Happy 10 months old little Caleb-baby. We loved celebrating Christmas with you this month and have enjoyed all the goodness you bring to our lives. That gummy smile of yours never fails to melt the grumpiest of hearts, you're solidly keeping your spot as everyone's favorite little person.
Official Stats:
Weight - 20 lbs 8.5 oz (54%)
Length - 29.4 in ((71%)
Head Circ. - 46.5 cm (79%)
Stats: 3 month diapers. One (sharp) little tooth on the bottom middle-left. Size 12-18 month clothes. As his stats state, he's lonnggg (and he's got a big head) but he's not super chubby. Except, he kind of feels that way, considering that Austin was 20 lbs at his 2 year birthday! But really, 54% is a great place to be.
(He had the worst reaction to his immunization shots and it's been so sad. He fevered for over three days with a runny nose that got into his throat and made him cough. Nothing bad enough to call the doctor about - but it's been so sad, especially because this is his first time really being sick. I guess I can't complain because he's been so healthy - but it's been sad!)
Things to remember:
-He's starting to crawl! He can't get up on his hands and knees yet, but he's figured out that he can use his arms to pull himself along. He started out slow, in fact - the first place that he ever really crawled was when I put him on my parents counter when we were there to help get ready for Christmas and he was able to pull himself along the slick surface to get to something that he wanted. I got it on video - so I'm excited to put that into his one year birthday video. It's especially fun because the first time I ever crawled was on my Grandma and Grandpa Walker's kitchen table. My dad told me that, and we all thought that it was great that Caleb and I both learned the crawl the same way. After that, he slowly figured out how to army crawl on the ground - usually not going very far. But at this point, he can get anywhere he wants - and relatively quickly. He's starting to push up onto his toes so his body is in a push-up/plank position and you can tell he'll be crawling on his hands and knees soon - he just has to build up enough muscle to move himself around.
-With the crawling, he's also started to roll more again. For a while he all but stopped rolling altogether, but now he's a little mover and he's rolling quite a bit more. He still thumps his legs both when he's sitting up, and when he's laying down. He's so powerful at thumping his legs that the force of it frequently moves him backwards.
(He's my little Primary Friend, hanging out with me at church - luckily he still stays right in our little corner without venturing too far.)
-He's not quite strong enough to pull himself up on things, and hasn't figured out how to cruise around furniture yet - but he wants to stand up. If you go to set him on the floor, he'll keep his legs out straight and refuses to bend to sit. So we will prop him up by giving him something to stand up with and he's usually pretty happy about that (until he gets tired and doesn't know how to get down without falling backwards.)
-He's an inquisitive little guy. Favorite pasttimes? Pulling out the wipes from the package and sticking his arms as far as he can under the couch to pull out stray pieces of popcorn/paper/marbles/crayons to put into his mouth. (ugh - now that he's officially crawling and putting everything in his mouth I'm realizing how much we need to re-baby-proof our house). At Christmastime, he pulled a whole roll of Christmas paper out and crunched and played with it for a significant amount of time. (It had water damage, so we weren't going to use it and we let him play with it. He was thrilled.)
-He's started making some word sounds. Still only says "ma ma ma ma ma" when he's really sad, but if you ask him something he'll say "Yeah." Depending on what you're asking it sounds more like "yeh" or "uh" or "yah", but you can tell that it means yes. It's my favorite.
-Christmas was just the best with him. He was so happy with all the paper and music and excitement. I think between nine and ten months old is a pretty perfect time for a baby's first Christmas. Obviously he's way too young to understand anything, but he was old enough to enjoy it!
-He has a lot of admirerers, and although he's happy to sit/explore by himself - he usually has someone nearby trying to hang out with him. (He's lucky to have so many people that love him.) And he likes people, too. If you are sitting on the floor, on the other side of the room from him, he'll crawl over and try to crawl on top of your legs/lap, usually trying to get at whatever it is that you're playing with. Playing Candy Land with the bigger kids has gotten exponentially more difficult, because he will stop at nothing to get at the game pieces/board.
We sure just love him a lot.
-He's good at hanging out during our bedtime routine. In fact, he's started going to bed earlier than he was before and it's been so nice. We do Scripture-Song-Prayer together in the big-kid's room. Then at seven, Austin goes into his bed, Lydia goes into the other room to do some "journal coloring" and book reading, and I put Caleb down to bed. Then I come back to finish checking on the kids, and finishing the bedtime routine - but it's so nice that he's going to bed earlier because we are just starting David's busy season schedule and so I'm starting to do bedtime by myself most nights.
-He goes to bed at seven, wakes up when we are going to bed (he has a sixth sense of when I'm just about ready to get into my bed, doesn't matter what time it is), usually wakes up once or twice in the night, then I usually fall asleep in the chair with him about six or so until 7:30. It's not the best situation in the world, but I feel like he's old enough to start sleeping better so we're doing a bit of sleep training and that seems to be helping. He usually naps twice a day (morning and afternoon) and sometimes takes a short 30-45 minute nap around 5. One day he had woken up from his nap but I was still working on something and so I thought I'd just let him hang out in his bed for a minute, the kids asked if they could go in to him and I said yes - but a few minutes later I heard loud noises from the monitor and saw all three of them in his crib together. It was so sweet! Lydia was reading to him and Austin was talking to him. (I finally went up when Austin started climbing on the side of the crib and jumping back down over Calebs body. *sigh*
-He's started scruching up his face, especially when he's not thrilled about something. It makes me laugh, so he usually starts smiling after he does it because he's reacting to my laugh (he's a social laugher like Lydia and will laugh if people around him are laughing). But when he's upset about something, he scrunches his face up and looks like the grumpiest baby in the world. It's kind of hilarious.
-He's a champ to go wherever we go, and even though he's big, he does wonderfully in the baby carrier. He doesn't really sleep in it, but he's content to just hang out and watch whats going on wherever we are. #babycarryingforthewin
-He's such a great eater. I say this all the time, but it's true. It's amazing the food that he is good at eating with only one little tooth. His favorites this month: oatmeal (cooked just a little longer so it's not so wet and he can feed it to himself), frozen bananas, cooked carrots, rice & corn Chex. He doesn't like oranges much, but makes the best funny face when you squeeze some of the juice in his mouth. He's also started throwing food that he doesn't want over the edge. Not just scooting it off the edge, but grabbing it, and throwing it to the floor with force. Also, he won't eat food that you try to put in his mouth without him looking at it thoroughly. He has to inspect it and evaluate whether or not he wants it then he'll usually take it from you and put it in his mouth - and only occasionally will he allow you to put it in his mouth for him.
-We went swimming, and again he made basically no noise the entire time. I held him while we were swimming in the deep end (and went around the lazy river about a thousand time), and he just watched everything and everyone. When we spent some time in the shallow end, he was pretty happy to splash the water with his hands!
-He likes bathtime more and more - and he's even more stable than he was before so I like it too. He is entranced by the water coming out of the spout, then spends his time splashing and throwing toys.
Oh my sweet Caleb. Words can't even express how much we love you.
Happy 10 months Baby-C.
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