Liam is 32 Weeks

Liam goes through different phases where one week he's fairly quiet and another week he is more 'talkative'.  Well this week was one of his 'talkative' weeks, and probably the loudest and most vocal we have heard from him so far.  It's most pronounced when he's excited, he will just scream and blabber on, as if he's telling a story about something that happened that day.  He has taken a liking to our dogs too, and he will stare at them and just start giggling.  His two new foods that he tried this week were butternut squash and peaches.  We also gave him some apple juice in a sippy cup...great pucker for that one!  He also got two new toys, a toy piano and a toy cell phone.  He has been doing new sounds and movements with his mouth too.  One new one we noticed in the last couple days was he started clicking with his tongue. The other impressive move we noticed today was he was able to get his toe into his mouth!!  He has also started to reach his arms up to us when we go to pick him up.  It is such a subtle thing, but it is so sweet and endearing.  We just are constantly amazed at what this little person can do!

Liam Laughing
http://www.vimeo.com/1369864

"We LOVE LOVE LOVE this video of Liam laughing. It was taken on 7-6-08, one day before he turned 7 months."

Liam is 31 Weeks

We have been pretty lucky lately with Liam, he had another happy week.  It seems we have finally got a routine down.  It varies a little each day, but generally speaking he has been pretty easy going.  His sitting is improving more and more.  I would not say it's quite 100%, but fairly close.  He is not crawling yet, which is OK with us because we are not in any hurry for that one!  He does scoot on his tummy though, and rolls like a champion now.  He started doing this clapping thing last week, it's not quite clapping hands together, but rather up and down, almost like rolling them.  He continues to teethe, but still no teeth poking through yet.  He tried 3 new foods this week, first one was carrots, he really liked those, second was apples, and the third was pees.  He seems to like the vegetables a little more since they aren't as tart.  He has been doing this really cute thing lately, he likes to blow raspberries on our shoulder or arm, and sometimes our face.  It's pretty funny.  It seems like we waited so long for him to start laughing, and now he laughs and smiles a ton!  It doesn't take much to get him to be happy, even when he's upset we can usually coax a laugh out of him. Although we have noticed that he gets bored pretty easy, and we constantly have to find ways to entertain him.  We look at him each and every day and feel so grateful to have him.  ( I know I say that all the time, but it's so true!)

Liam is 30 Weeks

Liam had another pretty good week this week.  Early in the week we went to visit some friends who were having a brunch at their home, and he was really cute with all the new people.  The older kids were playing in a wading pool and Mike put his feet in the pool, he wasn't too happy about that, might have been too cold for him.  For a couple of nights we had him in his own crib during the night, although it's pretty rough in the middle of the night to go up and down the stairs, so we are taking that one with baby steps.  One of the questions for his evaluation for the doctor last week, it asked if your baby can pick up small items like a cheerio, we tested it out, and we were amazed at how meticulous he was picking it up with his thumb and pointer finger!  He tried a couple new foods this week.  The first was banana flavored rice cereal, which he seems to like better than the plain flavor.  The second was mashed banana baby food, which he made the funniest faces with the new tastes.  He has been sitting so well this week too, each day it seems he gets better and better at it.  And now that he has discovered that he is mobile he is always on the move.  He rarely likes to lay down anymore except to drink his bottle.  He just loves to roll all over the place, and with help he likes to stand and jump!  He has also been more sensitive to sounds around us, and if he gets startled he will look to us for reassurance and comfort.  He also has started to cry when we leave him in his crib for a nap, he has outgrown the wrap, and he doesn't want his binky any more either which makes nap time a bit difficult at times.  Thankfully though he usually will settle down after about five minutes.  On Thursday we had a professional photographer come over and take pictures of him.  She said he was such a good model baby and did some positions that were hard to get other babies to do-we were proud parents for sure!  He wasn't shy at all with her or our good friend Heidi who came to visit us from Seattle.  She played peek-a-boo with him, and made him laugh a ton!  He was really cute!

