Eight Months!

Jude is eight months old now. Hmmm. What is he doing these days? Let me think.

More stuff that makes me want to pass out with cute overload. Of course.

He laughs spontaneously all the time. He even stopped nursing the other day just to look up at me and laugh for no reason (Dad K and Mom L witnessed this - it was grand). I have a small collection of ridiculous faces that I make at him. They put him into hysterics, especially if I'm making them at him from further away. He thinks people are funnier if they're far away.

He is sitting up on his own, and I can leave the room without worrying he'll fall over and bump his head (though I still set him down a nice distance from hard/sharp objects).

He is eating everything. Barley, brown rice and oat cereals. Sweet potato, peas, green beans, carrots, pumpkin & zucchini. Plums, prunes, blueberries, apples, peaches, pears, banana & avocado. I just introduced whole-milk yogurt (plain) and egg yolk (not a fan of that yet). The only things I have left to "introduce" are wheat, cheese, meat, cow's milk, honey, citrus fruits and non-green beans. Some of that is nixed until his first birthday (cow's milk and honey), along with sugar. No teeth yet.

He acts self-conscious, and occasionally shows off when he knows we're looking. He'll be playing with a toy by himself, and he'll notice he's being watched. He then gets a tiny smirk on his face (almost undetectable) and looks quickly back at his toy. He can't help but check every three seconds if you're still looking, but he tries to "act busy" while he's doing it. The old "I don't care if you're watching me or not, because I'm completely absorbed in this activity" routine. Not very convincing.

He makes a wider range of noises, including one that sounds like he's gagging. That one's his favorite actually. Nice.

He's good at playing by himself now. He can entertain himself for 30 - 40 minutes at a time.

When he's exploring something, he holds it in one hand and pokes at it with the other. He hasn't gotten the hang of the old thumb/index finger pincer skill yet, so he fans out his fingers and taps gently at something like he's playing the piano. We call it "twiddling". He especially enjoys twiddling the propeller on his toy airplane.



He imitates us... including noises we make like the "lip-popping kissy sound" (hard to describe), the "pbthhhh" sound he's been loving for awhile, and that grunting/gagging sound I described earlier (we imitate him with that one, not the other way around). He also loves to shake his head back and forth in a "no" motion, and when we do it back he is thrilled. This can go on for quite some time.

He loves to play peek-a-boo, especially if we hide behind a door frame and peek out at him from further away. We try to make the "a-boo" sound scary because he likes it better that way. He's also becoming a fan of "sooooo big", and is just starting to lift his arms a little bit when we say it.

He finally got sick :( Just a few days ago he had his first runny nose and fever. We recently left him in the nursery at church for the first time. Bingo.

He is obsessed with cars going by. When we're out on the front porch and he hears one coming, he's starts going ballistic in my arms: body stiffened, legs kicking, arms waving, heading turning back and forth frantically to see where it is. As it passes he follows it with his gaze until it's out of sight.

Best of all, he leans toward someone when he wants them to hold him. He's just starting to reach for people too, mostly me in the middle of the night, which I love. I'm not being sarcastic - I could do without the 1am (and 4am) feeding(s) he's still demanding, but when he reaches for me, what can I do? I'm putty.

Honestly, I was unaware that babies were so hilarious before I had Jude. He cracks me up all day every day. I wasn't much of a baby person before I had him, and now I'm wondering what the heck my problem was. It doesn't get much better than a miniature human being covered in a nice layer of chub doing miniature things all day. I mean, come on.

P.S. I wrote most of this post a few days ago, so here's a recent development. Jude officially slept through the night for the first time last night -- right on the day he turned 8 months old. I'm so excited I can't stand it. I feel like calling everyone I know. Every once in awhile I think of it again and get a shiver of disbelief down my spine. I will function as a normal, fully-awake human being again.