My Baby's Going to School!

Me and Lukey! Snuggly!

Lukey in his oBeralls!

Baby BedHead

New teether!

Aren't we the cutest?!


I really need to keep up with blogging because when I don't I either have five million things to say or I forget all of the funny little things that happen.

The latest:
1. Luke is very possessive over his Boppy pillow all of a sudden. If I lay on it, he comes and sits in it to push me out. He uses his feet and kicks me out if necessary.
2. Luke is terrified of the springy thingy behind the door. When it makes the BOING noise, Luke looks as if he's been shocked with electricity. He crawls/walks by it and stares it down.
3. Luke mocks people's laughs. No matter what laughing (or crying) sounds I make, he usually tries to replicate them. He mostly gets the same rhythm, not the pitch.
4. My baby's going to school on Monday for the first time! When we went to orientation on Friday, he hammed it up and stole the show. He saw so many new toys and wanted to play with them all. He also met some new friends that are a bit younger than him. He wanted to touch them (with his pointer finger), which I totally discouraged for my and the other parents' sake. He's not exactly gentle. But, he loved staring at himself in their mirror and smiling back at me. I'm just wondering if it'll all be okay when he stops playing and realizes he doesn't know anyone there. :( Poor baby! But they'll be learning Sign Language, Spanish, English (of course), and doing arts and crafts! I'm so excited for him, but I'm missing him at the thought of it.
5. Luke likes black eyed peas. The food, not the group. But who knows, he likes to dance to Lady Gaga!
6. Luke is getting two more teeth in on the bottom, both sides at the same time!
7. Luke knows how to throw a ball! YaY Luke! But he also uses this skill to throw his bottle, pacifier, spoon, or anything else he has in hand and decides to fling!
8. Luke bites me, A LOT! I know he's teething, but it really hurts! He bites in and then pulls back with my skin still in his teeth! Come on now! He also pulls my hair. It's like a game for him. He jumps up to get it because I always have it pulled up away from him!
9. Luke has definitely developed object permanence. If I have the remote control and he sees it, even when I hide it, he'll try to find it.
10. Luke is a fearless climber. The latest scheme was moving his noise-making bongos over by the couch so that he could step up on them to get into my bag on the couch.
11. Luke still LOVES to eat leaves. I pop his hand, yet he never cries.... but when he bites me and I pull away he cries when I say "OUCH!" I don't get it!

There's certainly more, but I'm getting super tired. I'll be sure to post this week!

Picture Post...

These are Luke's new shoes!





So messy from "eating"...


Then he needed a bath!



I'm going to bed... I'll gab tomorrow!

Chew On This...

Gorgeous, I know! Luke decided that he was going to bite into his crib railing, over and over again. It might have been around the same time he was pitching a fit and throwing his pacifier on the floor. Maybe not. Who knows what goes on during naptime and night-night time. My Mom has told me that my little brother used to wait until she thought he was asleep, and then he would make little inventions and things out of Lego's. Though I know he's not making inventions, I'd still love to be a fly on the wall during what little time my eyes aren't on him!
He's so silly. His Daddy taught him to dance by wiggling his little 25th percentile head around like Ray Charles. We sing, and he smiles and wiggles his head. Sometimes he does it out of nowhere for no reason at all. Even when I try to be as serious as I can sometimes, he can giggle, and then I'm laughing regardless. The other night I was drinking orange Gatorade and playing with Luke. He wanted to drink some Gatorade from the bottle, I could tell because those little eyes were zoned in on it. I started to feel like I was going to laugh, with the drink in my mouth. I quickly swallowed and thought, "that was CLOSE!" I gave him a sip, it of course spilled down the front of his shirt. I went to take another sip, got a big gulp, and he made a goofy, teethy smile... trouble. I laughed and spewed Gatorade everywhere and felt it come out of my nose. There was literally a puddle of liquid in my lap. Wow! I was so glad that Brian wasn't in the room because of two things: 1. He would've really made fun of me (though I wouldn't blame him) and 2. He is super carpet protective. Luckily, I got it mostly cleaned up before he was back.
By the way, this sleep training thing isn't getting easier yet. He now fights his sleep worse during the day for naps. He had the worst fit today. I'm so over this. Seriously.

Sleep Training is TORTURE

What is sleep training exactly? Basically, it's doing (or NOT doing) whatever it takes to get your child to fall asleep and stay asleep on their own. BOO! Not my idea, but the doctor says it's best. We are trying, but it is so hard to hear him cry!
We were instructed to NOT rock him to sleep because he then feels that the only way he can fall asleep is if someone is rocking him, and cuddling him and playing with his hair and breathing in his sweet babyness. When he's had his bottle, we need to say our love you's and give kisses night night and then sweetly place him in his bed. Oh and we have to leave him there.
He cried 11 minutes the first night, but they were heart wrenching minutes. Tonight is night number 2, and I think it was only 5-7 minutes, but it was so sad. He was crying to where I could hear him choked up in his breathing. He was ALL worked up. Brian broke his stern facade and had to go check on Luke, which made none of us feel better in the end. Luke still screamed, Brian had then seen the saddest face on earth and had to leave him there, and I just sat here on the couch knowing my baby wanted me to hold him. Terrible.
Supposedly he will "sleep up to 12 hours," and that's something to covet when you love sleep as much as I do, but I'm not sure it's worth the sacrifice. Luke has been in his crib since he was 6 weeks old. I've always tried to do what's best for him, but I'm tempted to take this one for me. I love rocking him to sleep at night.
At his appointment he weighed in at 20 pounds exactly. He's perfectly healthy, and he only had to get a finger prick this time! Next time, more shots. We have to try and feed him his cereal in the mornings again because his iron was low. He did alright with that this morning because I mixed some fruit in with it.
Thank goodness he's starting to find some things he likes! Lately, he eats mostly:
Baby Cereal or Oatmeal
Yoplait yogurt (he really likes the lemon kind)
Cheese grits
Mashed potatoes
Grammy's lasagna
Jennie-O Turkey/gravy
Bread or buns
Chicken salad from Chik-Fil-A
Scalloped Potatoes
Cheesy Crunchy Baby Snacks
Strawberries, Grapes, Melon
So I plan our meals around finding something he can eat. That's a task!