Week 49 - Can you say NUM??

Week 49 - Can you say NUM??

(7/20/08 - 7/26/08)

Well it is official, all of the comments that people told me over the past few months while I was worried about Jake not crawling were true. He went from taking two wobbly steps a little over a week ago to down right "booking it" within 4 days (which everyone told me would happen). So he is now all over the house, trying to climb the steps and is officially frustrating because now he doesn't want to sit at home, in the stroller, or shopping cart AT ALL!!! He wants to try out his new found skills of crawling even if in the middle of the grocery store!!! As a matter of fact he crawled all of the the local Staples last night because we finally realized that his crying was more disturbing to the other customers than him crawling around the store would be. Don't worry it was an extremely clean floor!

The one cool thing he is doing right now is letting me know when he is hungry. The past few months whenever Paul or I would feed him finger foods we would say "YUM". Jake has now decided that he is going to say YUM too, although his comes out as NUMMMM! So now if he wants some cheerios he will point to the container of cheerios and say NUUUUMMMMM really really loudly! It is really cute, he even the other day said NUM while pulling on my shirt to be fed....that one I find hillarious, cause I can picture it now being in the middle of church or something and Jake pulling on my shirt wanting to breastfeed and having everyone in the church look at me while he says NUM NUM NUM NUM!! Sometimes when he is really hungry he repeats it until you feed him which could be 20+ times if you have to walk any distance to get the NUMs!

Paul took a few days off this week so we researched local attractions that we could take Jake too, we found that there is a petting zoo about 40 minutes from our house (which is alot closer than the hour and 10 minutes the D.C. National Zoo would be. We went and Jake had a great time!! He got to see sheep, deer, zebras, camels, monkeys, parrots, horses, many many many more animals. We got to feed the camels and the sheep. Jake just absolutely LOVES animals (as I am sure most children do) so it was a great family outing!!! We will definintly go back every summer while Jake is growing up!

We are thinking about getting Jake a dog for his birthday (Ok Ok Paul and I would like a dog too, and are using his birthday as an excuse) but seriously Jake LOVES dogs, and even barks when he sees a dog since he can't say doggy yet!!! I just don't know what kind to get, we want something that is small but not too small, doesn't shed, and is good around kids........any suggestions???

Week 48 - We are mobile! Slow but mobile!!!

Week 48 - We are mobile! Slow but mobile!

(7/13/08 - 7/19/08)


First let me say that Jake is 11 months old today! Yeah! According to Super Hero Birthday Boy we are 30 Days, 14 Hours, and 56 Minutes away from his First Birthday!!!

So this week came with A LOT of new things that Jake decided to do. I guess he wanted to cram as many things as he could in before he was 11 months. Obviously from the video he is crawling now. Don't get me wrong though, he isn't going to win any races, and he is still semi crawling. He will crawl about 4-5 feet then stop, then crawl another couple feet then stop. And he still occasionally straightens his legs and falls down to his belly, but he is pretty good at getting back into a crawling position now so I give it another week and he will be racing all over the house. It took him a little over a month to go from the "rocking onto his knees" phase to actually crawling, but he got there eventually just like I thought and everyone had been telling me.

The same day he started crawling we had another big surprise. Jake started getting up again in the middle of the night (only once though) which is better than I was getting, but not as good as a few all night sleepers that he had last week. This particular night in question he woke up around 11pm and when I went in to get him he was sitting straight up in bed. He hasn't been able to get himself into a sitting position from lying down before (he would get close but not quite) and he hasn't done it since, but I have a feeling our lives are about to change dramatically!

Jacob also started drinking out of a straw this week. Being a 100% breastfed baby Jake has never had to learn how to drink out of a bottle or sippy or anything else for that matter. I of course have tried to get him to drink out of all of those, but it always ended up with him chewing on the bottle/sippy or playing with them. I am teaching a class in a week and I realized that I had to have some sort of liquid nourishment for Jake while I was gone 5 hours a day for a week. So I thought I would try a straw cup from the store (kinda like a sippy but a straw instead). Well he loves it, and immediately started drinking out of it. So now I feel a little better being away......it is going to be my first time away from him for any significant amount of time so I am scared!!

