Birthdays, Blue Eyes and Sleep

I have been trying to start planning Blake's 1st birthday party so I could get a bunch of it done before school starts up. So far the hardest part was figuring out where to have it. October is just to iffy for the weather to have it outside. But we found a place that should work. Now I just need to get the decorations and food figured out which is the fun and easy part. The not so easy part, deciding what to get him for a gift. There are so many toys I want him to have and it's really hard to narrow it down to just the very best. Thankfully we have plenty of time.

Blake isn't likely to have blue eyes for much longer. Sometimes they still look blue but they mostly look green or brown now. Although I never thought he would have blue eyes it's still said that they are changing. I liked his blue eyes but I am sure they will look good however they end up.

No one in this house is getting any sleep. Not even the dog. He can barely drag himself out of bed to go to the bathroom in the mornings. We (stupidly) tried changing Blake's formula to a regular formula which failed, and bad. So that and some more teeth have really been making him sleep poorly. We probably shouldn't have taken away his pacifier because he would really still like to have it back but hopefully one day he will learn to sleep better without it.

I haven't been able to sleep it either, which really sucks when you are woken up by a baby still. I don't know what to do to fix it but I sure hope I figure something out because I am really tired.



Trying out his big boy car seat.

First Haircut

Strawberries

Today we went strawberry picking. It was a lot of fun and a lot of work. Plus it was hot. We were able to pick 14 lbs. though which we are going to have turned into jam. Blake was really good considering it was during his normal nap time. He sat on some straw between the rows and played with a couple of his toys (and tried to sneak some grass to eat too).

Blake his been crawling and pulling up like crazy. He is a fantastic army crawler and just about has the regular hand and knees crawling down. He would probably know how to do that better but he spends the majority of his time pulling himself up onto any furniture he can find. He really likes the coffee table at the house where I work. Tonight he was crawling so much before bed his knees were very red. I also had to move him up to 12 month pajamas.

Having him so close to walking and wearing bigger clothes plus seeing some other babies turning one makes me really sad that he is almost one. Thinking about it makes me all sad and a little anxious, but I have NO idea why. I can't wait for him to be a toddler. So he will grow out of some of these baby things that have been so hard to deal with. All the naps, the fussiness, crying all the time, the bottles, waking up at night; I know it doesn't all go away the day he turns one but it will be a lot less (I hope). I am already trying to think about what we will do for his first birthday. October is such a weird month to plan something for. There is no way of knowing what the weather will be like so we will have to plan something indoors which kind of sucks. Either way our little baby is much of a baby anymore.

Baby Food

Baby food, especially organic baby food is pretty expensive considering what it is. I know I should probably just feed him more table food but he wouldn't get as much variety that way. So we tried to make our own baby food. It took us about two hours and made a huge mess.

All the produce we used to make the food.


Carrots from the Farmer's Market. We also used organic carrots from the grocery store.

All chopped up.

In the steamer.

The carrots after we blended them. We left both kinds of carrots plain.

Yellow Squash

I think we added rice to some of the squash, we made so much I don't really remember though.

Leeks and potatoes that we add peas to later on.

We also made broccoli and rice, acorn sqaush apples and rice and blueberries (although Ryan dropped half of the blueberries all over the kitchen floor).

Everything all done and freezing.

I don't know that we will be making baby food again. It didn't save us any money in fact we probably spent the same as if we had bought this pre-made and it took us a lot more time. There is also less variety and its a pain. I have to remember to defrost what ever I want to use, which I haven't remembered to do yet this week. He has eaten the jars that I didn't freeze and I will say I tried them and they aren't very good. He didn't like one of them AT ALL, it was either the leeks and potatoes or the squash but I wasn't sure which one it was because the all look about the same. He didn't like the broccoli that much but he didn't fight eating it.

I have given him a lot more table food lately. He LOVES puffs, he tried some mild cheese and tomatoes this week and seemed to like both. Tonight he had pasta in tomato sauce with beef and enjoyed it. It was really funny watching him chew up all the little noodles. He is much of a fan of yogurt which is to bad. He doesn't like to take his formula that much anymore so I like to give him yogurt for the calories and protein. Hopefully it will grow on him, however I can't blame him organic yogurt has a really weird consistency which seems to determine if he likes something more than the taste of it.

I think if someone has plenty of time I would recommend making baby food but if you don't, like us, I don't think it's worth the effort.

8 Months!

Blake is 8 months old today! He has changed so much in the last month. He has 4 new teeth with more still coming. He loves to sit and reach for things. He has been working on crawling for the past week or so. He can army crawl and he gets up on his hands and knees a lot, he still chooses to roll a lot of places though. He loves to chew on EVERYTHING! Especially furniture, dirty tables and highchairs at restaurants, people's shoes or feet so mostly gross things. Which means he is already starting to learn the word no. He really enjoys playing with his toys now and will do so by himself which I think is a major accomplishment, he is not one for alone play. He loves his 3 friends at work and enjoys playing with them. He loves to be outside and he loves to play with George or any other dogs we come across. He is starting to try and ween himself from formula and loves to eat anything we give him that he can feed himself. He has gotten to be a lot of fun and both Ryan and I are having fun watching him grow and change.

Unfortunately he can't sleep that great and cries a lot when he is put down. It has been very hard for me to deal with but we keep trying and hopefully sleeping will continue to improve.

Blah

I have been trying to think of something interesting to write about for almost two weeks now. Still haven't thought of anything... All we have been doing is trying to keep the house together, going to work, and taking care of baby. He has been getting more and more mobile every day. Last week he started crawling and will do it now and again. He is starting to army crawl more regularly but most of the time he just rolls to get what he wants or sits and cries until someone gets it for him. He has also started showing an interest in pulling himself up on furniture but usually he doesn't get far because he would rather chew on whatever he is by. He also started clapping and loves to do it, but apparently only for me. If anyone else tries to get him to he looks at them like they are crazy. Too bad though its pretty cute when he does it.

We also have moved him up to stage 3 foods. I know that doesn't mean much but I try to thicken his food and he gets lots of finger foods to try. He is doing better getting things in his mouth and really enjoys eating different foods. He is also apparently trying to ween himself off the bottle. He refuses to eat more then 4 oz most of the time and is phasing he is middle of the night feeding out. This has been good because then no one (well Ryan) has to get up with him and the less he eats the less he throws up, but he isn't getting the recommended amount of formula. I am trying not to be too concerned right now because he eats his solids well but it would be nice if he would eat a bit more.

Brat Fest