The first month of 2010 is half over and not much has changed in baby development. He is still crawling with his elbows, and some people say that it might be because our floor isn’t carpeted at all so it’s easy for him to slip if he went on his hands and knees. I have no idea. Lately, he’s also been propping himself up on various things, getting on his hands and knees to see around places. And when I’m on the floor with him, he’ll leave everything he’s doing to crawl up to me and climb up on me. I love that.
Too much crawling, though, has caused us to invest in a Superyard XT. We have it separating the computer area in the office with the play area. Despite the fact that the computer area is a mere few square feet of the room and he has a ton of room to play, he obviously wants to be where he doesn’t belong. Yesterday, I gave him the opportunity to roam around on the wrong side of the gate and he started eating styrofoam. Oops.
We’ve had two play dates with other babies so far. In both, David in his antisocial self wasn’t really aware of his surroundings, which makes a whole lot of sense given that he’s not yet 8 months old — but he doesn’t realize that other babies make noise too. During the first play date, any unexpected movement would cause David to cry. He was better during the second one but he did cry a bit when the second friend made a noise. It’s actually super cute, but I don’t think the other parents realize how lucky we are to have such a good behaved boy! To them, all hell breaks loose when other people come over.
In other news, we had to pull the monitor off the side of the crib. He kept banging the crib to make the monitor fall inside, and once in, he wrapped it around himself twice. This naughty baby obviously doesn’t realize that he is scaring his mother half to death.
While I’ve confined him to a schedule, I’m only starting to get used to his cues and he’s starting to really adhere to it rather well. He goes to bed a little after 10pm, wakes up around 8:30 and plays in his crib until I get him at 10. I change him, feed him, and give him time to play with his toys until 11:30-12 when he gets a bit fussy. At that point, I put him down for a nap and he’s usually very good lately. (He used to hate it when we left the room. Only in the last 2 weeks or so did he understand that he can self-soothe. It’s such a liberating feeling!) He sleeps until 2-3:30 and that’s when I feed him again. More playtime follows, and then he gets a smaller nap. Then it’s dinner, playtime or mommy time, daddy time (when he gets home from work), bathtime, and then it’s the real last dinner. And he’s usually quite good after we leave after storytime, which is new but I don’t want to lose it! He’s such a good kid.
Another thing I’ve noticed lately is that he’s taken a liking to pillows. Whereas up until I was four years old (which is something I actually remember), I would push away every single pillow thrown at me and sleep on my mattress, this little one LOVES raising his head on something. It can be a burp cloth folded up, a blanket, or his little bunny bear (it’s a teddy bear with a bunny ears hood). I just checked on him and he’s sleeping on his bunny bear.
Tonight might have marked a new milestone. He might be saying his first word! Right now, it’s “mamamamamamamamama” and he also goes “bababababababa.” I have no idea if this is a one-off thing of I should expect more of this, but I like it.
My umbilical hernia surgery is in less than two weeks, and I worry that I may not be able to lift him for awhile, but I’m probably not going to let that get to me. We’ll see. I love this little guy and want to do whatever I can with him while he’s this little!