Ren, you are 8 months old!
At 8 months:
*Grandma Janet weighed you this past week and you were around 21.5 pounds.
*You wear size 3 diapers, and they're not snug at all yet.
*We're moving into 12 month size clothes. Some 9 month stuff fits you still. I bought you a 12 month size outfit at Target and had to exchange it for an 18 month size because you were just too long. Tall and thin, with chunky thighs. :)
*You continue to be so happy all the time. You just smile and smile at everything and everyone. If you are hungry, you get upset. Especially when I start making motions to feed you, then you start all-out crying sometimes. As soon as you're fed, you're back to our happy boy.
*You have started becoming more aware. When I'm around, you're whinier because I think you just want me to eat and hold you all the time. You will sometimes reach out to Daddy and I when we go to pick you up. You get sad when you're left alone for very long.
*You sleep from 8-8:30pm til 7 or 8am. You had been waking up consistently just twice a night, but lately it's been a little more rough. We had one night this week where you had me up 7 times. The next night was 5 times. And you didn't need to eat each time, you just wanted to be awake. I still nursed you almost every time because that's the only thing that would relax you enough to go back to sleep.
*You've been rolling over for awhile, but you've just begun to roll over in bed. You've always been a tummy sleeper, but lately I've been finding you on your back when you wake up at night. I think that's part of what's waking you up...the new-found discovery of laying on your back in your bed.
*I just put the crib bumpers in your bed today because since you're now rolling/moving around more in there, I've found you a couple times with a hand or leg through the crib slats.
*You nap mid-morning (the time depends on how early you wake up) for anywhere from 30 minutes to 1.5 hours. Then you take an afternoon nap around 1:30pm. That nap is still frustrating because you always wake up after 30-45 minutes and want to nurse, but then you go right back to sleep for sometimes up to 2 more hours. If you wake up early from your afternoon nap, you'll also take a short evening nap. Then you go to bed between 8 and 8:30pm.
*I still just don't understand that afternoon nap because when you wake up in the middle of it, you always cry/yell out...which is
not how you wake up at any other time. When you wake in the mornings, sometimes you whimper or sometimes I just can hear you moving around. Same with nighttime wakings. You usually just whimper a bit, or do kind of a quiet cry. But that afternoon nap waking is hard, sad, or maybe even scared crying.
*You had been on a pretty consistent schedule of nursing every 3 hours. Sometimes it's still like that. But lately I feel like you've been eating less more often. And not taking a bottle as well when you're away from me. I don't know if it's part of you being more aware and realizing you prefer nursing to bottle feeding, and you prefer cuddling with momma more often, or if it's teething, or what.
*We've finally gotten you to eat a few things. You will eat broccoli, lunchmeat, cheese, puffs, chicken. I even let you try a little hummus this week that you seemed to like. But even with those, if I leave your pacifier on your high chair tray, you'll eat a few bites and then suddenly decide you're done and pop your pacifier in. There's a lot of whining that goes on while I feed you real food and I can't decide what that's about. Maybe you just still don't like eating much.
*Foods I've tried that haven't gone over well with you: sweet potatoes, fruit purees, meat purees. All seemingly good things that you just haven't liked.
*You've become a lot more interested in toys. You need to have something to entertain you when you're sitting or laying around, so we have a special basket of baby toys now.
*You're a pro at sitting now. We still put pillows around you if you're going to be sitting for awhile by yourself, but you do a really good job!
*You love love love bath time. You splash around and squeal and smile. This month, I've started letting you sit up in the bath, but we have to be really careful because you always bend all the way forward to look at your hands under the water and your face gets dangerously close to the water.
*You love to empty my makeup bag. It's hilarious how deliberate you are about it. You sit in the Bumbo on the counter and take things out one by one and chew on them then drop them and go in for another thing. You're much more interested in my makeup than any of your toys.
*You don't nap on my bed anymore. It's too light and too distracting in there. Your room is much darker and more soothing, so all of your sleeping is done in there now.
*You said "dada" all the time. I hear baba sometimes and I've heard mama maybe once or twice, but usually it's dada all day long.
*I think you recognize a lot of words, such as Mommy or Momma, Daddy or Dadda, Sutton, Diesel, hungry, sleepy, hi.
*You still are in full effect with the man-growl. You yell in your man voice all the time. It's still hilarious.
*You love to clean the hair out of my hairbrush. Sometimes I find you with fistfuls of my hair if I left the brush too close.
*You have the cutest little toes.
*You still grab our faces a lot, especially when you're tired. You love to pull at Daddy's beard.
*You just have so many cute expressions!
*You like to blow raspberries. You haven't gotten into giving kisses yet.
*You like to bury your face in my chest. Especially when someone is trying to talk to you. It's almost like a shy reaction. But then you unbury it and smile at them.
*You chew on your fingers a lot. You have gotten really good at putting your own pacifier in.
And here is our monthly comparison! You're getting so big!
