Learning

It feels like awhile since I've been able to update this blog. Fortunately my fantastic husband has been keeping up with things! :) I don't have brand new pics to post, but Ari is growing and changing so fast that I thought I'd update about that a little.

New skills that he has acquired or is working on:

- pincer grasp... he is now the king of his cheerios, he loves them.

- babbling noises that sound more and more like talking - blah bah gah bah!

- rolling, rolling, rolling to get things.

- SO close to crawling now... he can go from sitting or belly

to on his hands and knees, but so far he moves backwards for

the most part.

- starting to try to pull himself up on things, although not successfully yet.

- he is starting to do the semblance of a kiss - he did this with Sean a few times where he actually pursed his lips to kiss daddy. :)

- he not only can take all the rings off the ring stacker, but sometimes he manages to put one back on it. He also puts the rings on his feet while sitting.

- I think he might be starting to wave.

I can't believe how much he has grown and how many new things he is learning all at once. He will be ten months old shortly and I am already starting to plan his 1st birthday party for the July 4th weekend. 1st birthday!! What happened to the itty bitty boy we brought home from the NICU?

From this...

To this, in little over 9 months!

Butterfly Exhibit

On Saturday we went to the Butterfly Exhibit at the Tucson Botanical Gardens before Nana Mary's birthday party. Ari had a great time and was in good spirits despite only having a 15-20 minute nap on the way there. His spirits could not be described as good later in the evening. The plus side of no naps was that he slept for 7 hours strait before getting up the first time. I don't think we will make a habit of it however, we will just hope for 7 hours of sleep with naps.

Mom & Ari at the exhibit.
Up close with a butterfly.
Just a small sample of butterflies that were there.
African moon moth. This was a female that had just emerged from her cocoon. She only has 3 days to find a mate and lay eggs. The curator said that wasn't likely because they didn't have any boy moths, but that she would probably lay her eggs anyway.

9 Months

Well we are doing better than most months with this update. Ari turned 9 months old while we were in Vegas. Once again it's hard to believe how much he's grown since we brought him home. He has two teeth now and just last night and today has started fussing again like maybe some more are on the way. His hair has started curling in the back when it's wet and is pretty darn cute. We had our nine month check up with Dr. Bean on Wednesday and he said we have healthy baby boy. He weighed in at exactly 20lbs and was 28" long which is the 50th percentile for both. Sorry cousin Everett you are now the smaller cousin, maybe you should put on some weight will all the teeth you have now. :) Ari is still suffering from separation anxiety and some days are better than others but there is no doubt he's a momma's boy right now. It seems as though we may be only days away from a milestone, this boy is about to crawl! While in Vegas something clicked for him and he's doing tons of push ups on to his knees and getting the butt wiggle going. On a few instances he has even made forward progress only to get a strange look on his face like, how did I do that? I better get to baby proofing!

Check me out in the big chair at our hotel room in Vegas.
What a mug!! You can actually see some teeth too.
Who needs fancy toys??

Las Vegas

Who says you have to be 21 to go to Las Vegas? Well Ari wasn't listening to them anyway. We took a little family vacation to Las Vegas last weekend. Thanks to Aunt Piper who was kind enough to let us crash with her and even gave us the bed. After a 10.5 hour trip to arrive in Vegas because of road construction, an accident on I-17, Hoover Dam traffic and lunch, we had a good time. Ari did exceptionally well in the car for as long a trip as it was. Alas he didn't sleep much better while we were there, thanks in part to his 9 month growth spurt.

Mom and Ari at the M&M's store, he wasn't that impressed.
Hanging out in front of the Bellagio waiting for the water show. We didn't actually see it till the next day after we looked up the schedule, we were an hour early for it to start on Friday.
Our first dip in the pool as a youngster. It wasn't super warm but it was heated enough he liked it just the same.
With Mom at the Bellagio flower exhibit in the botanical gardens.
A lion fish at the Mandalay Bay Shark Reef.
Cara and I also went and saw the Cirque du Soleil KA show at the MGM Grand on Saturday night. Thanks again to Aunt Piper for taking her only night off the watch Ari while we went out. The show was awesome and I'm sure we'll take in one of the other Cirque shows next time we are in Vegas. We have decided to go back when Ari is a little older and can stay with one of the Nana's for a long weekend.

Visit

Cousin Mikaela came for a visit on Monday. She is staying in town this week with Nana and since Nana had to work on Monday she came to visit Cara and Ari. A good time was had by all, although more by the kiddos since Cara was still feeling the effects of her cold. She is feeling much better today. Our family may have to stop having kids because everyone else is going to get jealous of how cute they are! At least until they come hang out with them for a while.

Couple of cute munchkins!
Just hanging on the cuddler!
I think they like each other!

