Teeth

Carter's 6 teeth.  Such a big boy!

8 Months

    

Carter turned 8 months old last Wednesday. Here's what he's up to:

He has 6 teeth, we think the 7th might be coming in soon.

He gets around by pivoting and rolling.

He's becoming very social.  He's constantly smiling and laughing (that is when he's not around new people).  It is SO cute and SO much fun.

When we are walking up the stairs to our apartment he loves looking back at the person behind him.  I think he is going to enjoy a good game of chase when he gets older.

He is eating solids three times a day and has a hard time eating chunkier food.

He goes to sleep no problem for bed time.  He just needs his burp cloth.

He loves a good game of peek-a-bo.

He'll give us kisses, if we kiss his mouth he'll coo and open his mouth and try to stick his tongue in ours. It's so funny.

He's getting more cuddly.  Every once and awhile he'll lean in and give a hug.

He LOVES to bounce, whether it's someone holding him or he's in the standing position, he loves it.

The helmet is coming along, he went from being 1.1 cm off to 6 mm in 4 weeks.  Not bad.  His skin irritations are going down too.  He still hates to have it put on and taken off and gives himself a little head message when it's taken off (it breaks my heart).

Carter keeps getting more and more fun.  We love this boy so much!

Cupid Shot Me in the Buttocks

Kristy Carter was a friend of a friend less than four years ago.  A beautiful girl with the cutest, funnest, sweetest personality (sprinkled with spunk, of course - my favorite spice), but a girl I'd never have known without a little Cupid.

But Cupid must have used his most powerful love potion on me, because after he put us together the first time, I spent almost every day with her until now.  She was charming and gorgeous.  She was kind and sweet and dedicated to God.  She was a little spunky and knew what she liked - no pushover.  She was intelligent and driven.  She still is all those things.  Thanks, Cupid.

So now it's Valentine's day.  Cupid's day.  I am alone in an apartment sitting on a black leather couch.  It's a little too cold in here.  Don't worry, though.  It's not what it seems.  This morning I opened the sweetest note from my wifey, including music, pictures, and animation.  In fact, I'm wondering if Cupid has reapplied some shots of love because I cannot believe that almost 4 years after the first date my love is deeper, sweeter, sincerer, and fuller.  So thanks, Cupid, I guess... for shooting me in the buttocks.

I love you Kris.  Will you stay my valentine forever? :)

Dalan

Until We Meet Again

Today I found out that my dear Grandma Carter passed away.  Finding out that a loved one has passed on has reminded me of what life is all about.  I know that she is with my Grandpa and many other loved ones now. I will miss her very much.  My Dad reminded me of the Christmas stocking that she hand stitched for Carter last Christmas and how special it was. It was similar to the one she made for me.  It will be a special reminder each Christmas of the many fond memories of family gatherings, cousin sleepovers and many other special times. Thank you for your love and example, Grandma.  You always were striving to do God's will.  I love you.

The Works

We decided that we want to start exploring more.  For our first exploration we decided to take advantage of the library's free museum tickets (you can check out two free museum tickets from our library each week, cool huh?).  We picked up tickets to The Works, where kids explore how things work, I pictured the science museum in Salt Lake City.  We hoped they would have the address on the ticket receipt so that we could plug the address into our smart phones GPS. We wish we had smart phones ...and so do our parents, because whenever we need to look something up and aren't at home we call them. The address wasn't on the tickets, nor could we find it on our GPS ...so we called my Dad and asked him to look it up on his smart phone for us (thanks Dad).  That address led us to some elementary school in Edina, and not wanting to bug my Dad again we called Dalan's Mom and asked her to look it up for us (thanks Ann). we're the biggest smoochers.

It ended up being in Bloomington ...funny that I would choose the museum farthest from where we live. 