Well I am off to get Jake, he is pulling on a lamp cord!! OH GREAT!!! I am totally NOT going to love the whole crawling thing!!! (hehehehehehehe)

Week 47 - Finally .......ZZZZZZZZZZ....... Sleep

Week 47 - Finally.......ZZZZZZZZZZZZ....... Sleep!

(7/6/08 - 7/12/08)

This week has been pretty good, we don't have Jake back on the perfect sleep schedule yet, but it is better then it has been for the past two months. As anyone who reads this blog knows, Jake started getting teeth 2 1/2 months ago and now has 8 teeth. So pretty much once a week for about 2 months he got a new tooth. These past two weeks have been pretty good with no new teeth popping out in the near future (Can anyone say JINX!).

Back before Jake started teething we had him on a great schedule, he was asleep by 8:00-8:30PM and wouldn't wake up all night until he would get up to start the day around 7:00AM. When the teething started it could range from a bedtime at 7:00, 8:00, 8:30, who knows!!! Then the nightly feedings and/or crying could range from once a night to 5-6 times a night. My worst night these past 2 1/2 months being a few weeks ago when he woke up every two hours like a newborn.

He isn't on a great schedule right now, but it will do. He has been staying up until around 9:00-9:30, and then sleeping through the night until around 7:00-7:30AM.

I think the late bedtime is stemming from the fact that he used to take two 1-1 1/2 hour naps during the day and for the past week he has stretched his first nap of the day to between 2 - 2 1/2 hours. Then his second nap has been coming later in the day inevitably pushing back his bedtime at night.

I don't want to complain, at least I am getting a full nights sleep again, but darn I hope he either learns to skip the second nap or starts going to bed sooner. The hubby and I don't have any time to just hang out and chill before we have to go to bed, I would love at least an hour where I can veg in front of the TV or computer without having to worry about staying up to late, or whether I am going to get enough sleep.

Oh well, I will take what I can get, and right now I am getting 7-8 hours of sleep again!!!

Week 46 - Jake wants you!

Week 46 - Jake wants you!

(6/29/08 - 7/5/08)


Well this week was pretty uneventful. We did pretty much the same old thing every day this week. There were lots of close calls on the crawling, lots and lots and lots of standing (it is his new favorite thing to do), we visited friends, swam in the pool and got some decent nights sleep.

The best and most important thing that happened this week was the Corcoran Family 4th of July Celebration. Paul's family is very big (he is one of 9 kids) and Jake is the 32nd grandchild. Some of the family is still out in California but Paul, his parents, 1 sister, and three brothers are out here on the east coast. The festivities started last night with a downpour around 3:30. Jake was sleeping so it didn't really matter. Paul and I got all packed up and headed on our way around 4:30. It pretty much rained until around 7:00. But in between we had some periods where it was nice enough to come out of hiding from inside or under the tents. There were about 100+ people there including family and friends, so I had A LOT of babysitters last night. And of course if you are under the age of 20 and a girl, Jacob just thinks you are the best thing since sliced bread and will let you wisk him away with absolutely no protests. Luckily I had many neices in attendance that allowed Paul and I to hang out and have conversations with all of the over 20 crowd that wasn't hanging all over Jake!

We also celebrated another cool event last night. My nephews' 16th birthday. YEP, he was born on the 4th of July. He had a blast and even though he won't admit it, really loved the attention!

We pushed the envelope and decided to see if Jake would like fireworks. We kept him up until 9:30 because fireworks were going to start at 9:15, as predicted he cried like crazy partially because of the noise and partially because he had been up since 4:00pm without a nap. We got into the car and watched two more fireworks from there because you couldn't hear anything. Jake did seem to enjoy that, so hopefully by next year we can stay and watch some more!

I also need to mention that the shorts that Jake is wearing in the picture up top were his God Father Jimmy's shorts when he was Jake's age. They have been passed down through his family and are now with me and Jake! Pretty cool!