Sorry for the lack of updates - I am sure you all are have been as busy as I have been with the holidays. Jake has been plauged with another bad episode of coughing and wheezing and sneezing and a seriously runny nose. Poor baby. I've got to find a way to get him out of that stupid daycare. I still have not found a good local situation. Jake was a mess on friday - I thought his medicine was helping, but it made him seriously constipated. He was extremely clingy and was in a lot of pain. Lots of crying, lots of straining, and lots of hard yucky diapers. I felt so bad for him.
So we had some cool milestones lately - Jake has learned how to clap and loves to do it. But it's funny because he sometimes claps when he is mad and crying! I had him on the changing table and he was crying his little heart out, but still clapping. Poor thing!
He also learned how to go from laying down to sitting up, and from sitting up to laying down. He goes back and forth all the time. He crawls around in this funny combination of rolling, sitting, laying back down, doing a military crawl, rolling some more, then getting up on his knees and hands (belly off the floor), and then sliding back down on his belly. Very funny to watch, but he gets around very quickly, making us scramble to try to get our house in some form of baby-proofed. He still refuses to use his legs. He doesn't want to stand, and doesn't even like to try to use his legs to bounce himself in the Jumperoo. I think if he realized he could make himself jump he'd love it. We've tried to show him how to do it, but he doesn't quite get it so far.
He is still refusing to take baby food from a spoon, but he will take anything I give him in a bottle. He's also eating Wagon Wheels - and by eating them, I mean he licks them, bites them, chews on them, mashed them around in his mouth, and then either spits them out or gags on them. I think he may have an over-active gag reflex. I took it as a good sign the other day that he wanted to eat some food directly from my fingers. usually, he wants to be the only one putting food in his mouth - whether that be a bottle, wagon wheels, fruity puffs or whatever. He doesn't trust anyone putting anything in his mouth. But he leaned over yesterday, eager to eat a fruity puff from my fingers! I was thrilled! Covered with slobber...but thrilled.
He also has gotten a bad case of seperation anxiety. If I so much as leave the room to grab his bottle, he is hysterical. It's a little trying at the moment... but I know he is just doing it because he loves us.
He is still SUCH a great boy out in public. We had him out with us Christmas shopping last week - he was sick, had gotten up early, we kept him out late, he hadn't eaten in hours, had a wet diaper - and he was STILL a perfect angel for hours and hours while we shopped. He's amazing. He just loves to people watch and to look around, and he is sooooo well behaved in public. He lasted an entire three hours in a very nice restaurant last night while we had the Valentine annual family holiday dinner. He was such a good boy - no whining, no crying, no complaining - nothing! We are so lucky that we can bring such a young baby out to a fancy restaurant and be confident that he will not cause a scene.
Okay, I've chatted your ear off... I am sure you have tons of presents to wrap, shopping to do, trees to trim, cookies to bake, and cards to send. Thanks (as always) for reading - look forward to the Christmas card picture outtakes coming soon!!!
