Jack and his Walker

Baby Jack loves his new walker, although he sometimes gets mad that he can't pull the attached toys off of it. I realize our house is starting to look like a Babies R Us store. Between the swing, the vibrating chair (which he has about outgrown,) the many floor mats, the high chair, the walker, and countless toys, it's a wonder we have room for the baby! And yes, I have heard the countless reasons why you shouldn't put a kid in a walker and I don't care. I think they are great and as long as we don't overuse it, I think Jack will be just fine. Look at how grown up he looks.

6 months old

Baby Jack turned 6 months old on the 22nd. Stuart and I do a photo shoot at home each month to capture the moment. This is my favorite picture.

He had his check-up yesterday and did great. He cried for less than a minute after his first shot and was fine for the second one. He was smiling and laughing with the nurses after that. What a difference from the last time.

He is also growing at a rapid rate: 22 lbs and 10.5 oz, almost 29 inches long. Holy cow! He's not sitting up yet, he can pull himself to sitting, but can't balance all that weight and length yet. He is rolling around like crazy though and trying his best to scoot around on his belly.

Sleeping Baby

Our little Jack has been struggling with sleep for the last month. He began sleeping through the night at about 6 weeks old. It wasn't quite as great at it sounds. He would go down at 8pm and sleep for a solid 4-6 hours and then fuss in his sleep until he got up at 6am. We had to check on him about every hour, but he didn't need a feeding for those 10 hours, so we considered ourselves lucky. Well, since the beginning of January, we have had some difficulty. Between the stomach virus, the flu, and teething, we were back to night feedings and fussiness. It was so bad, we started putting him in bed with us each night (I know, I know, but when your baby is sick and you are both tired and working, you get desperate!) This meant weaning was put on hold as I would sometimes breast feed him hourly to get him to settle down. Well, the good news is he is over being sick and that first tooth has made it's appearance. As a result, my baby went to sleep last night and slept from 8:30pm-6:30am. No waking, no fussing! I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the clock this morning. Woo Hoo! What a way to kick of my first day on my new job as full time mommy!

He is also napping much better. (In fact he is already asleep in my lap as I type and it's only 8:30am!) He must have some catching up to do on sleep. This picture was taken Saturday night as he fell asleep while I was feeding him his favorite: carrots. He must have been tired!

Independent Jack

My little boy is becoming increasingly focused on doing things for himself. It is very cute and a little frustrating. He loves to take his socks off, and gets mad if it takes him too long. Even if he can't get them completely off, he is at least happy if he can stretch them far enough to get the end in his mouth.

Here he is in his new high chair, enjoying fruit for the first time. He loves it, but still prefers those carrots. He is pretty good at letting me feed him his solids, but increasingly would like to do the bottle by himself, which would be fine, except he has some difficulty finding his mouth.

Random Stuff

Well, I am officially unemployed. I finished my final day in the office today. It feels more than a little weird. I left work today and am now a member of the mommy club. I am so excited about spending more time with my little man. I am also excited that Stuart and I will have more time for each other with less external demands on our time.

Baby Jack's first tooth finally poked through this morning. He has been fussy and not wanting to sleep lately, so we are glad it finally made it's appearance. I would post a picture, but I can't seem to get him to show it to me...he keeps sticking his tongue out. It is there, I can feel it! I guess that means we really have to stop the breast feeding now!

These pictures remind me of how lucky I am. Those are some good looking men!

Where's Baby Jack?

I Quit!

It's official, I have resigned from work. For all of you who didn't think I could do it (myself included at times) I have proved us wrong! I will be staying at home with Jack for the next year to focus on what is really important. I always knew I would be content being a stay at home mom, so I was surprised that the decision was so hard for me to actually make. I really love what I do and I am very good at it. I have been in corporate education for over 15 years. It was a career that took a detour from my orignal plans to teach 3rd grade, but you would be surprised at how similar adult learning is to child learning. It is exciting to implement learning solutions to performance problems. It is also rewarding to be able to tie our efforts to specific improvements. My company couldn't have made it harder for me to leave. Not only is the money hard to walk away from (they promoted me twice in the last year, once about 2 weeks before my maternity leave and again when I first returned,) but the work has allowed me new challenges and personal growth. My last day will be February 22nd. So, if anyone is wondering how soon before we move back down south, it will be awhile since I will be staying home, delaying our ability to pay off our mortgage...oh well, we will get there eventually. Besides, isn't this little guy worth a few more years of house payments? Really, I know how blessed we are to be in a position to allow me to be at home during this important time.

Jack is it!

Jack was tagged, but with the flu running through the house I haven't had a moment to post his 6 things before now. Here we go:

1. Jack is a very happy baby. He so well tempered. He really has to be in pain to scream or cry. He wakes in the morning with a big smile. I think this is for his dad's sake. Stuart is not a morning person, but it's hard to be grumpy when you hear your son laughing, no matter how early it is.

2. The ice maker on the fridge freaks him out. It's very weird. When you get ice from the fridge he shakes his head back and forth and scquirms around. It will even wake him from a dead sleep. He does not like it.

3. He really is a very big kid. I am frequently stopped by people who assume he is much older that he actually is. At 5 and 1/2 months he is about 22 lbs. He's only a little chubby, and the doctor says he is height/weight proportionate, he is just a very long kid. I think we could have a future ball player on our hands!

4. Yeah Carrots! We are just introducing him to solids. Cereal and peas were well received, but we weren't anticipating the recent excitement over carrots. Apparently, he loves them. He laughed out loud after trying them. He giggles with each bite he so excited. Can't imagine how much he's going to love fruit.

5. He loves the song Baby Mine (from Dumbo.) When I sing that to him, no matter how hard he is crying, he will stop and smile. It immediately calms him.

6. He does this thing we like to call "rabid baby." He gets into this fenzied state of excitement, where he goes into mini vampire mode on his mom. (He doesn't do it to his dad, just to me.) He tries to bite and suck on my cheek or neck while making a growling noise. It is so funny. Note this video is while he was calming down from rabid baby mode. Sorry it is hard to hear him growl, I couldn't stop laughing.

You call this sick?

Well, the last week in this house has been miserable. Jack and I have been sick since Thursday night. We finally went to the doctor yesterday and confirmed that Jack has the flu. My poor little man. I feel so bad for him. He is so extremely congested and is also wheezing so the doctor is making him do breathing treatments. His eyes are all red and runny and he looks miserable. Usually he is happy throughout everything, so I know he is bad off when he is actually acting sick. For the most part he is calm, but has had a few fits where he has screamed in pain. No one prepared me for how much it would hurt to see my baby in pain. Stuart can't stand to leave Jack by himself when he is sick, so he has been in bed with with us each night, so we can check on him. As a result of the flu, he isn't sleeping through the night, so I am exhausted. I think we only had a couple of weeks of wellness between when the last stomach virus cleared up before he caught the flu. This picture was taken last night when he momentarily forgot he was sick....we are lucky to have such a good tempered baby! Knowing how I feel this week, I am very surprised he has been as calm as he has through this. I have lots more to catch up on, but am feeling too weak and tired to do any additional blogging tonight. Gotta rest up for LOST tomorrow night!