Walking???

I think we are getting mighty close to having a walker!!! Last week I mentioned that James was taking 1-2 steps at a time before collapsing into our arms. Well, starting last night he increased those steps to 5-10 at a time before falling over. He is even stopping on occassion to rebalance himself before taking a few more steps. The problem comes when James gets so excited that he falls over!!! And he is so excited when he is walking and when he is done, he squeals and squeals in delight! Now... the bad part... I worked today, I work tomorrow, I am at a conference in San Jose on Friday and Saturday, and I work on Sunday. I had a little discussion last night with him about only walking when Mommy is around to see him. According to Desiree (the daycare provider), he listened today but I don't know how well the next 4 days will go. But it is just so exciting to see him take steps and see how excited he gets!!!!!!!! We are loving it!!!!!!

James is also talking up a storm! He talked for about 5 minutes straight in the car on the way home tonight but, as soon as I called G-ma-ma for him to talk to, he stopped immediately! Silly boy!

Another cute story tonight... after giving him his bottle, I decided to read him a farm book where he can pet the animals. He actually sat there and listened while I read the whole book TWICE! Then I put it down and said it was bedtime, he started whining and pointing at the book. So, I gave in and read it one more time before putting it down again and going to bed. It was wonderful to see him enjoy a book so much and sit still for me to read an entire book 3 times! He is growing up so fast!

Well, I guess that is about all for now... off to cook some meals for the rest of the week and for a friend with a new baby. Hope you all have a wonderful evening!!!

Jet Blue

We just got a $46 Jet Blue credit that is fully exchangeable and must be used in the next year. If anyone is going to be flying Jet Blue in the next year and wants to help us out, we would love to exchange the $46 credit for a $46 check with anyone! Thanks!!!!!

Having so much fun...

We are having so much fun!!! James is feeling better, Mommy is feeling better, but Daddy still has another day or two before he feels better. Hopefully the weekend will allow him some extra rest and the opportunity to get healthy too!!! Even with all the sickos, we are having so much fun! Here are some cute pictures from the past few days...

We have initiated a little snack time mid-afternoon which usually includes some cheerios and some milk or diluted juice in his sippy cup. For some reason, I think the floor is a good place for this activity and the tile floor is much easier to clean than the carpet. This day James was learning how to pull Cheerios out of a snack trap lid. It usually results in some still falling out but it is so darn cute to watch.

Enjoying snack time... The next day we had snack time without the lid. It was the funniest thing ever to watch. James had me laughing out loud!!!! He put one hand in the container and pulled out a full handful of Cheerios and tried to shove them in his mouth which resulted in a few in his mouth, a few on the floor, and about 6 still in his hand. He then reached into the container with his other hand and pulled out another handful. (I think you can say he was "double fisting it!") As soon as there were only 2-3 Cheerios left in his hand, he would again reach into the container and pull out another full handful! You would think that I starve the kid, but trust me, he eats!!! And it's so cute to watch!!! He also knows what he wants to eat. When we are eating in the high chair, he will point to what he wants on the table. He is getting so big so fast!

The entry table has this cool platform to crawl across.

And off the end...

And back the other way...

Still going...

Ummm... let's go back...

Stretching is in order first...

Mommy: "James, don't pull that out. Let go please."

James: "Watch me!"

LOVE this picture!

Cruising around with his cool dump truck full of toys from G-ma-ma and Grandpa Craig.

Examining some of the toys...

"Do you want the ball Mommy?"

The magnets on the fridge are the coolest!

This new kneeling position is quite popular!

"Hey, what are you doing over there? I want the camera!"

"Look what I have!" James loves to throw his toys, then go get them, throw them again, and continue to chase after them. (By the way, those are 18 month pajamas!!!! Can you believe it?)

Here I come...

He's just so cute!!!

Okay, off to bed for me but I just had to share our cute little boy with everyone. We are having so much fun with him and enjoying watching him grow so much. What these pictures don't capture is what a little chattermouth he is becoming. He loves to talk, talk, talk! No idea where he got that from!!! Hope you all have a great weekend!