Easter

Ari got to celebrate his first Easter and of course we got to celebrate with him. Cara got him his first Easter basket and stuffed animal. No bunny ears pictures, sorry cousin Everett. We even got to see both Nanas on Sunday and had dinner at Nana Alexis' house. Ari consumed more sweet potatoes in one sitting than ever before, Nana must have done a good job cooking them. Ari also got a cute little stuffed lamb from Connie, a friend of Nana Alexis. We didn't die eggs this year, that will be a few years away but Ari did sleep through all of his cousins dieing eggs at Nana Mary's house on Saturday.


The approach...
One happy boy!
I'm pretty sure this was a body slam.
Don't think I can't see you eyeballing my stuff Dad!
No candy, no problem!!

Head shoulders knees & toes....

Ok well mostly hands and knees but it's one of his favorite songs anyway. Last week Ari was getting crazy with the push ups. This boy really wants to be mobile! We've had many a fit thrown when something is out of reach and he can't get to it. Of course he forgets that he can roll over and get to it but the fit is easier. I don't think we are ever going to sit down again once he starts moving.

You'd think he'd be happier being that he's getting closer to crawling.

And the head part of the title, heavy is the head that wears the crown!

dreams

Last week I had a couple bad dreams about Ari. Well, one was a bad dream, the other was the most horrific nightmare I've ever had. Ever. I talked to my mom about it and she said once you have kids, your bad dreams almost always involve them. Figures. I knew that I adore my little boy, but that nightmare made it hit home with me that I love him more than anything, my own life included. Aaahh, motherhood. Incidentally, a day or two after the bad dreams, he got sick. Sean says it was a coincidence, I've decided I'm psychic. Heh. My mom is probably most accurate: my inner mommy picked up on signals or something sub consciously and warned me in my sleep. ;) Anyway, I'm glad my little man is finally feeling better, and I hope I never have such a terrifying nightmare ever again!

Sleep is for sissies!!

I just thought I would throw that out there. In case you hadn't heard, Ari is sick for the first time. Talk about a pathetic looking little boy. Worse part is there's not much you can do for him. After two days of snotty nose and general miserableness followed by a screaming bout at 1 last night we took him to the doctor today. Turns out his problem was multiple fold. He has a cold or something, double ear infections and he cut a new tooth last night. No wonder it was as sleepless as it was. Hopefully his antibiotics will kick in on the ear infections quickly and then we just have a runny nose to deal with. Wish us luck! If anyone is up at strange hours and wants to chat, more than likely Cara or I will be on Facebook.

8 Months

Once again it's time for a little Ari fix! Our little man hit 8 months at the beginning of the week. One day after Cara and I celebrated our two year anniversary. It's hard to believe it's been two years that we have been married already and almost four years that we've been together. I must be doing something right for her to want to stay around, so I'll just keep doing what I'm doing. All joking aside, she is more than I was ever hoping for in a wife and much more!

Ari is officially teething and cut his first tooth the day after he hit 8 months and he's been working on the other one the rest of the week. We knew he was teething but now we have some proof to show people. As you can see from Cara's last post, the last few months have been a struggle and last week was especially bad. Normally Cara tries to let me sleep during the week so I'm not totally dead at work but I think I was up five of the seven nights last week at 3 because he had been up so much and she needed some sleep too. Hopefully once his other bottom tooth come through we can get a break for a week or so before the top ones start hurting his gums. It sure would be nice to catch up on a little sleep if we can.

Ari is getting closer and closer to becoming mobile everyday. Last night during quiet time, part of our bedtime routine, he pushed up onto his knees five or six times pretty much right in a row. Although he still fusses if he's on his belly too long. We aren't too worried about that phase as once he starts moving he won't care what part of his body he's on.

We didn't have a doctor's appointment to report on this month. First time in a few months that he didn't have to get poked with a needle. Woo hoo!! Cara is participating in a study for nursing moms at the U of A and they weigh and measure Ari periodically as well. She had an appointment last week and Ari weighed in at 20 lbs 2 oz but the lady could really figure out how to run a tape measure so he only measured 26.25 inches. Which is only slightly longer than a few months ago at the doctor's office. We have never been real impressed with the accuracy of measurements anyway. We can tell he's much longer because a few months ago his feet didn't fill up his footed jammies and now they do. Our next wellness check up is at 9 months and thank goodness there won't be any shots then either. Stay tuned for our next update!!

Yes it actually got cold enough to wear this outfit a few weeks ago so we figured we better take advantage of it because it was probably our last shot before he grows out of it and warm weather returns.
What, you think I can't get over there?
Hey mom, where's my shirt?? I feel naked with out that thing.
Mmmm bananas....
and sweet potatoes!!!