8 months

Another month has come and gone and Levi was 8 months old on Wednesday. He is just getting smarter and smarter every day. He can be a little stinker, too. I think we are going to have our hands full with this one!


We went down to Renville for the Bruns Christmas on Saturday, and today we celebrated with my family (my mom and dad, sister and Josh). So we had a fun-filled weekend! It's nice to be home though. Levi got lots of awesome presents from everyone! When we got home he wasn't sure which one to play with first!! He loves them all! :) I will post pics later. Anyhoo, here is my big boy:

 The following photo is a few of the 'outtakes' from our little monthly session today. Oh. My. Lord. I was sweating by the time I was finished and I honestly only got one decent picture (above) where he wasn't moving or trying to crawl away. It wasn't super bright out and I wasn't getting a ton of light through the window, so it didn't help that I had my shutter speed a little low either. I attempted to take one of him in front of the tree too, but it took .5 seconds to realize that wasn't going to work without Paul here at least to help me.

 Levi at 8 months::

20.6 lbs (weighed at home)

29 inches long (approximately...)

In size 4 dipes.

Pretty much in size 12 month clothes. I can still get him into some 9 month ones, but 12 months fit more comfortably.

FINALLY got a tooth!! Just last week actually. Bottom right, and I'm almost certain he's working on the left one now too. I can feel a little bump.

Still having a bottle several times a day, depending on what he feels like. Sometimes he eats really good, the next he isn't interested.

Still loves food. Does great for the most part with his baby food, and wants anything and everything that we put into our mouths. The only thing I've found that he doesn't really like are peas. Loves those little puffs, too.

Crawling, crawling, crawling. FAST.

Stands next to anything he can reach. Which now includes the dining room table, on his tippy toes of course.

He figured out quickly how to go around/under/over things. He tries to go under the coffee table a lot, but if he bumps his head one too many times, he'll back out and fake cry...yes sweetie, I feel so sorry for you when you are trying to crawl under the coffee table to get to the Christmas Tree that you can't seem to leave alone...Lol.

Lately he has a thing with doors. He tries to push them shut, and then open it again. He usually gets frustrated when he gets himself in the way of opening it up again.

Fascinated with the bathroom downstairs. If one of us goes in there and he sees that door open, he bolts right in that direction.

Still likes to make noise. Lately it's 'huh' or 'hmm'. If we copy him, he'll copy us. Either that or just screaming, shrieking or squealing. No consonants yet really.

I don't remember if I put this in his last month's post, but he's in the big tub now with a rubber mat down. He loves it! He likes this little octopus and carries that around the whole time he's in his bath. His main routine is to stand up next to the side where I am sitting, then sit back down, play for a minute (or less), then stand up, and so on. Not a huge fan of getting lotion put on though.

Starting to get better at the sippy cup. I give him water or Apple Prune juice in it. He's still not extremely interested in it...he'd rather just chew on the handles, but every once in awhile he'll take a drink.

Night time is getting better. We did a few nights of letting him cry awhile when he woke up in the middle of the night and wouldn't go back to sleep with just giving him his paci, and he has been improving. It was hard, not gonna lie. Usually now he'll still wake up once or twice but usually goes back to sleep with just the paci. If not we let him fuss for awhile and try not to pick him up unless we think he's not feeling good or something. I am getting to where I can tell the difference in his cries if he's hurting from an ear infection or something.

Speaking of ear infections...had another one of those this month too. This time he got a little stronger dosage of the amoxicillin so it seemed like it helped faster, unlike the last one he had where he didn't feel better until the 7th day of being on meds. :( Hopefully we don't have any more this winter, but I'm not getting my hopes up too high.

Here are some pics of Levi from the past month::

christmas cards

I am done with my Christmas cards! They will go in the mail tomorrow. I guess I am not 100% done, since I had to order 12 more, but what I have is done. :) One of those where we got a card from someone that wasn't on my list already. Anyhoo, I've had them for awhile but it took a few evenings after I put Levi to bed to get them all addressed and stamped. I actually have a mis-match of cards this year...I saw some from Paper Coterie that I absolutely loved, but they were waaaayyy too expensive. Then I happened to see a promo code on facebook for 12 free cards from there...SCORE! So I gave those out to our immediate family and got some from Shutterfly for the rest of the list that I also absolutely love! There were so many great designs it was hard to choose, but this one caught my eye:

Merry Merry Christmas

Turn your favorite photos into Christmas cards at Shutterfly.

View the entire collection of cards.

Simple, clean and colorful. Right up my alley!

waving bye-bye

Levi just started waving bye-bye! It's pretty cute. Sometimes he won't do it, but today he has been doing it for me quite a bit. :)

small change

I wanted my pictures to be bigger on here, so I made the blog wider! I'm  not going to go back and re-size all the previous ones, but from now on they'll look like this:

Daddy's "helper" unloading the dishwasher!

bananas!

