Tanner Bananer is 8 months old!

How is tman already 8 months old?!?! The other day someone asked me how old he was and I almost said 6 months…um what happened to the last 2 months?!?! He is two-thirds of a year old!

He is definitely getting bigger-I’ve given up using his carseat as a carrier…he is way too heavy for that!

He is still in size 6-9 month clothes (some are just labeled 6 months and some are 6-12)…but a lot of these 6 month outfits are getting a little snug…he’s a long little guy!

He is still in size 3 diapers…we’ve officially switched to Huggies…I think they’re more absorbant and this kid needs all the absorbancy he can get (maybe this will prevent future kidney stones-a mama can hope right?!?!). We put him in a size 4 Huggies overnight diaper and wow…it’s like a brick in the mornings! Kind of crazy!

Sleeping…well, Tanner was doing great sleeping through the night and then we decided to take a vacation to Colorado. Um this messed him up royally in the sleep department and he started waking up 1-2 times a night. We have now officially entered self-sooth boot camp…you need your sleep and I need mine. I’m hopeful this month will get us back to good sleep! Bedtime is about 6:30 and he usually sleeps until about 7 or 7:30 in the morning! He’s still taking 2 naps a day-the best one in the morning for sure!

Tanner is still mr. snaggletooth with only 1 tooth on the bottom…lots of days of drooling but no other teeth that we can see or feel.

No pacifier for several months now, but I’ve noticed just in the last week or 2 that you have really decided you LIKE your thumb! I might regret this later, but it’s super cute right now!

Food…he has gotten so much better at eating and so far, we haven’t given him something that he absolutely won’t eat. We tried green beans this month…definitely not his favorite but I think it was more of a consistency thing. Other new foods this month: carrots, plums, pears, peaches, oatmeal and blueberries. He also LOVES to drink water! He loves it out of a straw, out of a normal cup or his sippy cup-it doesn’t matter…he just loves to drink water! I have to hide his sippy cup at meal time until after he’s eaten some or else all he wants to do is drink! He hasn’t mastered the cup, but we’re working on it!

He started giving kisses this month. It’s so sweet…huge, slobbery open mouth kisses. He’s definitely an “independent” child…he will only give you a kiss if he wants to. He thinks it’s funny at night when Lance asks for a kiss to pretend to give him a kiss and then to turn his head away at the last second…of course with a huge smile on his face!

He pants (just like a puppy) when he gets excited-it’s hilarious! He also is still mr. fake cougher for attention and his newest trick (besides all of his babble) is doing the motorboat sound with his mouth/lips. He does it all.the.time!

He still loves his praise baby dvds and gets super excited when he sees little kids on the tv. He also loves dancing to any kind of music with me (or watching me dance-done soley to make him laugh)! His favorite toys-his exersaucer, loves to chew on his tools (he plays with his hammer, screwdriver and saw every day!) and his very hungry caterpillar, loves his bath toys (doesn’t have to be bath time to play with them!) and LOVES a water bottle as a toy.

No crawling yet but he’s definitely getting around…he twist, turns, and scoots across the floor or his crib.

He loves bathtime and loves splashing with his arms and legs…I usually end up quite wet by the end of his baths.

We both had a cold at the end of this month…no fun…but we just spent lots of time snuggling and watching praise baby in our pjs!

We love you, tanner, so so much and are having so much fun watching you grow up!!!

(he didn't want to pose with his puppy dog...instead he just wanted to play with him! lance pointed out tonight that he's now officially bigger than his puppy or monkey that we take pictures with-he's getting so big!!!)

happy wednesday!

this week is flying by-i can't believe it's already hump day! :-) that's a great thing...i've figured that even though i'm not "working" (although i think that statement is totally false-tanner is A LOT of work!) i still really look forward to the weekends...maybe even more so now than before. i love having lance at home to get to do our "everyday" stuff with us! it's great fun watching him play with tanner. he's a super daddy and tanner always has fun! this weekend lance decided to get adventurous and feed tanner his dinner (yes, he's often a little grossed out by tman's dinner time since food usually ends up all over the place). and feeding the little man isn't as easy as it sounds...sometimes he's definitely into his dinner and other times he's just not that motivated by food. but we started carrots this weekend and tanner is a fan (i'm thinking he might like them just like uncle grant...who ate them so much as a baby that his nose turned orange!). i was trying to figure out what else to feed tanner for dinner (not always easy-since he can only try out a new food every 4 days, i feel like we're feeding him the same things over and over) and lance said he of course needed peas with his carrots...cause peas and carrots just go together...and tanner agreed!

YUM!!!

even in the hair!

um so maybe i need a bath now?!

today is also my meme's birthday so we tried to take a fun birthday pic to send to her...tanner was very excited about wishing her happy birthday and thought it was an edible birthday card!

and since it's not 100+ degrees outside today (this cool front and rain is WONDERFUL...the high today is only 88!) we decided to go for a walk and to visit the park...tanner loves swinging! after the park we just walked the neighborhood for almost an hour...i'm ready for fall!!!

