6, and now 7, Months

I totally missed my 6 month blog, as Declan was 7 months this past Saturday. Oh well! You've read the tooth blog, you've seen the crawling video, what else is there? Food! Milestones! And stats from his 6 month appt.


Food:

We have officially started real solid foods! My first attempt at making baby food did NOT go well at all! I wanted to try out peas first, thinking they would be easy. We couldn't find fresh peas at Ralphs, so we went with frozen peas. The recipe I have for making baby food is from "What to Expect the First Year", so it's pretty generic, which is fine for me! It said to boil about an inch of water and simmer 1 cup of peas in a steamer basket for 7-10 min, then puree for younger babies and wala...you have baby food! My hang ups: should I have thawed the peas first? How many cups are in this bag? 3?! Are the peas steamed enough? How much water or breastmilk should I use to puree with? Is it completely blended? Let's just say it was NOT a good experience, and I was feeling quite out of my league making BABY FOOD! What?! But...my poor son....we tried to give him some anyway! :( I have video of it, but let me tell you about it first and you can tell me if you would want to see it! His face was REALLY cute when he first tasted it, you know that face: "eeewwww, what is this?!" Then I was "smart" and put a whole spoonful in his mouth.....to which he immediately gagged on and proceeded to throw up! I doubt he ingested any of the peas! I was really worried he wouldn't take to other foods after that, but the next day I bought a fresh sweet potato, diced it really small, steamed it with an appropriate amount of boiled water, pureed it with plenty of filtered water, added a little breastmilk for familiarity for D, and he was great! Still made the "eeww what is this" face, but he ate it! And no throwing up! I've since done carrots, and hopefully I will do green beans soon! We'll have to give peas another try someday. I also gave him oatmeal cereal the other day and he loved it....from what I can tell! :) So he gets cereal in the morning and a vegetable in the evening, and in a couple weeks we'll try fruit at lunch! I have to say, before starting solids, I was excited, but nervous about making my own baby food, thinking this was a daunting task. But it hasn't been bad at all, in fact it's pretty easy! And CHEAP!! I made about 18 servings of carrots from a $4 bag of baby carrots. That's about half the price of pre-made food. I encourage all mothers to do it! It's really not that hard, ask for help if you need it....I know I did!

Milestones:

Teeth update: Yes, TEETH! Plural! There is a second little tooth just popping up right next to his first one. He is no longer a one-tooth hillbilly! I had started calling him Cletus! :) (I apologize for offending anyone named Cletus who may be offended by being referred to as a hillbilly.......and to any hillbilly who does not like the name Cletus. :)

Just this past weekend, Declan has started pulling himself up! In fact, right now he is STANDING next to me while holding onto the coffee table and playing with a coaster. Let me make a clarification though: he's not necessarily successful at pulling himself up, I have to help him....mainly because his socks slide on the carpet and his bottom half goes under the table! But once I help him, he stands there holding on and playing! What a big boy! He can also pull himself up to his knees too, but the coffee table is too tall to enjoy from being on the knees! :) So he still hasn't mastered crawling, but standing supported is now a favorite!

The stats:

Ok, these are now almost a month old, so figure he's a little bigger than this! So he was 16 1/2 lbs, and......crap, now I can't remember his length....I think 27 1/2 in? That sounds right.... :) And his head was like 17 or something. Still about the same percentages. I thought he would be bigger, weight-wise at least, but the doc said all was great!

I definitely have pictures, but they are all on the desktop tower and unreachable at the moment. As soon as that is all set up, I WILL post pictures of our big boy!!