29 Weeks

Liam has been a pretty happy baby this week.  He's at the age now that he wants to be entertained, or he gets bored.  One day I needed to get some work done around the house, so I put the Jungle Book in and he enjoyed watching it (well most of it anyway).  We have been getting him some new toys to help entertain him, and teach him new motor skills.  He really likes the cookie jar toy that has different shapes, and sings about the different shapes and numbers.  He now remembers he can roll in both directions, and will now do several in a row to get to where he wants to be.  He can lift his mid-section off the floor with his legs, so we think he will be crawling fairly soon!  He tried 2 new foods this week, the first was sweet potatoes, and he really liked those.  The second one was pears, and he wasn't too fond of that one, he gaged and made funny faces.  We'll keep trying on that one!  He smiles and laughs all the time now, especially when we sing to him or make funny faces or sounds.  He had his 6 month check up today and he is a big boy at 18 lbs. 6 oz. which makes him just above the 50th percentile for weight, he's 27.5 inches (about 75th percentile), and his head is in the 76 percentile!  Dr. says he's doing great, and luckily so far has only seen him on on his well-baby check ups!  Liam has opened our hearts in ways we never knew imaginable, and we are grateful every day to have him as our son.

Liam at 6 month wellness check-up http://www.vimeo.com/1273426 "This was taken 6-27-08 while Liam is waiting for the Dr. He just weighed in at 18 lbs. 6 oz. (up exactly 12 lbs. from his birth weight). He found the paper to be a fun new toy!"

Liam is 28 Weeks

Liam's new thing this week has been grabbing both his feet with his hands and holding them in the air.  Sadly, he had a really bad night early in the week, part of it was from teething, and part of it was he was really hungry.  We decided we need to be more consistent with feeding him food in the evening.  One night we were able to catch him at just the right time, and he ate ALL his food, and slept fairly well that night...then one night he was too full still from his bottle, and only ate a little.  It's a work in progress, but hopefully we can get into a routine soon.  He has decided that he really likes to sleep on his belly now, and usually doesn't cry anymore when he rolls over.  He's starting to sit fairly well too, although if he sees something, he will fall over. It won't be long till he's sitting unassisted!  We have noticed recently that he has lost interest in his binky, which seems somewhat early for a baby, but we are fine with it if he is. We decided that we'd like to teach him a little sign language and have started with the sign for 'milk', 'mom', 'dad' and 'doggy'.  We just want to start with a few until he starts to catch on, which can take a couple months.  When we show him the signs, we can tell he's really thinking about it.  We are excited for when he starts to sign back to us, it will sure make figuring out what he wants so much easier!  Anyway, other than the teething, this week has been fairly good for him...he just gets cuter and cuter every week!

Liam is 27 Weeks

Liam has been a lot more social and more interested in things around him and will try to reach for stuff that is beyond his reach.  If he can’t get it, he lets us know that he’s not happy about it.  He has also been more vocal, and has started to communicate with screaming lately.  He rolls onto his tummy a lot, and sometimes he’s happy about that, but sometimes he gets mad about it, but he still doesn’t remember that he can roll himself back.  This new development presents a problem when he’s trying to sleep and rolls over and decides he really didn’t want to be on his belly.  He will cry and we will roll him back, then he will roll again onto his belly.  Thankfully he has found a comfortable sleeping position on his belly and will sleep that way sometimes.  We started giving him rice cereal a couple weeks ago, and have been practicing eating a few times a week.  It has been a bit tricky to know when is a good time for him to want to eat.  He has to be in the right mood, and just the right amount of hungry. If he’s too hungry, he will get frustrated and won’t eat, if he’s not hungry enough he won’t eat.  The dogs also create a distraction for him because they mill around waiting for him to drop some food.  It seems like they are more interesting to him than eating.  Although, we know with time and practice, and a little patience it will get easier.  And we look forward to introducing him to all the new foods out there!  On Saturday we went to our sis-in-law’s family’s house and took pictures with their photography equipment.  He was really cute and held up surprisingly well considering the amount of time it took.  We got them done just in time before his teeth started hurting him again today.  It just breaks our heart to hear him in pain.  We would do anything to take that pain away for him!

Happy 6 Months Liam!

It is so amazing to us that Liam is already 6 months old today! We started to feed him rice cereal a week ago, but we had to hold him in our lap because we hadn't bought a high chair yet. Before he was born I had seen some fancy (and spendy) Swedish ones online that I was pretty sure that I wanted, but since our dining space was pretty limited we were not sure we wanted a full size highchair. After seeing the Fisher-Price booster seat that Liam's cousin has, and also a friend of mine has, we really were liking the idea of having one that was small, portable, and inexpensive. So for Liam's half birthday we got him his very own booster seat. When we put him in it, his face lit up at the new experience of sitting up in a chair. We fed him his rice cereal, and he ate it pretty well. We also tried giving him an empty sippy cup to see what he would do, and he grabbed it and brought it straight to his mouth to drink from. We love watching him grow and change and experience new things. He is such an amazing and wonderful baby, and we feel so lucky to have him in our lives. We love you Liam! Happy 6 months, and many many more!