We Have a...

TOOTH! OMG. I so did not expect this to happen so early. Things grow and change so fast in the first year for sure.

It’s not like he’s ready to bite or chew on food just yet, but for the last week I’ve been swearing to Andy that I can see a white mound around his bottom front tooth. Like something is trying to push through, though I was not exactly sure what it would look like and what to look for! Then yesterday, 4 days before Andrew turns 5 months old, Andy yelled to me while I was in the kitchen that he felt something in there. So I came and had Andrew chew my finger too and low and behold, it hurt! He can bite hard anyway but this was like a needle poking me. I gave him some frozen things to chew on and he gnawed away at those. Then later on in his tub I checked it out. The tub is the best place because he can be distracted enough to let me hold his bottom lip down while looking in there from the top as he lays on my lap and he won’t try and cover it with his tongue. It still takes several tries but both Andy and I got to see it. It’s like a little clear piece of plastic pushing between his gum tissue. Oh and we got so excited!!

Sure part of me is sad that my baby is growing up so fast but the biggest part of me is thrilled! Think of how cute his smiling baby pictures will be with that little tooth! And who knows maybe he’ll get the one next to it next and then he’ll have a little cabbage patch smile.

His dexterity is also improving greatly. He reaches with his hands and grabs things so much better. He still likes his Kick and Play in his bouncy and his play gym and what he does now is hold his hand out to the toys and seem to examine his hand along with them, kind of spinning it and looking at it while it is touching the toys. I have also caught him using his pincers a couple of times! This is huge to show readiness for food. I have a feeling that he will surely be ready by six months.

He is already trying to sit up. I have him exercising his torso muscles regularly. When he tries to pull himself up to sitting like when he is done nursing, I don’t just immediately sit him up, I let him work at it for a bit. Then, I just kind of help his to sit himself up. He can also sit on his own for several moments now. But he doesn’t seem to understand that that is what he is doing. Like he just falls forward to reach for something! Too cute of course!

To prepare him for meal times, we are trying to get him used to sitting with us at the table for dinner. He does it in restaurants fairly well if our timing is right and he isn’t too tired. But now at home we have his bumbo in a chair at our dining room table and we will all be eating our dinner there together. I think I have finally worked out the best time to cook supper around here to get it before he starts getting too sleepy and needs his bath and bed time.

His toes are finally making it into his mouth! Not always, he is still turning his hand on those and putting his fingers in his mouth first, though he doesn’t do that with familiar toys only new things. So it is just a matter of time before his toes will be a constant in his mouth like his fingers I am sure! He started by grabbing his socks and pulling those nearly off to get them to his mouth, and now he does it barefoot too.

Speaking of baby feet… I still call him monkey feet. From the moment he was born he was gripping with his toes and now instead of decreasing that behavior, he has gotten better at it! He grabs at toys with his feet and holds them between his feet with a grip so tight, I can lift him up and carry him to another room and set him down without him dropping said toy. His hands still get flailed around some and he likes to bang things with them so toys are more often dropped.

Still rolling from tummy to back only though I put him on his back a lot more now too to try and encourager the other. And he is reaching around and getting to his side and very close to that roll. I am not looking forward to him rolling around here on the floor here. With four cats it is impossible to keep the cat hair off the floor and I do not want him to help me clean it up by rolling it onto all of his clothes. I do however accept this as an inevitability and know there is not much I can do except to try and clean the floor more often! Which I am sure seeing him roll on it will motivate me to do every single day!

Speaking of cats, he loves them! They do not quite know what to think of him still. My old cat Raven is about to get kicked out the house for being loud and obnoxious but that’s nothing new, and he is the one who likes to rub up on everybody for petting, baby included! He’ll take his rubbing anywhere he can get it. Andrew hasn’t quite mastered petting yet though and does a lot of banging and grabbing handfuls of fur and just cat back. It is so funny! We’ve gotten some of these encounters on video so we will post them someday. I have a couple of small videos I’d like to get up soon also. We’re working on it.

I love all the new things Andrew does but of course I have a few favorites. Mostly, he has recently started cuddling with me at night. When he’s on his back, he’ll pull his feet up and let them fall over onto me and leave them there. He also scoots his head over to be next to me, right up against or using me almost as a pillow. If he’s on his tummy, he likes to lift his head up and put it over onto me or up next to me. It is so awesome to wake in the morning to a couple of baby feet on your belly! What a great way to start a day let me tell you!