6 Month Check-up

Sleepy boy after a fun morning at the Zoo!
I love that he sits with one leg bent behind him....Jake did the same thing!

Walker had his 6 month check-up yesterday, and everything looks good with my little man. He weighs 17 lb 13.5 oz (50%), is 28 inches tall (90%), and has a head circumference of 17.5 inches (75%). (For comparison, Jake was 18 lb 11 oz and was also exactly 28 inches tall). Dr. D says he thinks Walker is going to be a quarterback. ;) Praise the Lord for a healthy little boy...a tall and skinny little boy at that!


Since I wrote my 6 month update, Walker has started using his new trick (sitting up from lying on his tummy) to his advantage to get around. He has figured out that if he can't reach something, he can just lay on his tummy, roll to the object, and then get it and sit up. I never knew a baby that couldn't even crawl yet could get around so much! Gone are the days of him staying put in one place!

Gator Chomp

Since Jake's "ABC" video got rave reviews from the family, I decided I needed to post videos of the boys more often. Well, I couldn't pass up the opportunity today to record Jake and the "Gator Chomp."

You see, Jake's teacher, Miss Brittany, went to Florida and is a big Gator fan. When it came time to give Jake's class a name, Brittany chose "Little Gators." Apparently, every morning the kids come in and do the "Gator chomp" and put their "gators in the pond." I still have no idea what the "gators in the pond" deal is about, but I'm sure it's super cute. Anyways, Jake is constantly doing the "Gator chomp" despite the fact that we are big Georgia fans (and UAB, too, of course). I always give Miss Brittany a hard time and tell her to quit teaching my child such bad things; good thing we love her anyway!

Okay, so go watch the video. And in case you have a hard time making out what Jake is saying, he says, "Gators....gators...CHOMP, CHOMP, CHOMP!"

6 Months Old

On 10-10-10, Walker turned 6 months old! Happy half birthday, Walker! And yes, Jake ran around the whole day singing "Happy Birthday to Walker." It was so sweet!

So, what's new with Walker? The biggest thing is that he can now sit up from lying on his stomach. I wish I could be more excited about this milestone; however, there are two problems with this: 1) He still thinks it is hilarious to throw himself backwards while sitting up, so it's just a head injury waiting to happen and 2) He loves to practice his new sitting up trick when I go to lay him in his crib to sleep on his tummy, so naps have been pretty tough lately!

This is how I found him when he woke up from his nap this morning.

While we're talking about sleep, Walker naps about 3 times a day and sleeps for about 12-14 hours at night, and he usually wakes up once during the night for a bottle around 4 or 5.

Walker is eating great! He is still taking about 5 oz every 3 hours or so during the day. We've tried a lot of baby foods and his favorites seem to be green beans (YUCK!) and peaches; he eats baby food 2 times a day right now.

Walker has started really "talking" up a storm. He loves to say "buh buh buh" and "muh muh muh" and even something that sounds like "hey" and "bye bye." I find myself calling him "Walker the Talker" a lot because he is constantly babbling something or just squealing in delight; he never stops talking!

Walker has a cute personality, as you can tell from the pictures. He smiles a lot and is generally pretty happy...except if he sees food. If anyone is eating or drinking in his vicinity, Walker starts grunting and fussing until he is fed and his tummy is full! I'm thinking Walker has inherited my impatience and my stubbornness...oh, and my love of food! Ha!

Happy 6 month birthday Walker! I can't believe in just 6 short months, we'll be celebrating your first birthday!

Train Ride to the Pumpkin Patch

Every year on Tyson's bye weekend, we try out a different pumpkin patch in the area. This year, we went to the Heart Dixie Railroad Museum and rode a train to a pumpkin patch. It was a pretty fun little trip; the whole "excursion" lasted about 2 hours, and both boys were awesome the whole time!

I had been looking forward to this trip for Jake for a while...the boy LOVES trains. And sure enough, he thought it was so cool to see all the different trains at the museum. The actual train ride, though, wasn't as big of a deal to him as I thought it was going to be. I think he was a little disappointed because the conductor never said "all aboard!" Poor baby, that's all he really wanted to hear! :( Oh well, he quickly forgot about it once we pulled up to the pumpkin patch.

Once at the pumpkin patch, Jake felt the need to pick up every pumpkin, inspect it, and then throw it back on the ground. I thought Tyson was going to have a coronary! Luckily, Jake didn't bust any of the pumpkins and eventually caught on to the fact that you just "gently" put the pumpkin back down if you don't want it. :)

Speaking of pumpkins, how do you go to a pumpkin patch and not come home with a pumpkin? Easy...you spend your pumpkin money on boiled peanuts and wine. Yes, boiled peanuts and wine!!! Classy, huh? There was Vineyard right next to the pumpkin patch that had a wine tasting for the pumpkin patch goers, and Tyson and I couldn't turn it down. The wine was amazing!! So anyways, the pumpkins were a no-go, but Jake never even noticed. Don't they sell pumpkins at Walmart? ;)

It was such a fun day with my 3 boys! I sure wish we had Tyson around more often on these beautiful fall weekends!

