Eli Updates

It seems like Elijah is growing and changing at such a rapid pace, especially in the last few weeks. Here are some of the recent changes:

*As I mentioned in a previous post, he is now sitting up and getting better at that every day.

*He has been rolling over for a little over a month now, but is now what I will call a "proficient" roller! He flips from front to back and back to front "fluently" now. While this is fun and exciting, it also means my days of laying him on the bed while I do something and counting on him to remain stationary are drawing to a close.

*Another change is that he is officially teething! While I have been suspecting this for a while, we finally have our proof. On Friday when Elijah was chewing on my finger, one of his favorite past times, I felt a sharp little ridge along his bottom gum line. Sure enough, his front two bottom teeth are coming in!

*Elijah's hand eye coordination is getting much better. He loves playing with all of the little gadgets on his exersaucer and with his other toys. Also, we will go walk around outside and look at the trees and he loves to feel, grab, and pull the leaves off of the trees. He reaches out to grab anything and everything he can get his hands on. He has a super strong grip so this usually prevents me from wearing my hair down for any enduring length of time.

*Our little guy is now completely obsessed with his feet! He loves to hold onto his feet at all times. Sometimes I will think he is asleep because he has been quiet for a while and when I check the video monitor, I realize that he is not sleeping but playing with his feet. Last night I saw him putting his feet in his mouth for the first time. Quite the flexible little fellow. The trick is getting him to let go long enough to change his diaper.

*Finally, he has gotten to be quite the giggler. While he has also been laughing for a while, he loves to laugh louder and more often now...sometimes for no reason at all! I can be sitting there doing nothing and he will just give a little chuckle...maybe he is remembering a funny joke? We play constantly and I will tickle him or make funny noises and he laughs like I am just the funniest person in the world. He is so happy and fun and it is such a joy to spend my days with him.

While I could continue my Mommy Chronicles of all of the things Eli is doing, I will end the updates for now. More will be soon to follow. Now for a few pictures.


Above: Grabbing those tootsies


Above: Chewing away...he loves this little toy


Above: Our little teething boy


Above: Sitting up like a big boy


Above: Playing with his exersaucer and grabbing all of the gadgets. He likes to put the blue teething toy in his mouth.


Above: When did my little newborn turn into such a big boy?


Above: Elijah being silly...he loves to jump and bounce


Above: Say cheese!


Above: Rolling over on the floor and playing on my tummy.


Above: Laughing at Mommy.


Above: Raising those eyebrows.


Above: One of our best purchases recently has been this "breathable bumper" we got for Elijah's crib. When I would lay him down for naps, he would flip around so much that after about a minute he would have both arms and a leg caught in the crib slats. I would go in there, pull his limbs out of the slats, and try to center him back in the bed...only to repeat the whole process a minute later. While I know that the trend today is not to use the bumpers, Ethan and I agreed that something had to be done because this was not working. We found out about these mesh bumpers and went to Babies R Us and got one. It has been fantastic. Here you can see Elijah sleeping with his back up against the side of the crib. Our little kiddo is pretty smart, however, and has figured out that getting a limb stuck in the rails means mom or dad will come back in the room. Even with this bumper, he has managed to get his leg stuck by kicking his leg as high as he can. While he is successful in this sometimes, it is still so much better than before. We would recommend this product to anyone whose kiddo is as crazy of a roller as our little man.