Everett - 8 months!

This boy is on fire!!  (Rhianna style)

Monumental month, I tell you.  It actually makes me laugh to re-read that.  When I start to list Everett’s 8^th month milestones, they’re very informative about the things our family sees value in… some of it is comforting, and some is downright laughable.  

Hey! I'm a baby in a bucket!

I'm a little tired of being a baby in a bucket.

When will these people get me out of this bucket and FEED ME?!

Everett LOVES food.  Seriously.  If I happen to be unloading the dishwasher (okay, stop laughing…if Christopher happens to be unloading the dishwasher) and we’re putting away your little colored dishes and spoons, he starts shrieking and yelling and get a crazed look in his eye.   The shrieks turn a little indignant when he realizes it’s not mealtime, and he’s been known to sulk for a bit. ;)

Napping during our walk on Sunday

Oops!  Camera woke him up!

He's such a happy, toothless baby!

This month Everett expanded his culinary pallet to enjoy: brussel sprouts, lima beans, butternut squash, cauliflower (the BEST food for eating away from home… a perfect no-mess meal!), broccoli, plain yogurt, and…AVOCADOS.  Oh man, you fit right into our family with your intense love of avocados.  After one teeny tiny bite you started flailing your arms and legs about so furiously that I was actually concerned you were a) going to dislocate a shoulder, or b) break my nose the next time I got close enough to give another bite.   You make me proud on a daily basis, but perhaps never more so than the moment you recognized the culinary masterpiece that is the avocado.   =)

Speaking of avocados… he’s going to be eating lot more of them.  (No lie… I have a bowl FULL of avocados in the dining room waiting to ripen so that I can feed you avocados every day.  We took Everett to see Dr. Robinson this week and he still isn’t gaining very much weight.  He weighed in at a whopping 17lb 2oz and was 26.5 inches long.  That means only about 2lbs of growth in 6 months, and he sank from the 25% to the 10% percentile in height and weight.  We’re going to start enriching his bottles and adding more cereal into his diet.  While the spectrum of veggies is great for his vitamin intake, it’s not very calorie-dense so we’re going to up his calories with cereal, enriched bottles, avocados, and maybe even bananas (we hadn’t planned to start fruits until the end of his first year) and we’ll see how that works.  He is still perfectly plump and soft in all the right places, but he’s definitely a peanut.  =)

Grabbing little toys with his left hand.

You did manage to hit another important milestone that we’ve been impatiently calmly waiting for… you FINALLY rolled over.  You’ve been rolling tummy to back for a long time, but for the LIFE OF ME, we could not figure out how to coax you to roll from your back to your tummy.  Every time we tried to work on it, you seems to look at us with annoyance and think to yourself “Why in the world would I roll onto my tummy when I don’t like to be on my tummy?!”  We tried coaxing you over by placing a bottle, a rattle, a puppy toy (don’t tell Ruby), and even ME just out of reach on your playmat.  Nothing worked… until the day we were changing your diaper in an open space instead of the changing table (which hardly ever happens).  It just so happens that you LOVE your wipes container.  We stopped using the plastic box a while ago, and have switched to the refill-type packages.   When the package of wipes was set just out of your reach, you immediately flipped over and lunged for the wipes.  Like it was the most natural think in the world!  After lots of shrieking and excitement on our part, you repeated the feat several more times and seemed to be incredibly amused at the reaction you were getting.

Mother Goose is a favorite, only second to "Where's Spot?".

"These pages look tasty."

Everett’s sleeping is finally getting into a manageable routine.  He doesn’t sleep all the way through the night, but he usually manages to make it to 4am.  I feed him, and then lay him back in bed until 6 or 6:30.  With Caroline finished with standardized testing, it’ll be a little easier on us (and her) to let him fuss a bit if he wakes up earlier than that, so I’m hoping we’ll be sleeping more and more as the next months come.  I’ve realized recently that he will moving to toddlerhood soon, and it’s REALLY important that we establish a good sleeping routine before that or he’ll be up and trying to climb into bed with us every night.  Yikes.  I finally found a thought that strikes enough fear into my heart that I’m willing to let him cry a bit.  

Taking his afternoon nap on the way home from downtown.

My favorite tiny tootsies.  Best to love on them now before they get stinky!

You know who doesn’t like to hear the baby cry?  Caroline.  She does not appreciate it when the baby cries and we don’t address it immediately.  And she really doesn’t appreciate it when we ask her not to address it either.  It’s usually a case where Everett is in the room with us, but is playing on his own.  Anytime someone new enters the room, he whimpers for a moment  to see if someone will pick him up.  If we don’t acknowledge it, he stops in about 4 seconds.  For Caroline, that’s four seconds too long.  She has such a tender heart… it’s not the noise that bothers her, it’s the idea that Everett has a need (actually, it’s a want) and she knows she can address it.    As such, Caroline is quickly becoming one of Everett’s favorite people to see!  

Anxiously awaiting Caro's Brownie troop.

Nothing better than a sunny afternoon with pretty girls lined up to feed me!

This perfectly captures our life right now.  Pretty days, lots of playdates, a camera-loving baby, and my other monkey in the background who NEVER STOPS MOVING.

He’s also falling quickly in love with his Daddy.  Their relationship is definitely moving from a strictly-nurturing tone, to a tone of play and masculine banter.  Everett is learning to rumble and tumble on the floor with Christopher, and enjoys his morning playtime that usually consists of pulling on Christopher’s beard as hard as possible and shrieking with delight when he sees Chris wince.  Bath time is still Christopher’s specialty, and Everett’s happy noises fill our whole house each evening at 7:40 when he’s placed on the changing table to disrobe.  He knows those queues perfectly, and he launches into his helicopter arms with excitement.   (Oh, the sadness we experienced last week when Chris was gone and I didn’t have time to bath him.  He went straight from clothes to jammies and looked lost and confused the entire time.)

Favorite pastime:  Yelling

2nd Favorite pastime: Pulling Daddy's beard.

Chris thinks Everett will be an early talker – I think it’s certainly a possibility.  Everett loves to babble, and this month started lots of da-da-da-da, and even some ba-ba-ba and some ma-ma-ma.  The b’s and m’s tickle his lips, and it’s quite a sight to see him make the noise, get startled by the tickling sensation, smile to himself, and then start the whole thing over again.  We’re still waiting with baited breath for him to laugh.  He’s the happiest baby I’ve EVER known, but we can’t get him to laugh for anything.  

Maybe next month…

Dear Everett,

Oh sweet boy, you’re melting my heart even more with each day we grow to know one another.  There’s a new excitement with each day that begins with our morning snuggles, and moves into sweet babbles, smiles, and shrieks of delight.  Our mornings are filled with a brightness that carries us through some long and cumbersome days, and we love to talk about the joy you bring to our family.

I love to see your relationship with your sister grow each day.  Daddy and I pray each day that you and Caroline will grow to love and trust one another.  That you will both love the Lord with all your heart, and you will seek to serve him with your special gifts.  

Sweet Everett, my heart is starting to break a little as I realize how fast your little life is moving.  My heart is aching from loss already, and the thought that I’ll lose my blessing baby to toddlerhood is almost more than I can take.  But you, sweet baby, fill my heart in a way that no one else can.  And I am looking forward to each new age and stage with you, trusting that each will bring new laughter, new lessons, and new wondrous acknowledgement of God’s greatness.  

With a full heart,

Mommy