Movement/Milestones: No crawling yet, but we do regularly see Caiden rocking on his hands and knees. The lack of crawling doesn't keep Caiden from moving. He can roll, spin, swivel and scoot all over the place. He will pull himself up on anything (or anyone) he can. A few days ago I saw him waving at a favorite daycare teacher, and sometimes he sits and waves at himself, watching his hand as he does so.
Activities: Caiden loves goofing around with people, playing with toys, investigating everything, babbling, and climbing. Oh, and hair pulling. See all these toys? His favorite one is the water bottle.
The older he gets the less snuggle time we get (sniff, sniff). He lets us know when he would rather be down on the ground playing by doing this:
Things he doesn't like: having his body manipulated (clothes being put on, being put in car seat/stroller straps, etc), having his face or nose wiped, or having favorite toys taken away.
Food: This kid will eat just about anything. Avocado, fruit, and squash are favorites. He is starting to get chunky foods and handles it like a pro. When he is enthusiastic about eating he gets what we call "dance pants", he kicks his legs and opens his mouth. Very funny.
Beets were a recent food addition, he looked so funny with beets all over his mouth!
Sleep: We turned a corner this month. After way too many months of sleep deprivation we broke down and did some "cry it out". Because Caiden has almost always gone to bed easily on his own, it look me a long time to accept that there wasn't anything physically wrong with him that was causing him to wake up crying in the middle of the night. So we decided on nighttime rules, and would only go into his room accordingly. He cries harder when he sees us, so it's better to stay out of his room, although we would peek in to make sure he was still in one piece. The first couple of nights involved a lot of crying, and I can't even explain how horrible it was to listen to, but got better in a few days. And over the 2 weeks following (the Cape trip set us back a few days otherwise it would have been quicker), he slowly started sleeping longer and longer. He was waking up around 2am for a night or two, then a few nights only waking at 3am, then it was 5am, and finally- we had a few nights of no wake-ups*. Sometimes he cries for a few seconds at various times of the night, but quickly settles himself back down. I feel like a new person! He is usually up for the day around 6 or 6:30.
Caiden's naps are good, but he isn't very consistent with the schedule. I think it's because his days vary so much between daycare, home, and Nanna Nan's. At home on weekends, he will nap for a combined 3-4 hours. It might be broken up into several 45 minute naps, or he might take two jumbo naps. But at daycare, he usually only takes two short naps and might snooze in the car. The daycare people just commented that Caiden is their only baby who goes to sleep on his own. Go Caiden!
*I wrote this post a few days ago. Caiden must either be coming down with a cold or actually be teething, because he was very upset on Sunday and has woken up a few times the past 2 nights, seeming to be in pain. We will revisit the sleep training once he is feeling better, if necessary
