Dear Chase – Month 8

Dear Chase,

Yesterday you turned 8 months old! That’s 2/3 of a year, buddy! Crazy. It’s time to recap this month, but if you need to catch up first, check out my previous letters:

•  Months 1 & 2
• Month 3
• Month 4
• Month 5
• Month 6 
• Month 7 

I feel like I say this every month, but this was a big month!

Let’s talk about food first since it’s your favorite. For the first half of the month you continued with the four 6 oz bottles per day but a couple of weeks ago I dropped one of your bottles and you’re now down to three 7-oz bottles per day. Last month you tried 4 of the 8 major allergens (eggs, treenuts, wheat and fish). This month you added two more – you had peanut butter and you also milk (in the form of yogurt and cheese). The last two on the list are shellfish and soy.

Coordination is improving, especially with non-slippery things! Top left- chunk of sweet potato banana bite, top right- pork tenderloin, bottom left – roasted sweet potato. Still struggles to grip red peppers and avocado bc he doesn’t like them coated in anything!

A video posted by Lindsay L, RD (@theleangreenbean) on Jun 23, 2015 at 11:50am PDT

At this point, there’s not much I won’t let you try. Obviously nothing like tortilla chips, popcorn or extra spicy things…but mostly, if we’re eating it, you can try it. For the most part you stick to your usual foods thought. You get a bottle around 8:30/9am and usually have some cheerios while mommy eats breakfast, some mornings you’ll share a few bites of mom’s PB Banana Oat Muffin for a mid-morning snack.  You eat lunch around 12/12:30 (usually a mix of sweet potato, avocado, red peppers, sweet potato banana bites, fruit like blueberries, nectarines, meat and yogurt. For a while you were liking the prune, nut butter and banana popsicles I made for you but you’re currently not loving them so much. You get a bottle around 2:30/3 and then another bottle around 8:30/9 along with some of your oatmeal mixed with prunes and scrambled egg. Read more about our modified baby led weaning approach here.

You’re getting better and better with your fingers. You can pick up non-slippery things like muffin chunks, meat, sweet potatoes etc but still struggle with things like avocado and red peppers. You get things into your mouth about 60% of the time.

You still don’t like when your meals come to an end and you also don’t like when we don’t feed you fast enough. You scream and screech VERY loudly…to the point where mommy doesn’t love going out to eat currently because I spend the whole time shoving food in your mouth trying to keep you quiet!

Sleep is going pretty well. You typically fall asleep on the couch around 9:30, I bring you upstairs around midnight and you sleep in your crib until around 8am. Most mornings you’ll take a nap sometime around 9:30/10 for an hour or so, another nap around 1 or 2 for an hour or so and then another nap from 5:30-6:30 or 7. Sometimes your morning or afternoon nap is longer than an hour, some days it’s shorter. And some days you take a later morning nap and then don’t nap again until 4 or 5. Suffice it to say you’re not super consistent with your naps!

Last month you were oh so close to crawling…well, this month you mastered it. And boy can you move. We ordered you a play yard…or gated community as we call it…

It’s huge, but we like it because it gives you lots of room to crawl around and can hold a lot of your toys. At the beginning of the month you really didn’t mind being in there but now that you’ve mastered crawling, you definitely prefer to be out exploring. You love to crawl and I spend a lot of time each day following you around as you explore.

In other big news, you learned how to stand up…and now that’s pretty much all you want to do. You can easily pull yourself into a standing position and can stand for fairly long periods of time. Once you figured out how to stand, I bought you this Laugh & Learn Activity Table and you like to stand and work at your computer and play on your keyboard.

I have a feeling it won’t be long until you’re walking!! EEK!

Other activities this month:

• Your daddy celebrated his first Father’s day.
• Mimi and Grandpa came to visit for a couple days.
• You went for your first bike ride.
• You tagged along to several workouts with mommy and daddy.
• You’ve had your fair share of crying fits.

We had a fun little summer photo shoot with our photographer friend and we’re so happy with how they came out. She’s the same photographer who took my maternity pics and our 5 year anniversary pics.

You love your daddy. He can make you laugh like no one else.

You’re definitely mommy’s boy. Just in the past couple of weeks you’re starting to show a little separation anxiety. You cry when we leave you at grandma and grandpa’s to go work out and when you want mommy, no one else will make you happy.

Mommy is still working from home and watching you full-time. I wouldn’t trade it for the world but it’s definitely a bit more challenging now than it was before you were mobile 🙂 We do lots of playing and I cram a lot more into nap time and evenings but it works for us!

You still love your animals, especially Tucky. You figured out how to crinkle your nose and it’s now your favorite face to make and you’re VERY vocal. It seems like you’re always shrieking – either happy or sad. You HATE being on your back. You won’t even lay still long enough to get a new diaper on most of the time. You’re constantly flipping over or trying to sit up and I’ve pretty much given up on trying to get shorts on you. You hate having things on your head. Putting a hat on your head and watching you try to get it off is hilarious.

You LOVE books. Mommy has taken you to the library twice so far to find some new books to add to the rotation. You especially love books with flaps. You quickly learn where they are on each page and reach out to lift them up. So smart! You also love knocking things over. We bought you some rubber blocks and stacking toys and you knock them down as quickly as we can stack them up. You are obsessed with tv remotes and cell phones.

Mommy and daddy love you and can’t wait to see what next month brings!

Love,

Mom