need a laugh?

this guy has a few to share:

oatmmmmmmmeal!

William has been enjoying oatmeal cereal for about a week now. He loves it!

Delicious!

i wish i was a little bit taller....wish i was a CRAWLER...

Ok, so maybe that's not exactly how the song goes, but it sure does describe our little monkey these days. Will is so active and always wants to be moving, rolling, or jumping. I totally support these activities, except for, say...when he is being changed or more importantly, when nursing. Usually not a problem, but yikes...

Here are some videos from this afternoon that show our little pre-crawler. Barrel rolling is still his most efficient way to move, but I think he's getting pretty close to crawling. Watch out!

And here is what Will was doing after his crawling adventures. Jabbering like crazy!

Maniac.

sunday funday

Although it was roughly 150 degrees outside, we decided to go up to the lake yesterday for a little fun and a lot of pictures. It was a little bit too hot for Will to really get into it, and Matt and I were literally melting after about 10 minutes, but we did get a few good pics before giving up. Here are my favorites:

standing in the grass:

my favorite boys:

Will and me:

Will wasn't so sure about being up on my shoulders:

I think he liked being on dad's shoulders better!

love Will's gleeful expression:

Lots of fun!

5 months

William turned 5 months old on Sunday, and it seems crazy that next month will mark half a year! He is truly a blessing in our lives, and every day is more fun than the last. Here are a few 5 month pictures.

He's about to catch up to the bear!

Sweet boy:

Such fun!

Here are a few fun facts about Will at 5 months (if you don't want to read a lot, just skip to the pictures below):

• We didn't have a 5 month check up, so I don't have official weight and length stats. However, according to our scale, Will weighs about 17 pounds. Big boy!
• He rolls front-to-back and back-to-front, in both directions, meaning he is really quite mobile for a tiny dude. He can barrel roll wherever he wants to go!
• Will's sleep habits during this last month were a bit of a mess because of a few things: nighttime eating habits, rolling over, trying to stop swaddling, surgery, and cereal. BUT - just in the last week, things have definitely started to improve. Not sure if this will last, but Will is currently sleeping from 8pm to 8am with one wake-up at around 2-3ish to eat. Cutting from 2 to 1 nighttime feedings has happened 3 nights in a row, so I am hoping he won't go back. He is still in the woombie, but we have successfully moved to both arms out, so I don't think it will be long before we can transition to a less fitted sleep sack, although now that he has both arms out, I'm not sure there's a reason to force it. As of this week, we have also stopped using the paci for bedtime or naptime, because I was worried that he was going to form a big sleep attachment to it. It was easier than expected to break the habit, and he now falls asleep without it! There are still some nights and naps with a bit of crying at first, but he seems to settle down and sleep much better once he falls asleep now. (yay!) Fingers crossed that this month will be even better in the sleep department!
• Still nursing, and all is going well. We haven't tried cereal again since the rice cereal experience, but I got some oatmeal cereal to try next. I found out that I didn't do well with the rice as a baby, but oatmeal was fine, so perhaps Will is the same?
• Will loves playing and jumping! He wants to be so active these days. Just yesterday, I got him a jumperoo in addition to the exersaucer that he already has, because my arms were getting worn out from jumping him around all the time. He loves it! (Side note - I probably should have kept doing it all myself, and maybe I would have developed some arm muscles! Hopefully carrying around a 17 pound man will help.)
• He loves playing on his tummy now, which I never expected to happen. It's sometimes hard to keep him on his back because he loves rolling around so much.
• LOVES to chew on his hands, often with both crammed entirely in his mouth at one time. Poor guy sometimes even gags himself.
• Will really enjoys the baby bjorn. He doesn't love going for walks in the stroller anymore because he's still in his carseat and can't see much. But he loves going places in the bjorn! It's such a lifesaver, and I even use it around the house when I need both hands and Mr. Man doesn't want to play independently. Fabulous invention.
• Will is still rocking the small patch of red hair, although he has recently begun to grow some new hairs. Hooray! There are lots of little fuzzies coming in, but it's hard to tell what color they are going to be. They look pretty blonde, but in some lighting, I still see red, so we'll see. One thing I know for sure is that the boy has his daddy's eyes! So far they are still the same dark shade of blue that Matt has, and I am hoping they stay that way.
• This month, Will has really started to enjoy his toys. His favorites are his light-up spinning toy (still - he has loved this for months!), his orange rattle ball, Sophie the giraffe, his stuffed giraffe, and he loves chewing on burp cloths.
• The boy loves the cow noise. One of his favorite activities for months has been "what sound does the ___ make" for all of the barnyard animals. Even when he's tired and doesn't want to smile, a good "MOOOOO" will still usually get him going. We may be raising a future dairy farmer here.

Here are some pictures of what we've been up to lately. Lots of fun!

Will got a new whale pool. It even sprays water out of the front!

Right before his first swimming experience:

Not so sure about swimming (I think the water was too cold when we first filled up the pool):

Sort of having fun...sort of humoring me:

Day two of swimming - much better!

Trying out the swing:

Playing in his safari hat:

Hanging out with mommy:

Exersaucer!

Chewing his hands:

New jumperoo AND hand chewing - what could be better? Plus we finally found a good use for all those big law books!

Worn out from all his adventures:

rice cereal? looks fun...but no thanks, mom!

Since Will is almost 5 months old, we decided to give rice cereal a try last weekend.

Will was excited:

And perhaps a bit concerned:

But overall, enjoyed the experience:

Yummy and fun!

But wait!

Unfortunately, the cereal seemed to give Will a terrible stomachache both nights! Boo! We fed him cereal around 5pm on Saturday and Sunday, and both nights he was very uncomfortable (i.e. screaming) about every 30 minutes from 8pm until midnight. So we backed off the cereal for now and maybe will give it another try in a few weeks.

We also had a fun and relaxing 4th of July. We mostly just hung out, ate good food, took walks, and enjoyed having Matt home on Monday! Here are a few pics from the weekend.

One of my favorites - Will looks so tiny next to his dad!

Love these guys:

Happy 4th!

Wardrobe change (there were 3 that day!):

gardening. FAIL.

Although I am at home all day now, this is what has happened to our lovely hanging plant under my care:

And here is our delicious cilantro:

I clearly do not have a green thumb or know much about gardening. However, since part of my pre-William job included working on product packaging, I feel that I do know a bit about how things should be labeled. Therefore, I take issue with the 2 jalapeno plants we purchased this year.

This one is called "mammoth jalapeno." This mammoth has been growing for 3 months:

This is the "regular" jalapeno, also growing for 3 months:

Doesn't seem quite right, does it? I suppose I should just enjoy the fact that there are jalapenos growing on them, and I haven't managed to put them down yet. I have to give credit to Matt. He is actually very good at keeping plants alive and nursing half-dead plants that have been in my care back to life.

Here are some of his pretty tomatoes:

LUCKILY...I still seem to be doing just fine at growing a happy, chubby-legged little baby boy. :)