From the first few bites I wasn't sure if he would like bananas. They were a little tart, not sure if that's the word I'm looking for, maybe just sweeter than he's used to. After he got used to them he liked them!

 

peas!

Well, we found the first food that Levi doesn't like! First I gave him the ones I made, and he literally gagged on them, even though they were the same consistency as the beans (that he seemed to like). So after a couple days of that, I tried jarred ones. At first he seemed ok with them if I mixed them together with the cereal, but since it's been a couple weeks already and I've tried them a few other occasions, he just does not seem to like them. I might try a minty pea recipe I've seen, maybe he'd like that better! I didn't catch any of his good faces on camera this time! :(

Next up....bananas!

mini album

Now that it's December, I have some pics to post of my summer mini album! Ha. I had the base of this album made from way back in like June or July, but I never did anything with it. I had a paper bag I collected things in throughout the summer, and I took pictures with it in mind, but never got around to doing anything with it. I am not very good at keeping up with these things as they happen, I am more likely to collect things, take pictures, etc., then put it all together at the end of whatever time-frame. When I have something on my desk I want to get it done and cleared off for the next project instead of sitting there in progress for a few months. Anyway, once I finally got around to finishing this thing, I just printed off my pictures using my own printer (bad idea since they look like crap), and put it together pretty quick. I probably didn't put as much thought/effort into it as I could have. I do like how it turned out though!

Levi meets SANTA!

We took Levi uptown to meet Santa and Mrs. Claus on Monday night. I think practically every kid in town under the age of 7 was there! It's nice to see a good turnout for such a small town though. Well, Santa even brought his reindeer along and his helpers were giving out rides while Santa met all the kiddos. We skipped out on that and got right in line, which ended up to be a good thing, because by the time we left, the line was all the way out the door of the community center! Levi was a good boy and just looked around at all the other kids while we waited in line. Sucking on the binker of course. :) When it was Levi's turn, Paul set him on Santa's lap while I took pictures. He would not take his eyes off of him! He just stared, for like 30 seconds, then burst into tears. It was pretty funny! Paul scooped him up as soon as he started crying, and then he was ok. Hopefully next year there will be no tears, but only time will tell!

Thanksgiving

We had a fun, busy Thanksgiving weekend! Thanksgiving day we went to my mom and dad's and had dinner with them and my sister and her hubby. It was nice to have it low-key and just the seven of us. Levi was the center of attention and was loving it! Then on Saturday we went to Paul's brother and sister-in-law's house for dinner with their whole family on his dad's side. So there was quite the crew there! We have an annual tradition of making lefse, so after dinner that is what we did. Paul slept all afternoon and I was watching Levi, so neither of us helped a ton, but I made sure to get a sample! :) The girls have a good time, they like to help roll it out, so that is fun. It's something that all of our kids will remember when they grow up, and hopefully the tradition will continue! I don't have a lot of pics from this weekend, I chose to just enjoy it and not worry about taking so many pictures, but I made sure to get a few of Levi in his shirt!

 

We have so much to be thankful for this year! First on the list I am thankful for our healthy, happy, perfect little boy!  Also for Paul, my family and friends, the roof over our heads, and for everything that God has given us this year. We are truly blessed! :)

first snow of the season

It snowed last weekend on Saturday. We got like 6 inches I think. As much as everyone was complaining about it, it's the middle of November in Minnesota, and it was time. None of us are ready for a winter like last year, but it had to start sometime! It was actually coming down really nicely, no wind or anything. Maybe I enjoyed it more since I didn't have anywhere to go :) Sunday afternoon Paul blew out where we park and in front of the garage, and a ways down the alley too. Of course as soon as he was done the city plow came through the alley and pushed the snow all back over what he had just done...happens every year, the dude can't figure out how to push the snow the right direction....oh well... Anyway, I set Levi in front of the patio door while Paul was out there, and he was having a fun time watching him! It was pretty cute.

It is almost a week later now, and most of the snow is gone. We had some nice temps over the last couple days. It will be back soon enough!

Hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving!

plums!

These must have been a little tart, because the face he made was hilarious!! I laugh every time I look at them. What a goof!

 

I know the second one is sort of blurry, but I just love his face! Haaahaa! He did really like them after the initial taste! :) 

Next up...peas! Which means I better make them!!

pears!

I forgot to put up Levi's reaction to pears. Well, there really wasn't much of one. They are pretty mild, so he liked them right away!

7 months

Seven months. Each month goes faster! Levi was busy, busy, busy this month, gaining speed with crawling and standing next to anything he can pull up on. He is quick, that one! We had another ear infection early in the month, not sure if I mentioned about the first one, but 2 weeks after he finished meds for that one, he got another. Also had a little cold/cough for a few days, but that has since gotten better too. He still gets a snotty nose once in awhile but nothing major. The flu has been going around town lately so I am crossing my fingers that we don't end up with that at our house...ugh, not fun.