"really mom...put the camera down and swing me!"

that's better!!!!

wild child!

since we've been home...

well i know i just wrote about colorado but we've really been back for over a week...and we're still trying to get tanner back into his routine (mainly the sleeping all night routine!)!!! some fun we've had since we've been back...

tanner can officially grocery shop with me sitting up in the cart...he loves it! this is his first "big boy" shopping trip...

and since he did so well in the shopping cart, we tried out a high chair the next day at scotty p's with poppa...it looks like he's hitting the table saying "feed me! feed me!"

and despite his not so good sleeping at night, naps are going great! one day he woke up and i heard him carrying on quite the conversation with himself...he was one happy camper!

but the sad part about coming back from our trip (other than coming back to this texas heat!) is that aunt taylor has to go back to school. i don't know who is more sad...me, her or tanner (i think i might be the saddest!). we are going to miss play dates with aunt taylor, running errands with her and having her babysit so i can do random errands. i tried to convince brian that she should retire and be tanner's full-time playmate and my full-time errand partner/babysitter, but he wasn't too excited about that idea. yesterday we went up to visit aunt taylor and see her classroom all set up for the year. he loved "reading books" in the reading center (an old bathtub...how fun!!!) and he had lots of laughs at taylor's team teacher sherry playing peek-a-boo!

i guess we'll just have to start visiting dartmouth more often...taylor said she has 16 boys in her class this year...i'm sure tanner will fit right in!

family vacation to colorado!

we had a great trip to colorado...a wonderful escape from this horrible texas heat! my dad found us a great "home away from home" that had beautiful views, a great back porch and hot tub, and plenty of room for all of us.

me, tanner and lance flew up with my parents on wednesday. tanner did great on the flight...gotta love praise baby dvds to keep him entertained on the plane! he slept great the first night, but after that he must have been just overly excited to be on vacation and didn't want to miss anything because he was up LOTS of different times EVERY night! it was exhausting! i thought he'd sleep great-we found a big closet that we set up the pack n play in-nice and dark-but apparently he didn't like his sleeping arrangements.

on friday we all went biking...even tanner! it was his first bike ride and he really liked it-he conked out after enjoying the view for a while!

the next day we headed to grand lake...a little town on a lake near rocky mountain national park. it was gorgeous! we ate lunch and then rented a pontoon boat to take out on the lake. it was tanner's first boat ride! he did great on the boat...as long as you kept his life jacket down-if it started smooshing his face, he wasn't too happy about it!

we also hiked to a waterfall for some great picture! tanner was hilarious-ipop was carrying in the baby bjorn and he was laughing hysterically the whole way! he loved it!

while we were enjoying the views, grant was climbing trees and being crazy! oh how i hope tanner isn't quite this wild...grant was scaring all of us! but i have a feeling he will be-it's part of being a boy...and with grant, ipop and uncle mark he will have lots of crazies to learn from (ipop and uncle mark decided to go swimming in the lake while we were on the pontoon boat...yes they're crazy too!).

our last night there we made a fire and had s'mores...yum!!! it was uncle mark's first time to have one!

we had a great time...and of course tman enjoyed all the attention and lovin'!!!

and my overall favorite picture from the trip...

we had a great time and can't wait to do it again next summer!!!

7 months

tanner is already a month older-hard to believe! a few things from this past month...

• not sure what he weighs but he is definitely too heavy for me to carry him in his carrier much anymore...it just stays in the car as a car seat
• he has finally figured out the solid food thing! yea! it took him almost an entire month but he caught onto the idea about a week ago. it's funny-before solids i couldn't wait for him to be able to eat...and now that we're eating solids, there's definitely been a few days where i wish we could go back to just milk! way less mess! apples are his favorite so far, but he also is eating peas, sweet potatoes, bananas, avocado, acorn squash and of course rice cereal
• he has discovered how to cough...oh my goodness sometimes he coughs over and over and over. i, however, do not think it's so funny when he decides to cough through his dinner...coughing and solids don't go well together...bananas, peas and cereal e.v.e.r.y.w.h.e.r.e!
• he's still in the same size 3 diapers and size 4 overnights and still on the eating every 3 hours schedule
• we also had LOTS of progress on his naps this month-wahoo! what a relief! he's started taking a morning nap around 8:30-9 and usually sleeps around 1-1.5 hours. every once in a while i get a 2 hour nap from him! it's heaven! then he'll go back down for an afternoon nap around 12:45-1 and sleep until about 2 or 2:30ish. then he's up to play until dinner and bedtime! i am definitely loving it that his naps and routine is a little more set-makes planning the day so much easier!
• we had a few challenging days this month with rolling...thankfully he was a fast learner and figured out that sleeping on his tummy wasn't so bad after all. so now when we go to get him in the morning or after naps, he's happy playing on his tummy (he's temporarily forgotten that he knows how to roll from his tummy to his back)
• very early signs of crawling (i still think we have a month or two)...every once in a while i'll find him with his knees up under him and he's definitely a squirm...he can turn circles on the floor and can scoot a little, but no major moving around yet!
• he got his first tooth! we're currently calling him snaggle tooth-there's only one and i haven't seen signs (other than massive drool but that's pretty normal) of #2 yet
• we all still love praise baby-he's started getting a big smile and super excited anytime another baby is on the tv. we added 2 baby einstein dvds to the collection but praise baby is still his all time fav
• still loving his burp cloth
• he has mastered sitting up-every once in a while he'll tumble but he's definitely a sitter
• he loves jabbering and making noise

mid-cough...he decided pictures made him cough...

"wait...i wasn't ready!!!"

this one is hilarious..."mom...i am DONE with these pictures!"

and of course he still loves playing with his daddy...lots of laughs (and in true boy fashion, this is usually diaper time)

he is still such a happy baby and we love him so much! can't wait to see what new adventures this next month brings!