Brothers

After breaking down crying to my pediatrician last month about Jake and his sibling rivalry towards his little brother, I am happy to report that things have been going really well with the boys. I'm not quite sure what happened or what changed, but all of a sudden one day, Jake just fell in love with his brother and has been a different kid towards him. Don't get me wrong, Jake is not one to gush all over his brother and ooh and ahh over him, but he is acknowleding him, trying to play with him, helping me out with Walker however he can, and loving on him more and more every day. It's awesome and does my heart good. Maybe Jake is finally seeing how much Walker loves and adores him...who knows, but I just wish it could stay this way forever!

***Scroll on down, there is another post below! Have a great weekend! We have a fun one planned, so be on the look out for lots of pictures!

Walker's Walker

(Walker on the top and Jake on the bottom)






Well, I guess it is technically Jake's walker, but it's Walker's walker now. Does that make sense? Anyways, in a desperate attempt to find something to keep Walker occupied while I fix meals, clean up, do the dishes, eat, etc., I decided to pull out the old walker. Walker hasn't figured out how to "walk" in it, but it is definitely keeping him occupied just hanging out in it. Plus, Jake can now help keep Walker entertained by literally pushing him around the house in the walker. Jake has a blast, and Walker, well, the expression on his face in the picture says it all! Ha!

Wednesday's with Walker

Since Jake goes to school on Wednesday's and Walker doesn't, I get some special one-on-one time with my little man on these days. We play, we sing, he naps, he eats, and of course, we take a lot of pictures--the day is all about Walker. As I was feeding Walker some peaches this morning, which might be his favorite food so far, I decided to snap some pics of his messy little face. As soon as I snapped the picture, I knew I had seen that picture somewhere else before:

The picture on top is Walker and the picture on bottom is Jake the day before he turned 6 months. Look alike much?

Don't forget that UAB plays UCF tonight at 8/7 Central on ESPN. Go Blazers!

Soccer and Starting to Crawl?

SCORE!

SCORE AGAIN!!

My future goalie?

Let me just be honest here, Tyson and I are not big soccer fans. I'm still not sure why he isn't, but speaking for myself, it was just one sport I never grew up playing and I honestly have no clue how it works. I do know you aren't supposed to use your hands and that's about it. Well anyways, Tyson and I agreed to let our boys play if they were interested, and low and behold, Jake has shown interest in soccer. And according to Tyson (who apparently knows more than I do and even took a coaching class on soccer in college), Jake's pretty good at it...especially dribbling the ball.

Well this year, Jake's school started offering soccer classes once a week for 8 weeks; however, the class is for 3-5 year olds...and Jake doesn't turn 3 til January. Long story short, Jake said he wanted to play so we signed him up; he's the only 2 year old in the class, though, and is a good foot shorter than everyone else! Well, I went a little early to pick Jake up last week so I could watch some of his first soccer class, and he was awful! I don't know if it's because he is a good year younger than the other kids, but it literally took him 4 times to ring the goal whereas it took the other kids 1 or 2 times. I felt so bad for the kid! I will say this, though, he never gave up and just kept on trying and I was so proud of him for that!

Anyways, I went to Target this week and got him a goal and a new soccer ball to practice with at home, and I'll have you know that we practiced the same drill as I saw him doing at practice, and he can now ring the goal with only 1 shot! Yay! Practice does make perfect I guess...well, maybe not perfect, but pretty close!

Gettin' ready to go!...

...and then the dive for my phone!

...and then he's back up and ready to go!

The other day, Tyson asked me when Walker would start crawling, and I told him that even though Walker has already reached a few milestones before Jake did at this age, I didn't think Walker would be ready to crawl like Jake did this early on. But sure enough this weekend, Walker started using his arms some (and when I say "some," I mean very minimally!) to army crawl to get to things, and he started getting up on his knees into the crawling position! And just like Jake, as soon as he gets into position, he just dives for whatever he is trying to reach...mainly my Blackberry or the remote control! Ha!

Gosh, the thought of two mobile little ones sure makes me nervous! I'm secretly hoping it takes Walker a little longer to put all the steps together to this crawling thing; Jake doesn't quite understand the magnitude of leaving his toys (especially ones with little pieces) on the floor, so I need just a little bit longer to work on that. Plus, this means I have to step up my childproofing game again! Oh well, like it or not, here it comes!