 

I had a heck of a time getting a picture of this little stinker the other day! We can't just sit, we have to try and climb up the back of the couch, or crawl to the other end, or lunge towards me....yeesh. But I did get a few goods ones, even though they are all a bit blurry! I was trying to get them quick so I didn't have much time to get the focus right! :) Thank goodness for photoshop sharpening, ha. 

Levi at 7 months:

Weighs about 20 lbs on the dot, according to my bathroom scale.

I didn't measure him this month. Probably couldn't have gotten him to lay still that long anyways!!

In size 4 dipes.

Size 9 month clothing, can fit into some 12 month already too. Seems like he has been flying through sizes lately.

Never. Stops. Moving. The kid is ALL OVER. Every day he gains speed with the crawling, and he can pull up onto just about anything. Keeps me on my toes, that is for dang sure. Sad part is that it's only going to get worse! :)

Loooooves food. I don't think there has been anything he's tried that he hasn't liked. There's nothing that he refuses to eat. Which is probably why he weighs 20 pounds at 7 months old....

Also loves those little puffs, the ones that dissolve. And the ones that are called crunchies, they are cheese flavored....omg he loves those. Seriously, he sees me with them and he races over and like starts panting like I can't get it into his mouth fast enough! It's quite funny.

He tried crawling up the stairs once, and got up 2 steps to the landing before I moved him. I was right behind him so he didn't fall backwards. Besides that time he really doesn't pay attention to them yet.

He is more interested in anything that is NOT a toy vs. something that IS a toy. He will sit and play with the toys for a little bit, but then he'll spy the remote and take off like a banchee after that. Momma is still faster though!

Loves paper, obviously. Christmas should be fun, ha.

I've tried to give him a sippy cup with some Apple Prune juice (watered down quite a bit) but he would rather chew on the spout. When he does get a drink he's not sure what to think of it.

Changing his diaper is quite a workout. He screams as soon as I lay him down, like I am torturing him or something! At first I was worried that he actually was hurting or something, but alas, I have learned his ways. He lays perfectly still at daycare. Little stinker!! Getting clothes on him is also joyous. Sarcasm.

He loves being naked. I think if he could be naked all day he would be a happy camper. But since it's November and a wee bit chilly, we will have to limit that. :)

Sleep. Some nights are good, some nights aren't as good. He's getting better, slowly but surely. Hopefully. We've gotten rid of the middle of the night bottle, but he still will wake up a couple times. Usually he is up for the day by 5:00-5:30. Wahoo. 

He enjoys squealing at the top of his lungs. We call it his happy screams. He'll do it once, then when we laugh or something he'll keep doing it louder. He has always liked hearing his own voice!

Blows bubbles/raspberries all the time too. He's constantly making the brrrr noise with his lips/tongue out.

Car seat is apparently torture along with the diaper changing and putting clothes on.

Since he has absolutely zero fear at this point, when he pulls up onto anything and everything, he's had lots of klunks on the noggin from falling down. Some were pretty hard, but he usually only cries for a minute and then, surprise, goes and does whatever he was doing again.

For as much as he likes to get into things and crawl around to explore, he wants me right there on the floor with him a lot of the time. Or at least where he can see me. He doesn't like it if I put him on the floor by his toys, then run to the kitchen to try and do something quick. He seems to like the tupperware cabinet so at least that keeps him entertained for awhile!

He doesn't fall asleep to the bottle much anymore, except nighttime. But he does like me to rock him to sleep yet, which I can't say I mind.... Except when he fights it and is over-tired. Which is pretty often actually. I will always love cuddle time with my little man.

No teeth yet!

Well I think that about covers it. Now a few pics for good measure!

 See what he's after in the pic above? PLANT! MUST. GET. THE PLANT!!

applesauce!

This isn't quite the reaction I expected from applesauce:

 

Ha! I think the first bite was a little tart and caught him off guard. After the initial taste he did like them. Another jarred one, because I had them on hand from a gift basket that my mom got somewhere and gave to me. Next time he has apples we have home-canned applesauce for him!

Next up...either plums or peas, depending on if I get the peas made or not! :)

mango!

These went over pretty well! This was another jarred one just because I was lazy...lol. I think he liked them!

Next up....applesauce!

Boo!

We had fun dressing our little monkey up! We went to visit grandma and grandpa, and the cousins on Sunday. They all looked so CUTE! Madison was a southern belle, Allie was little red riding hood (but refused to wear the hood), and Aaron was a race car driver.

 

Then on Monday night we took Levi up to the school...they have a costume contest and games for the kids every year. Sadly our little monkey didn't win! But it was still fun! :)

 

I took a few more pics of monkey in his costume the next day, too... 

 

It was a great Halloween!