Archive for the ‘jake’ tag
Update on Jake’s lab work
NORMAL. Yay. 
Happy Valentine’s Day
Pulling up
He did it! He’s been able to manage to get to his knees for awhile., but lately he’s been obsessed with trying to pull himself up onto his feet. I found him standing up in his crib this afternoon. But he swung his head around to look at me when he heard me come in and lost his balance. No pix. Just now, I watched him pull himself up to his exersaucer, tho and grabbed a quick snap!
Baby in the mirror photo shoot
Last week I had a meeting in the office and, of course, brought Jake along for the ride. Nancy had her daughter Char there and she took these wonderful shots of Jakers! Not only are the shots just beautiful, but she caught two major milestones on film – his first experience discovering the baby in the mirror. And his first “real” crawling that is more than a commando effort:
Caught in the act
This boy is getting into everything. Not ready. SO not ready for this.
(Forgive the poor quality of the photo. Grabbed my phone and snapped this pic for Scott when I looked over my shoulder and saw what the boy was getting into. 
Jake is almost 6 months old!
Jake is almost 6 months old!!He’s had a few tastes of banana and avocado, but it’s been so minimal there’s not even any evidence in the diaper yet. 
He nurses quite a lot, still. Like, every 2-3 hours or so during waking hours. Sometimes he’ll split a feed so it seems even more frequent (nurse on one side, play for 30 minutes, demand the other side).
Jake is very active during nursing. How do I explain this? It’s like, when I’m holding him while he’s nursing, he’s sucking but simultaneously pulling his head back, plus wiggling and writhing. It’s very rare and he has to be very tired, but not over tired, for him to relax into me completely while nursing. I can tell that he is going to wear me OUT as a toddler.
Mercifully, at least he sleeps well, both during the day and at night.
In fact, Jake sleeps A LOT. He’s all go go go go go when he’s awake, but he sleeps about 12 hours at night (goes down around 9 or 10, with only one wakeup around 5 or 6 – and he’s up for about 1 hour before he goes back to bed to complete that 12 hour cycle. Then he sleeps another 5-6 hours during the day! (Usually in the form of 2 long naps.) The wake up times can vary (last night he woke up to nurse at 1 am), but he’s pretty reliable about mostly sleeping during that 12 hour span of 9pm – 9am.
He’s gotten so efficient (or efficient enough, as far as he’s concerned) with his commando crawling that he doesn’t even try to learn the classic crawl anymore. He seems to be more obsessed with figuring out how to sit up and stand up at the moment. Seems like he’s trying to pull himself up on everything these days.
Life has settled into a comfortable, although very busy, pattern. Seems I have time to read regularly again and I’m enjoying that. Might be time to revive and update my reading list – although there will be a large gap where I just didn’t keep track of my reading during Jake’s first months. It was enough to just BE reading. Actually, I think I might try this Shelfari
site a friend sent me awhile back – looks like it could be an easy way to track my reading. And I can put a widget here on my vox. Coolio. Will get back to you on that. 
Baby milestone: Sitting and standing
Jake just shocked my socks off.
I was changing his diaper when the phone rang. I left him playing on the changing pad (it’s on the floor) to go answer it. I expected him roll off and creep around the room a bit – no worries, the room is safe enough.
I DID NOT expect to come back into the room and find him SITTING UP. How did he do that and wahhhh that I missed it!
But, wait, there’s more. Then I walked out again to put phone away. When I came back a few moments later…? HE WAS ON HIS FEET. He was standing, but not all the way up – he had pulled himself up using the package of disposable diapers on the floor as a stabilizer and was bent over with his hands on it for support.
YIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIKES. Too soon, too soon.
Baby kisses
Jake does this thing where he plants his mouth on any available body part (arm, ankle, etc.) and hums.
It took me awhile to realize he is mimicking me! I'm forever pressing my lips to his head or cheeks and making a muuuuuuuuuuuuuuaa kissing sound.
He's kissing!
Getting back in my groove.
I don’t know why life suddenly seems so much more busy! Events ramped up over the holidays and just haven’t slowed down since.I hate when I fall off my blogging groove – it’s so hard to recoup, you know? And the more time that passes since my last entry, the more overwhelmed I get with the backlog of events I keep meaning to blog about! So, mainly so I can STOP feeling overwhelmed and just get on with it, here’s a bullet point summary of stuff going on lately:
- Christmas was fun, except for the part where I got mastitis.
We celebrated on the Sunday before Christmas, when we had all our family gathered ’round. I was feeling the mastitis coming on that day and I KNEW I should rest, but how could that happen, right? So I didn’t and it kicked my ass. I did bedrest the next day and the recovery started.
- We journeyed to Colorado with 5 of our 6 kids in tow on the 26th. Half the trip we spend at Keystone where Scott’s parents have a condo. The kids LOVED the snow. Scott and I got to have a date at the restaurant of the little ski lodge where we were married 2.5 years ago. Our first solo meal since Jake was born!
- We spent the second half of our trip in Pueblo visiting with family, particularly Scott’s grandparents, who got to meet Jake for the first time. Scott and I had a blast digging through old photographs and learning more of his family history. We also found this amazing photo of Scott’s dad when he was three months old. Look familiar??
- Jake is five months old now and nearly crawling. Noooooooooo – it’s too soon! He is a happy little man. He knows and loves his siblings. It’s so cute the way his face lights up when they pay any kind of attention to him. He was WONDERFUL on the plane. Our flights were fairly short and he slept most of the time. Getting though security with a baby, a stroller, a carseat plus the diaper bag was no joy, however. Not to mention all the other kids. Oy.
- I am ever more dissatisfied with my shape. I got a Garmin Forerunner in my stocking (I asked for it lol) and augmented that with a jogging stroller this past week. I need to get off my duff. Even if I don’t lose a pound (and I’m not likely to until little one is getting most of his nutrition from solids when he is 12+ months old), exercise will help me feel better about myself. I would be a lot more despairing if I hadn’t been through this before. I had a similar weight gain pattern after Mira was born – and I successfully lost the weight and got fit after her first birthday. I want to start with healthier habits NOW though – at least in the exercise department. I don’t know HOW I can curb these insane carb cravings when I’m nursing.
In fact, I’m going to upload my pictures, post this entry, dress the baby, gather up my gear and GET WALKING. Today. (Edited to update: Or maybe I will AFTER the baby wakes up from his nap. )
Baby on the move… !
He's not even officially 5 months old yet, but look at him go!
I am completely not ready for babyproofing yet!
Mom to 4 kids and 2 stepkids, I am a writer writing in the heart of chaos. I am the co-founder and former editor of 
