In the past month I have lost my baby and somehow gained a little man. The kid looks like he’s aged a decade in four weeks.  Gone is the cute little baby that I brought home from the hospital, in his place is a boy. A little boy.

Now I know that I’ve got a good couple of years before I will have a little boy on my hands, but he just looks so grown up these days.  It doesn’t help that he’s slowly moving out of the baby onesies and into tshirts and shorts.  He’s just growing up so quickly and I’m worried I’m missing it all.

In the past month he’s done so much.  He tried spaghetti for the first time.  He’s also become a huge fan of cheese. (Making his evil aunt proud!) He’s tried (and loved) pea and ham soup. He’s tried corn fritters (the weight watchers recipe) and loved them (and then proceed to poop corn for the next 3 days).  He’s had yoghurt – not such a fan but we’re trying again.  He continues to love eating his baby foods and putting away the bottles.  Eating is not a problem where this kid is concerned.  (Gets that from his parents!)

…are you sure I put this in my mouth?…

…how do I look?…

…I trusted you on the pasta, but this corn looks suspicious…

He’s really embraced the feeding himself when it comes to his bottle.  It’s such a brilliant development (I can feed my (hay day) pigs while he has a bottle!)  I love seeing him take command of it, although towards the end of the bottle he becomes a bit haphazard.

…are you sure this is right?…

He’s vocal so much more now.  Talks to strangers when we’re out and about. Likes to talk to Nan and Pop when he’s on Face Time. He laughs and giggles like crazy still, which we love (and I hope never stops).  He just lights up so much now when he sees us. It makes my heart melt. When HUBBY comes home from work he gets such a big welcome. It’s beautiful.

His sleeping patterns are a little more…. vocal than they’ve ever been. He’s grown out of his sleep bags so we’ve taken to putting him in his crib without one because (they’re so bloody expensive) he can roll over now, support his weight off the mattress and remove covers from his head. So I’m not sure whether it’s the move to free form sleeping or what but he’ll wake in the middle of the night crying until he either gets his pacifier back or I move him into our bed.

If I move him into our bed he’s back to sleep the minute his head hits the pillow.  But whoa mumma if I move him out of that bed queue the meltdown.  Needless to say he’s playing right to my sweet spot (I need sleep dammit!) so I’m opting for some very uncomfortable (the little tacker likes to starfish and make me sleep right on the edge of the bed) light sleeping (I don’t want to smother him by accidentally rolling on him) for an hour before it’s time to get up for the day.

…don’t let the cute fool you, he’s a bed hog…

…everyone needs a snuggle blanket…

He stood for the first time this month too (on the 3rd of February to be exact). He did it in such a way that can leave no doubt that he’s our child; he stood for cake!  I was entertaining and had put a chocolate cake on our coffee table (which is actually a blanket box) and I was sitting on the floor with him in my lap. I look up at the person I’m talking to only to look back and see that he had pulled himself up by the side of the blanket box and was standing in an effort to reach for cake. Bless!

I’m sure he’ll be crawling by the time he’s 9 months old (OMG my baby is 8 MONTHS OLD!!!).  He’s making all the right motions like he wants to be moving – there’s a lot of rocking and reaching going on.  I don’t know what I’ll do once he starts to move around of his own accord.  It’s been a whole new learning curve now that he’ll cry until you pick him up!

He has the reach of Inspector Gadget – we joke he has gecko fingers. If he wants something he’ll manage to get his hand on it even if you think there’s no way he could possible reach it. The other day he wanted my iPhone that was laying on his blanket.  He couldn’t reach it so he just pulled on the blanket until the phone was in his reach. He’s a smart one!

He had his 6 month check up (a month late) this month. He’s doing just fine (not that we were worried) and he’s weighing in at a healthy 9.5kg. His noggin on the other hand is off.the.chart! Seriously, the GP put the measurement into the computer and the dot came up outside of the graph grid. This kid has one big head (thank goodness for a C Section!).  I love his big head – it’s perfectly in proportion to the rest of him and just means there’s more places for me to kiss.

Last week we went to our first ever Wiggle and Giggle session because I’m starting to think he needs to get out in the world a bit more. It was… an experience. I can’t believe how many nursery rhymes there are now – back in my day (yes, I just played THAT card) we had 2 nursery rhymes – row row row your boat and rock-a-bye baby.  These days it’s a right smorgasbord of annoying songs and hand actions. I couldn’t keep up with it all (thank goodness we went with the veterans of the singing circles, Miles and Kate).

I’m not sure whether I can confidently say he had a good time or not, but I enjoyed being out with him (even if I did suck at singing about cold spaghetti and hot potatoes).  We’ll be going again. (I’ll just be sure to do some research before I go into song lyrics!)

I never want to forget just how lucky we are to have him in our lives. He’s just so amazing and I feel like everyday he teaches me something new about the world.  Part of me wishes I had kept better notes about his milestones (I had big plans when he was first born) but I’m just so knackered at the end of the day that if I was to try and capture it all I’d spend more time making notes and less time actually being with him – as it is I have to write these little snapshots while he’s sleeping.

It’s a totally amazing adventure this thing called parenthood. I am so totally in love with this kid it’s not funny. The past 8 months have been the greatest adventure ever and I can’t wait to have another 80 years with him. He’s my little man and I adore him.