Thirty-Eight Weeks!

Today Nick is thirty-eight weeks old! Merry Christmas to us - we gave ourselves a family :) We know this Christmas isn't a big deal to Nick, but it's a big deal to us. Our first Christmas with our own child! He's old enough to participate to a certain extent - sit up, hold presents, play with wrapping paper - but we don't expect him to actively participate. Hopefully we'll just get some cute pictures out of it! :) We put him in his special "My 1st Christmas" 'jams last night - so cute! Reindeer feet and everything :) More about last night later . . .

This week was busy! Last Saturday was the Pingle family Christmas party. It didn't start until 7 pm, which is after Nick's self-imposed bedtime of 6:30, so we went to Aunt Cindi's during the day to visit with Great Grandma Pingle and exchange presents. We headed out during Nick's usual naptime, so he napped in the car. He didn't fall asleep until we were halfway there, so to let him keep napping we stopped at Sonic to eat. He slept right through! We arrived at Aunt Cindi's house around 3 pm. Great Grandma Pingle was already there. We gave her the gift Nick bought her - a special ornament commemorating Grandma Juarez - and she gave Nick a cute personalized ornament and a turtle tambourine/washboard toy. It was so cute - he loved both and both immediately went in his mouth (well, one at a time) :) We hung out until Nick started to get fussy for bedtime - around 6 pm. Nick was very intrigued by their two dogs, Tigger and Deuce - two pretty big dogs. He hasn't been around pets very much at all, let alone two huge dogs. He wasn't scared at all! We put him on top of Tigger and took pictures, and even took a video of him fake-riding Tigger. He was laughing and smiling the whole time. At one point, he was sitting on the floor, and the dogs were walking back and forth around him - not touching him, just going by him - and he was just laughing and smiling the whole time. While he was sitting down they were about twice his height! We were shocked that he wasn't scared.

Over Friday, Saturday and Sunday Grandpa was working on Nick's playroom. He put on three coats of magnetic primer and two coats of chalkboard paint. We tested the magnetic primer - it works pretty good! It won't hold up heavy stuff, of course, but it will serve its purpose of holding up magnetic ABCs and 123s and some pictures Nick makes. We are really happy with it and so grateful that Grandpa was willing to take the time to do it for us. It would have taken us WEEKS to do, since we could only work on it while Nick was sleeping.

Sunday Melissa and Jim Madden came over for a visit and lunch. They got here around 12:30, and Nick went down for a nap around 1, so there wasn't much time to visit with him. He slept a long time - until about 3 pm. We read that between 9 and 12 months, babies will drop their morning nap - we've noticed that his morning nap is getting shorter and shorter, and his afternoon nap is getting a little earlier and much longer. When we woke up, he visited with Melissa and Jim, showed them his gymini and some other toys, and generally acted cute :) After Melissa and Jim left, Grandpa came over to do a coat of chalkboard paint. While it was drying, he sat with Nick while we ran up to Home Depot and bought the paint for the rest of the playroom. We selected Russian blue by Behr. By the time we got home, it was just about Nick's bedtime.

Monday was back to work and daycare. This week we started sending two solids, homemade cheerios and 14 ounces of milk. We quickly saw that with solids, 14 ounces of milk was too much, so by Wednesday I was only sending 12 ounces. I think more like 10 ounces will be sufficient. Nick ate sweet potatoes, bananas, avocado, and broccoli this week. He also drank some of his milk from a sippy cup instead of a bottle while at daycare. Still nursing the same amount at home. Monday Grandpa finished the chalkboard wall, and Tuesday he painted the rest of the walls. Wednesday was clean up and touch up day. And here's the finished product! We are so happy with it. The blue is the perfect shade of blue - not too masculine, not too feminine, not too young, not too bright, not too light.

Yesterday Nick was acting normally. We hung out at home pretty much all day. Grammie and Grandpa came over for lunch - unfortunately, they came over right when Nick went down for his afternoon nap, so Grammie didn't get to see him at all. Grandpa stayed longer and got to see him when he got up. They brought Nick a Christmas Eve present - two pictures to hang up in his room or his playroom. Jeff took Grandpa home, and by the time he got back, Nick had nursed, ate a solid food snack, thrown up, and was nursing again. He nursed to sleep this time, even though it was pretty early - before 6 pm. We thought maybe he was just extra-tired, so we let him sleep. But he was up within 2 hours. I nursed him back to sleep, then he was up within 2 hours. This time he was crying. This went on and on all night :( Poor guy, we don't know if it was his teeth or what, but he woke up crying several times and sometimes he wouldn't go back to sleep.

So, needless to say, this Christmas is starting out pretty roughly! We hope he has a better day and that whatever was going on last night has resolved itself. We want him to have a great 1st Christmas!

Later on we're going to Grammie and Grandpa's house. Tomorrow we're cleaning the house and shopping, getting ready for the Bradley reunion at our house on Sunday. Monday we're back to daycare and work for another short week. Thursday we're having a playdate with Nick's friend Emily, and then we're hosting a family-friendly New Year's party for all of our friends with kids. Friday we're taking Nick to his first New Year's celebration at the farm - we're a little anxious about the car ride. The other two times he's been to the farm he was much smaller so he pretty much slept the whole way. We don't think that'll happen this time :( But we'll see!

Nick is almost 9 months old, and he is busy acquiring new skills. He has mastered pulling up, and is proficient at going from his tummy to sitting up. He's working on standing on his own - he's holding on with only one hand when he pulls up now. Hard to believe he was a tiny lump just 8 months ago! Jeff and I always joke about how we thought he was so cute when he was first born, but he's way cuter now! He has so much personality and is so curious and loves doing new things. It's very exciting to see the whole world through the eyes of a baby, experiencing everything for the first time. We bought him a snowsuit, so we're hoping to take him out in a sled in February or March maybe.