Belly Morph

Sarah, this picture is for you. Sarah and I were talking the other day about babies kicking and being able to see it from the outside. This particular evening James decided to morph my stomach into this crazy shape then stay there long enough for Josh to get the camera and take a picture. This was at 37 weeks. His butt is the thing at the top and his head is right above my pants... in position and ready to come out. I swear he was trying to bust out the sides the last few weeks before he actually found the correct way out!

Skype

We Skype'd for the first time today and had so much fun! Great Grandma Whichard mentioned Skype the other day and I thought that would be a perfect way for our family who is far away to get to "see" James a little more often. So, we Skype'd with Great Grandma and Great Grandpa this afternoon and with Uncle Bruce (way out in the Atlantic Ocean). It was great fun to get to see our family and our family to get to see us!

Onto the sicko front, James is feeling much, much better! He only had a few "snot rockets" today compared with the few every hour yesterday and the day before. His fever is also gone and some of his appetite has returned. Though he continues to be fussier than usual and still a little congested, we are on our way to having our healthy little boy back. And as far as the nap refusal and the fussiness is concerned, I am beginning to think that some of it may be "Big Boy Opinions" in addition to the not feeling well. We'll have to see how it goes...

Now onto something more fun! Cute pictures from the last week or so...

James and Mommy were both wearing orange on Monday because Auntie Michellie was coming and that's her favorite color. We got a matching picture of us before Mommy had to go to work.

Aren't we cute???

James has decided recently that the trash can belongs in front of the dishwasher instead of it's current location. He has moved it here several times only to find out that it is mysteriously moved back when he isn't looking!

Here is James walking with the exercise ball.

It's also great fun to crawl around the house while pushing the exercise ball with your head! Who would have known!

James the organizer! The bottom drawer was empty (= no fun!) so he had to try the next drawer up!

This drawer has tons of cool stuff in it to take out!

Mommy stopped the emptying of the drawers so James moved onto the filing cabinets.

A cool calendar to look through!

Let's check out the third drawer...

Nevermind, this other one was better.

This was so cute tonight... James was crawling around the house pushing his fire truck.

Uh-oh! It got pushed right under the barstool!

That's okay, there are other things to play with. James pulled the towels down and I think he is trying to put them back here.

They won't stay!

I'll try again! (I'll let you know that it still didn't work so he just left them there and went onto the next toy. Thanks for the effort though little guy!)

Here is James playing some baseball!

Our new stroller is the coolest thing to push around the room.

A little background first on this one... James decided that naps were NOT necessary yesterday. So he slept for 15 minutes in the stroller in the morning and 30 minutes in the stroller in the afternoon. That equals three hours of walking for Mommy, a tired Mommy because of no breaks, and a fussy baby. Thankfully James decided today that Baby Einstein was pretty cool. He sat in his chair for 15 minutes watching Baby Einstein so Mommy could get dinner started. Thank you James!!!

James riding his horsey that Great Grandpa Whichard made for Grandpa Craig many years ago! So much fun!!!!

A few other fun things... James is starting to understand us much better in the past few days. We have been telling him for about 4 months now that he may not play in the doggy bowls. This usually resulted in James looking at us before proceeding to the bowls or no reaction what so ever. Well, guess what... yesterday and today he actually stopped!!! He does hear!!!

The cutest thing ever yesterday... we were getting ready for our walk so I had one of his bottles with a cap on it in the stroller. He pulled the bottle out and tried to drink out of it (but couldn't of course because of the cap). I reach out my hand and told him to give it to me so I could take the cap off. He handed me the bottle, I took the cap off, and gave it back to him so he could have some. When he was done he put the bottle back in the stroller and tried to put the cap back on. He needed some help of course but it was so cute to see him try and see him make the connection that the cap goes over the nipple. Amazing!!!!

He is also starting to take official steps!!!!! Once yesterday and twice today he took 2-4 steps without holding on to get from one place to another! It is so cute and so much fun!!! I think we still have a few more weeks until he is "walking" but it's fun to see him take a few steps on his own!

Off to Cold Stone for some ice cream!!!! Yum-yum!

Baseball, Basketball, or Football???