It also ended up being a little different than I had imagined.  It was less of a museum and more of a room filled with exhibits where kids could explore to learn how things work ...just like the title said, imagine that.  It was pretty cool though.  And if we had kids that were elementary school age it would have been even cooler!  The lady at the entrance looked at us a little funny as we entered with our free passes and an infant, "No lady, we don't have anything better to do."  Dalan was the BEST person to go to something like this with.  He makes everything fun.  He had to play with every exhibit.  It turned out to be a fun family exploration after all.  

I think we'll have to take our Dad's next time they come and visit us in Minnesota, this is perfect for the engineer minded.  The whole time I was thinking how much fun my Dad would have had playing with Dalan.  

 This exhibit would take a picture of your face and let you manipulate the picture.  I think my Mom has an ap that does this on her iPad.  Like Carter's face warp?

 This was my favorite face warp of our whole family.

 Dal's face warp.

 My face warp.

A giant etch a sketch. Did you know an etch a sketch works with pulleys? Who knew?!  

7 Months

I can't believe that my son has been alive for over half a year!

On January 15th, Carter turned 7 months old.  It's crazy how fast babies learn to do things.  I feel like new developments happen overnight.

On Tuesday, January 17th, I took Carter to the doctors because he has been acting fussy and crying during feedings and not acting like himself.  Turns out he had another tooth coming in!  He weighed 23 lbs. and 8 oz.

Here's what Carter's up to at 7 months:

- Rolling from front to back regularly.

- Pivoting

- 5 Teeth - two on the bottom middle, two on the top middle and a new one to the left of the top middle teeth.

- Eating a tiny bit of solids after nursing for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  He especially loves the Gerber mixed vegetables and an apples and banana's mix that I made.

-He thinks his Dad is the funniest person alive.

-  He is easily distracted when he eats.  He'll cry or look around if any noise is made at all, and he doesn't like Dalan or me to talk while he eats.

- He is getting very opinionated; he'll cry if we take something he likes away, or sometimes he'll cry if he can't see me.  A few days ago he started showing signs of stranger anxiety: he burst out into tears twice on Monday after being passed off to a friend.

- He'll roll into the wall and cry about getting stuck.

- He sleeps about 10 hours at night.

- He loves to chew on a wet baby rag.

- His bed time routine is to be put in his pj's, then his sleep sack, then held and sung a primary song (Our usual four songs are: I am a Child of God, Teach Me To Walk in the Light, Families Can Be Together Forever or I Love to See the Temple) to and then put in his bed and given his burp rag.  Then we kiss him on the head and go out of the room.

- He's not super interested in other babies, but (usually) loves any adult that will give him attention.

-He LOVES it when Dalan and I laugh.  If we laugh at something he get's a grin on his face and then will start up doing whatever he was doing before.  Sometimes he'll even laugh with us. -- a little clown just like his Daddy.

-He hates being dressed, having his bib put on him, putting the car seat straps on him, and having lotion put on him.

- He'll fuss when we put him down for a nap, but after he's in his sleep sack and with his burp cloth he snuggles right down.

-  He loves his pacifier, but not only to suck on.  He likes to chew on it and take it out and then try put it in different ways and chew on it.  When I give it to him and he's really upset he'll suck on it, then take it out and cry, then stick it back in, then take it out and cry some more.

- He's just starting to recognize people on skype and look at them when they talk.

- He loves to bounce, whether with someone holding him or in his exersaucer.

He just keeps getting more and more fun. :)  I'm so excited for him to crawl! ...I know I'm a crazy new parent.  Our doctor said that it might take him a little while because he's so big. Haha.

Helmet

Yep.  We did it. We got a helmet.

Are we happy with our decision?  We are still trying to decide.  Am I going to accept and own our decision? Yes.

We got it on January 13.  I cried the first day we put it on, and I haven't even wanted to talk about it to the internet world.  .... that's all I'm going to say, so please, only encouraging comments if you have any. :)

But here he is helmet and all.  He's so cute that he can even make a dorky helmet adorable.