8 Months!

Noah turned 8 months last week, and while I did take his picture in a timely manner, we have been quite busy so I'm still late (as usual these days) with my post. Now that I have a knock-me-on-my-butt cold from hell, I actually have some time for a couple of updates.

• Noah is still in size 3 diapers. I think he will be for quite some time.
• He wears 6/9 and 9 month clothing. Most of his 6 month stuff is too short now.
• According to our baby scale, he still weighs around 16.5 pounds. That's hard for me to believe because he feels heavier to me lately, so who knows. I guess it's possible that he's gotten longer but not caught up on the weight yet.
• Still no change in eye color. I think maybe it is what it is at this point. I don't know if it shows up in pictures, but they're an amazing hazel. Some people comment on his big blue eyes, others comment on his grey eyes. Up close, they're blue, grey, green, and brown. I thought for sure we would have brown-eyed children, so if I seem weird about documenting eye color each month, it's only because I still wonder if it will change. His eyelashes are thick and dark, like his daddy's.
• His hair continues to thicken, and maybe darken. But it's still very fine.
• He drinks 3-4 bottles a day and nurses once in the morning. All of his bottles are a mix of breastmilk and formula. One of his big milestones this month is that he FINALLY started holding his own bottle! It's been such a lifesaver for me in the mornings. It used to be that if he woke up while I was getting ready in the morning, I would have to stop everything to tend to him. Now I can plop him on the floor and hand him his bottle! And with this new skill seems to have come an increase in appetite. When I used to hold him he would get fussy and squirmy half way through the bottle. Now he chugs them down. He's drinking 6-7oz at a time, but we're thinking he'd be happier with 8-9oz.
• I feel completely lost when it comes to solids. He has about 1 jar a day, inconsistently, split between morning and evening. We're still only feeding him jarred baby food. (New foods this month include plum, banana, squash, and mango.) He's tried a hard breadstick and teething biscuits, which he LOVES, but the last time he started choking a little. Without any teeth, I just don't feel like he's ready for much else.
• Hopefully I'm not jinxing anything, but he finally is starting to sleep through the night consistently. Over Winter Break, he only had one night where he woke up before 7:00ish. Thank God for sleep!

Now the really fun stuff!

• A couple of days after turning 7 months, Noah finally decided to try sucking on his feet. There is something so cute about a little baby butt in the air and feet in the mouth. Most of the time, he only does this during diaper changes and while sitting in his high chair.
• I'm not completely sure, but I think he's been trying to kiss me. He'll open his mouth wide, and lean forward to kiss (or maybe just chew on) my face. It's a drooly, sloppy mess, and totally adorable.
• He definitely responds to his name now.
• His verbal skills have exploded. He's constantly jabbering, squealing, shrieking, fake-coughing, and laughing. It's so fun to converse with him.
• Noah is a total momma's boy these days. He has started reaching to be picked up, and if someone else is holding him and I get within reach, he tries to escape to me. And that's just fine with me, because I never get sick of holding him!
• He started moving from sitting to leaning forward and getting on to hands and knees. He has also successfully moved from hands and knees to sitting, but only once that I've witnessed.
• And the biggest milestone of all, Noah is army-crawling. Like a madman. He is quite proficient at it and can move surprisingly quickly. The biggest motivators are remote controls, iPhones, and dog toys/bones. He also crawls on hands and knees, but this is still an emerging skill. He can only make it a few scoots of the knee before his legs give out.

Another observation that doesn't seem like a bullet point is how detail oriented this kid is. My mother-in-law joked that we should have named him Hoover because as he crawls around the floor, he notices the tiniest pieces of lint and dirt and zeroes in on them. He can occupy himself for 10 minutes just pushing around a speck of dried-up leaf on the carpet. When playing with toys, he becomes entranced with little details on them. He has been known to spin the same part of a rattle for about 10 minutes. He's so gentle with things, too. He slowly manipulates toys and waves them gently like a beauty queen on a parade float. Oh, and strings! This kid loves to suck on the strings of mom's hoodies and sweat pants. Such a little goofball.

Each month gets more and more fun, but I feel like before I know it, he won't be much of a baby anymore. I'm not ready!