That is the question... which sport will James play? He has decided to begin training for all of them so maybe he will play all three (they are all different seasons after all)!
Baseball... James has a cool baseball toy with a little orange bat that you use to hit a ball that spins around a tee (thanks to Cion sharing of course!) Well, that bat is one of the coolest things (after the exercise ball of course) and James loves to crawl around the house holding his baseball bat. The only danger is if he lets go of it, Captain will often steal it to chew on. Oops!
Now, on to basketball... James has decided that he prefers the diapers in his diaper holder on the side of the crib to go in the dirty clothes hamper instead. Tonight he stood at the dirty clothes hamper pulling the diapers out and putting them in the hamper. Luckily I have retrieved most of them but I am anxiously awaiting the day I pull the laundry out to find a nicely washed and dried disposable diaper! Doesn't that sounds just lovely? James also helps with the laundry on multiple levels... I walked in his room the other day after his nap to find him alone in his crib with no blanket. I looked all over the room for his blanket before I finally found it in the hamper... I guess James wanted a new blanket for the next nap! James also does a great job of standing at the dryer and tossing the wet clothes in the dryer (unfortunately, many also come out!) and he does a great job of closing the dryer door (with a little help), and holding it closed while I turn the dryer on!
Football... Josh is most excited about this one of course... James has begun his lineman training in Josh's opinion. James will find anything to push across the room, including any walking toy, the exercise ball, his music table, his zebra walking toy with another kid sitting on it, the highchair, and, as of tonight, the trash can! So much fun!!!
Now, a not as much fun update, James got sent home from daycare for the first time today... he had a fever and did not feel well. James has not been feeling well for the past few days, I think he has a cold complete with coughing, sneezing, runny nose, fever, and overall fussiness. So, today he got to enjoy a ride home with Mommy at lunch then spend the afternoon with Daddy at home while Mommy went back to work. Tomorrow Mommy gets to stay home with the little man while Daddy goes to work. (Side note... Yeah Daddy for taking the first home sick day with the little guy.) So, how do we get James feeling better... lots of fluids and rest is usually the ticket. Fluids we can do, rest... that's kind of difficult to get James to sit still. Our friend Jen wonderfully suggested and let us borrow a Baby Einstein video. Great idea for most babies; unfortunately, as Josh says, "those videos don't work for James." James would glance up at it every so often before cruising off to the next place. At least he must be feeling pretty good to still be crawling all over the place. Tomorrow we will have to employ the "strap him down" method of going for a drive or a walk so he has no choice but to sit still and chill out! (The silver lining to James being sick... Mommy gets to stay home and spend time with James tomorrow!!!!!)
Time for me to go do a little playing with the new cake decorating techniques I learned this week and hopefully get to bed early. Cross your fingers for us that James gets better soon! Love to all!!

Steps???

Josh and I are doing what most new parents do and what most experienced parents say we are going to regret... trying to get James to walk! James can get up and cruise around quite well at this point. If you hold onto his hands or if he is holding onto a walker, he can walk to the mailbox and back. He can also let go with both hands and stand for a few seconds (though this doesn't usually last long because he doesn't stay still very long!) He has also recently discovered the exercise ball (which lives under the ping pong table so it takes some adventure to find) which is just about the coolest thing ever invented!!! He loves to stand with the ball and use it as a walker to walk across the room. This is quite a challenge and so much fun to watch because the ball is not very stable at all but James has gotten quite skilled at it. That's when we got mean... James would stand by himself so we would move the ball a foot or two away from him and he would take 2-4 steps without holding onto anything to try to get the ball. Then collapse onto the ball! It was so cute to watch and we even got a few steps on the video camera! I don't reallly count these as his first real steps but....

Today at daycare, James stood up by pulling on my pants then let go and stood next to me. I took a large step back to allow him to stand by himself and he took two steps over to me... and fell down! It was so cute to see him take 2 steps on his own again! He even did it one more time when we got home tonight!!!

Experienced mommies tell me that I should be pushing him over and holding him down because once he is walking, he will be running, and I will constantly be trying to catch up with him. But, it's so darn cute and so wonderful that I just can't do that! Please remind me of all this in a month or two when I am complaining about everything that he is getting into and that he is moving non-stop!

Okay, off to bed for me. I am a little on the tired side and could use some sleep considering that I didn't go to bed until 11:30 last night and James was up crying at 4:45 this morning because he is sick/teething. (I never really know until the teeth appear or don't appear!) Love to all!!!