8 Months

Dear Cooper,


You're 8 months old today! Usually, when you turn another month older, I think "okay, yeah, it seems like he should be 5 months old." But this month? How are you eight months old?! I think that what gets me the most is that you just LOOK like you've grown so much this month. You're starting to look more like a little boy and less like my baby boy.

This month has been full of smiles, big belly laughs, and squealing (by you, not us :) ). Although we have found that our old tricks to get you to smile no longer work, we've found more ways to make you laugh even more. You most love anything that involves being in the air; you often fly like an airplane from room to room :)

You are sitting up perfectly now, and when we encourage you to crawl, you end up going backwards! You also do this thing that I call swimming, but your dad calls skydiving. You flail your arms and legs in, I assume, an effort to move. So funny :)

But, we know that you can go forward because you have done it a couple of times, when no one was looking of course! Poppa caught you in action one morning. You scooted from your playmat to the newspaper. You must really enjoy keeping up with current events.

You still love to stand with our help. I ordered a walker for you last week, and I can't wait for it to come in, I think you'll love it. You also love to play with cell phones and remote controls. We got you your own remote because you kept changing the channel with ours :)

This month you graduated from the infant bathtub on top of the counter to the yellow ducky in the tub! You have so much fun splashing around in there!

You also started "knocking" this month, and that is hilarious :) You knock on everything, including your dad and me. Whenever you do it, I say "knock knock" and you burst into giggles.

You still love to try new foods, and there's nothing that you won't eat. You eat a breakfast of fruit and oatmeal, lunch of a veggie and rice, and usually something with meat for dinner. You also get 3 bottles a day. Sometimes you try to hold your bottle, but that usually ends up in a mess. Sometimes I make food for you, and other times I don't. It just depends. I make regular stuff like apples and pears often. Mostly I like buying it because you get much more of a variety than you would if I made it. I love all of the concoctions like "hawaiian smoothie" and chicken noodles that I really don't have time to create at home :) You're a pro at eating puffs now, which is so funny. You used to drop them all the time, so now any time you get in your highchair, the dogs circle the whole time you're in there, just hoping you'll start dropping food again! You're also learning to learn how to drink from a sippy cup. You LOVE to attempt it :) For the most part, you just chew on the spout.

You've been babbling for a couple of months. This months you've really been saying "dah dah dah dah", so I've been trying to get you to say Dada. Never in a million years did I think I'd be trying to get you to say that before Mama! You also say "ah dooo" and something that sounds like" hiiieeeee" a lot. We have lots of conversations :)

I'm not sure if you're teething or not. Of course, I've thought that you were teething since you were about 4 months old, so what do I know. But, you drool like crazy, and you always have to have something to chew on.

You still go to bed around 5:30-6, and you have been waking up around FOUR AM!! Why?! I am not a fan, but you are always so bright eyed and bushy tailed when I come to tell you to go back to sleep. (uh, yeah, that never works, by the way) You let us know you're awake by taking your pacifier and knocking it on the crib, haha. And you talk, or sometimes squeal..loudly! You've been waking up several times a night again for your pacifier, but it's usually between your bedtime and ours thankfully. You still take 3 naps a day for a total of about 3 hours. You usually sleep on your tummy, but lately, I've found you sleeping on your side more often. We briefly attempted to push back your bedtime, but that just wasn't working, so we gave up on that.

Best of all, you love to get kisses and you still let me cuddle with you pretty often :) You are so sweet and I just love it!

I love you with ALL my heart!

Mama