Rodriguez Family Ramblings: August 2010

Sunday, August 29, 2010

7 Months

7 freaking months old. Absolutely not possible that I have a 7 month old. Jake is growing and changing and doing more everyday. He has a fabulous little (big) personality and loves to laugh. But he also knows what he wants and is not shy about telling you what he wants! His biggest wants right now, any small electronic gadget in his sight (remotes, timers, phones, etc) and any food we are eating that he is not eating. He will throw a fit if he can't get what he wants or we take it away or we don't give him something to eat while we are eating. And by fit I mean screaming and arching his back doesn't want anything to do with us fit, but only until we give him what he wants. He might be slightly spoiled.

So what else is going on at 7 months:

Eating lots of finger foods, at dinner we typically give him his purees then some of whatever we are eating, he also loves saltine crackers
Definitely gets up on all fours but won't crawl like that, as soon as he wants to move he flops onto his belly
The army crawl is super fast and today he started exploring places other than the living room
He has started reaching for Josh and I when he wants to be picked up
Goes from sitting up to his belly, by choice and without just flopping over
Pulls up from a sitting position to his knees, and with help can get to his feet
Chases Cosmo and thinks Cosmo barking is hilarious
Starting to show preferences for toys
Takes baths in the big bathtub (a necessity after he decided that he needed to dive out of the ducky bath tub a few times)
He has mostly settled into taking two naps a day, once in a while he will still take 3 if his morning nap is short

And our 7 month old:

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Randomness

Not too much new is going on here. Just adjusting to a new schedule with Josh back at work. Jake starts at daycare on Monday. I am still not a huge fan of doing daycare, but I feel really comfortable with this lady watching Jake. I have no doubt that he will be well taken care of there. Jake is working on eating finger foods, but he hasn't yet figured out that he needs to pick up the food himself, he either tries to eat it right off his tray or wants me or Josh to feed it to him. He has gotten much quicker at scooting around the living room and is getting up on his hands and knees more often.

Jake, my mom, and I went on a little shopping spree last weekend for fall clothes for Jake. While we were shopping at Gap we had a few of the employees tell us that we should enter Jake in the GapKids model search they do every year. Of course we think he is the most adorable baby ever and has a great personality, but it was fun to have other people tell us the same thing. We will probably send in his picture and see if anything good comes of that. Jake also got a ton of fall/winter clothes that I can't wait for him to wear! They are so adorable! They had a ton of cute onesies that we wanted to get for him, but Gap onesies run short and that doesn't work for Jake so we passed on those. Sometime this fall we are going to have to find Jake some shoes. He has only worn shoes 3 or 4 times in his life, so I am not sure how that is going to go.

That's all that is going on here so here is a video and pictures of our not so little baby boy.

Hanging out outside when the "cold" front came through

Cosmo is SOOOO funny

Trying to crawl off the blanket

Up on all fours, now he just needs to figure out how to move like that!

Ready for the Cowboys game

Happy baby!

Sunday, August 15, 2010

New Foods and Back to School

Jake has been working on expanding his soild food repertoire in the past week or so. We have now officially (as we fed them to him for a "meal" and he was given a whole serving) tried, carrots, avocado, sweet potatoes, peaches, and green beans. So far the fruits were a success and the veggies mostly a fail. Unofficially, Jake has tried turkey, chicken, saltine crackers, strawberries, and yogurt. He has done great with all of those, he likes eating what we eat.

Jake has also gotten much quicker at his army crawling. As in, we can put him down in the middle of the living room and he can get over to the hardwoods in less than a minute. He actually got stuck under a chair the other day while trying to get to a toy that he kept pushing further away every time he got close to it. Of course I took pictures before helping him get out (he didn't know he was stuck so he was just happily playing). Also in new Jake news, he is no longer being swaddled to sleep. He now goes to sleep with his blankie and paci (and some nursing or rocking). He kind of decided he was done with the swaddling about 3ish weeks ago when he just wouldn't sleep swaddled so we just gave him his blanket and rocked him and he liked that much better.

Josh is headed back to work tomorrow. He says it snuck up on him. I am pretty sure he enjoyed being home with Jake and having the opportunity to spend so much time with him. And I sure enjoyed him getting up with Jake on the occasion he got up in the middle of the night and wouldn't go back to sleep! I am really grateful to have such a wonderful husband that wants to spend time with his son and truly enjoys taking care of him. Anytime he goes somewhere with Jake he puts him in the baby Bjorn instead of putting him in the cart or stroller and does things around the house while wearing him. I know that Jake is going to miss having daddy home all the time.

So with Josh going back to school we had to make a decision on childcare for Jake. We really wanted someone coming to our house like we had in the spring but we were unable to find someone willing to do part time and we aren't in a position to pay more than we were offering so we had a tough decision to make. We decided that we would explore our other options and we began looking at home daycares. We had a heck of a time finding people that had openings (we discovered that open spots are few and far between in home daycares) and that were willing to take a child part time. We finally found a few and went and interviewed them. The first one made me terrified to leave Jake in any home daycare and I was trying to figure out how we could swing me staying home. Then we interviewed the next one. Just talking to her on the phone made me feel like I could keep working! She was so engaging and wanted to about us and was very willing to share about herself. She was willing to take Jake part time which was huge. So we went and interviewed her and she was just as wonderful in person and was ready with references and willing to answer all of our questions AND willing to use cloth diapers, which we had been concerned about. So after talking with her for an hour Josh and I had both independently decided that we wanted to go with her, but told her we would call her and let her know after we talked. As soon as we got out of her house we talked and before we got Jake in the car had decided that we would call her references and as long as those confirmed what we felt then we would go with her. Josh called the references the next day and I called her on Saturday to let her know that Jake would be joining her. The only problem, the opening isn't until August 30th. So we scrambled to find some friends to help us out for two weeks. It is times like this that I wish we lived close to family. I have a bazillion cousins that I know would be willing to help if we lived near them! But we know that Jake will be well taken care of while we work and that is all that matters.

I think I will wrap up this post with some pictures.