever,

Mommy