No More Paci

I don't know how it happened, but Luke doesn't use his pacifier anymore.

Ben and I hated giving it to him and I really hated seeing pictures of him with it stuffed in his mouth. Neither of us wanted him to be like, 4 years old, and still needing paci all the time. Yuck.

I wish we could take the credit for weaning him, but he just doesn't need it anymore. It's a good thing too, because we only had one left! Lost all the others along the way.

Getting Into Things

It's amazing! Luke crawls faster and farther every day. He loves to explore new stuff. We still don't have any baby gates so we watch him like a hawk and get creative trying to protect stuff.

He was very interested in Ben's TV and electronics tonight. We just kept redirecting him.
Finally, Ben put a couple of the barstools on their side, in front of the TV. Works well. For now.

Last night he woke up at about 11pm and wanted to crawl. We tried everything to get him back to bed, but his mind was made up. We decided to let him wear himself out for a while. We wore out before he did!

It was cute though, at one point, we had him blocked in between us. He quickly grew bored of that so he decided to crawl over my legs. I didn't think he would be able to do it yet, but he proved me wrong. Cracked us up in the process. He got his front half over me pretty easily, but couldn't figure out how to get his feet and bottom across. He didn't have enough upper body strength to pull himself over! He finally managed to get one food on my leg and then he pushed himself over. So cute! I let him go. Decided he earned it!

He's a Maniac, Maniac......

Luke is crawling crazy!! He was up until 10pm last night because he couldn't stop! He usually goes down around 7. I finally put him down and he still struggled and fussed to get up! He didn't fight it too much though, because he was pretty darn tired. He even slept in until 8:30!

We were supposed to go to a Valentine's Day party today, which I was really excited about, but we didn't make it. I'm a moron. I read the evite THREE times and still thought it started at noon or so. Nope, it started at 10 and ENDED at noon. I don't know where my head is sometimes.

Luke was crabby anyway and is already down for a nap so maybe it was for the best, but still...

Anyway, Luke is going to spend the evening with his Grandma and Grandpa Nolen while Ben and I get some dinner. I'm sure he'll have a blast exploring their house. I hope they know what they are in for!! :)

Eat My Dust

We'll, he's off! He's crawling even better today! He can go 5 or 6 steps now. It's amazing.

He's (understandably) distracted with his new skill. He can't even be bothered to really eat or sleep much. I've been trying to get him to nurse often, but he just wants to go, go, go. It's funny because he gets REALLY tired, but he just keeps pushing himself. Silly guy.

Go Lukie, Go Lukie....

He's crawling!!! He's still getting the hang of it so it's slow going, but...it's official. (sniff sniff).

Just in the past day or so he's been inchworming his way around. Then today, just now, he actually crawled a few steps! To get a yellow highlighter, of all things!

I'm so excited and a little sad. I guess we really do need those baby gates now.....

Soooo Close

It seems like Luke is so close to crawling. He's trying to get to his truck, in the middle of the room. He gets up on his hands and knees and rocks. Then he pushes his toes into the carpet and puts his rump in the air. His knees move forward. The back end is raring to go, just need to get the arms in sync. :)

Teething or ??

Luke is crabby and is sleeping poorly. Several times during the night he woke up and stayed awake for an hour or so. He wasn't playing, just couldn't sleep. A few times he didn't even want to nurse. I figure his teeth must be really bothering him. If it is his teeth.

I'm starting to wonder if he has an ear infection, but am dreading taking him to the dr. It's a $20 co pay and all we would get out of it is a "yes" or "no". Dr. won't prescribe antibiotics (fine with me) for earaches.....So where does that leave us?

I've been giving him Hylands Teething tablets. They seem to take the edge off, but they don't work as well as Tylenol. I'm going to try the maximum dose of the tablets tonight to see if that does any better....

I'm off to surf the web for some ideas....

The Songs We Sing

A thread on a discussion board gave me the idea to post this.

