Friday, November 25, 2011

Happy, grabby, toothy boy







A couple of weeks ago now we went out and picked out our Christmas tree with Levi. He looooooves to be outside and enjoyed trekking through the fields of evergreens until we found our perfectly-sized blue spruce.

Levi can move in one full circle. He can also sometimes accidentally scoot backwards, though then he ends up under things sometimes - ottoman, bouncy seat, etc.

Even though he can't move, he has the uncanny ability to both focus and somehow stretch out longer to reach whatever it is he's trying for. He rarely gets impatient - he'll just keep reaching and reaching. Maybe he has inspector gadget arms, because he usually can get his toy after awhile :)

An of course, when he gets his toy, its a party down in here. happy laughing, screeching, and of course, chewing in celebration.

Speaking of chewing, this boy has entered the realms of teething. The first two teeth popped out with no problems other than increased drooling. Now? Most nights he's up at least once, inconsolable, tylenol, orajel, nothing works - even touching his gums to give him medicine makes him scream. Oy.

I should say that he's still very happy at times other than between 2 and 6 a.m. Even when he's rubbing his ears (from pain in his jaw) or a little whingy, we can usually make him smile and he'll chat and play nicely.

Levi is very grabby. We're trying to teach him to be gentle, particularly when touching people's faces or hair. It's impressive to see how he can manipulate objects - he can find his pacifier and put it in his mouth the right way (that was a long time coming!) and he can figure out the best parts of a toy to chew on or how to make things spin or light up.





Saturday, November 12, 2011

Swedish Pea Monster



We may have taught Levi to laugh like Ernie.

We used to laugh at him like Ernie when he was teeny tiny, because we thought it was funny. Now he does it all the time, particularly when he's pleased with himself.

Which is most of the time. I know every parent thinks their baby is the best baby, but this kid is so easy going. We had a two-hour photo shoot today for his six-month photos, and he was good right down until the last ten minutes. Even I was more cranky than he was after two hours of traipsing through the woods, posing, trying to make him laugh, etc.

Levi now has two teeth - and hasn't bitten either of us yet, which is great. He does like to chew on everything, of course. We might have let him try to eat a leaf today during the photo shoot. He particularly likes to chew on crackly things :)

He does, however, like to grab things. If it's a toy or object, it's great learning of motor skills. If it's our faces, oh man. Particularly because I'm not so great at keeping his nails short, every morning here's how it goes:

Levi eating while laying down next to mommy

Licking the sweet potato lid to the last drop
Levi stops eating, mommy dozing.

Levi reaches out to touch mommy's face.

Suddenly, Levi's fist closes on her nose/check/chin/eye socket/neck. Instant yell from mommy. scratch on her face for up to one week. Depending on the day, Levi either giggles or cries when mommy yells.

Ah well. We're working on understanding the meaning of the word "gentle."



Levi had his first green vegetable today - peas. It's one of the few vegetables Tim and I both dislike :) He's already made it past the "could be an allergy" for rice cereal, sweet potatoes, squash and carrots. The squash was the worst/funniest face along the way, probably partly because it was the first one he tried after the rice cereal and I tried to trick him by putting the spoonful in right after he'd swallowed one of cereal. He was a champ and has eaten everything we've given him, though he's still not the biggest fan of the squash :)

Speaking of vegetables, Tim has decided that even though Levi is very cute and cuddly, calling him "Sweet Pea" isn't manly enough, so instead he calls him some variant, such as "Sweet Little Pea-Man," "Sweetest of the Pea Folk," or - most commonly - "Swedish Pea Monster."