I sing to Luke quite a bit. It really helps him wind down and go to sleep.
Our favorite songs:

Somewhere Over the Rainbow
Baby Mine
Jesus Loves Me
He's Got the Whole World (In His Hands)
Winnie the Pooh
Love
A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes

Plus all the little sunday school songs from when I was a kid like; This Little Light of Mine, Jesus Loves the Little Children, etc.

I don't know all the words to Love, but here's what I sing to him:

Love

Love, it seems like only yesterday,
You were just a child at play.
Now you're all grown up beside me.
My how quickly these moments flee.


I hope he enjoys it as much as I do!

First Car Show

Today was Luke's first car show, a Nolen famil tradition. We go every year.

He did great. We went James and Meg and their 2 little ones, Hanna and Jordan, as well as Ben's brother Tim, and our good friend Justin.

He was carried the entire time and he loved every minute of it! Such a cutie. He only had a meltdown in the car on the way home. I know he was tired and his gums were probably bothering him. Of course, as soon as we got home, he did great. Tim played with him while we ate and we didn't hear a peep out of him.

Luke really likes people. He loves to be around other kids, especially. I hope he's always like that!

Pretty Day

Went for a walk in the part today. It's beautiful and sunny outside. We had snow 2 days ago. Whatever.

Anyway, something told me to take the sling, too, but I didn't because normally Luke LOVES to ride in the stroller. So of course we get half way around and he starts crying. I had to carry him and push the stroller the rest of the way. Well, I wanted a workout. :)

Right now he's on the floor here beside me crabbing because he can't figure out how to get to some toys he wants. He's scooting and rolling like crazy, but he can't figure out the crawling thing yet so he's very frustrated. I'm not going to keep giving him everything he wants because I think it's important for him to want to learn to do it himself.

Me and My Shadow

Luke has found his shadow. Sometimes I'll put him on the floor in the kitchen while I'm cooking, cleaning, etc.

The other night I saw him lifting his arm over and over. He would then stare at his shadow as he opened and closed his fist. He was really keeping himself entertained!

Today Luke has done great!! No fussing. I guess he's over whatever was bothering him.

I think he must be teething though. Sometimes he stops nursing just to chomp on his fingers. We got him some teething biscuits at the health food store today. He really liked it. I was a little nervous becaust it's recommended that you try one food at a time, but then the biscuits of course have several ingrediants, one being wheat. No bad signs yet though.

So Far, So Good.

No more throwing up today! Just a lot of crabbing. Luke took a good nap this morning but not so good this afternoon. Luckily he's perked up now that Ben's here. He loves his daddy!

Hopefully all will go well for tonight. It's just ironic because just last week Ben and I were marvelling at the fact that Luke hasn't been sick at all! Unless you count the darn reflux.

Pukie Lukie

Luke was really crabby all day Monday. I wasn't sure what was up. We spent most of the day nursing and sleeping.

Yesterday was much better. He was in a good mood all day, no big deal. That is, until after his bath. I tried to nurse him to sleep, but he kept thrashing around, rubbing his eyes, fussing. After a while I tried the other side. He nursed for a bit and then started fussing. Then he spewed. ALL OVER EVERYTHING. Holy cow, I didn't know his little stomach could hold so much!!

After he threw up he seemed fine. He saw his bucket of toys on the floor and wanted to play. So we put him down there while we stripped the bed down. I went to run another bath and then heard Ben say, "Ewwww, ewww, ewww". Luke was throwing up on the floor.

So into the tub he went while Ben started a load of laundry and cleaned the floor up.

I pulled Luke out of the tub and he promptly threw up again. Back into the tub. Pulled him out and, yep, he threw up again. Back into the tub.

Ben and I joked that we knew he loved his bath, but this was pretty extreme.

By now Luke was looking really tired and shaky. We got him out (no throwing up!) and put him onto our old mattress on his bedroom floor (with lot's of towels to protect it). He laid down for a while and then started fussing again. I pulled him into my lap and grabbed a towel right as he threw up again. Poor babe. There really wasn't much left to come out but he was tired and miserable and kept whimpering. So heartbreaking!

After that I just held him and sang to him and he was out in a minute! Worn out little guy.

So far today he's done okay, but he's still crabby and we have already had one long nap today. Sounds like it's time for another......