Category: Milestones

“Where is the G-Man and what have you done with him??” –J.

John was up in Seattle for a few days this week, and upon spending some time with Henry when he returned, he asked me whether I’d swapped Henry out for a new model! Our littlest dude has undergone some major internal and external development this week. Even I noticed it. He’s much more tuned in to what’s going on around him, he smiles more readily, he’s getting really absorbed in the toys he’s playing with, and even his face looks different…older and more like a little boy than a baby. Oh, and he’s babbling a lot more! He definitely knows who “da da” is, and I swear he tried saying “banana” tonight as I was feeding him one. He said “na na” a couple of times as I was talking to him about it.

These are truly welcome changes. He went through a really rough phase for the past couple months–very clingy and fussy and averse to changes in his environment. But happily, those days are over and he’s really quite a pleasure to be around and to observe. He saw his brother making “fish lips” the other day at the dinner table and made them right back! He also seems to understand when something is silly and laughs right along with the rest of us. And his demeanor, which is far calmer than it was before, is fantastic. It’s just so nice to see him fiddling with toys and keeping himself contented with far less intervention necessary from Mom-o and Dad-o.

Oh, and last but not least, today was the first day that Henry has not tried to eat the book I’m trying to read him–he was actually interested in looking at and turning the pages himself!

Today Henry turns 9 months old. Wowee, how time flies! Little Mr. H. has been working on lots of milestones lately. Two new teeth emerged last week after a long, painful, whiny stint of teething, bringing his tooth-count to 8 (ocho!)! He’s also been rolling from back to front (finally!) and back again. I honestly thought he’d never master the back-to-front roll, since he seemed so content to stay on his back once he’d rolled off his tum.

He’s started migrating around the crib during the night, has graduated from baby food to table food, and is learning how to transition from sitting to lying on his tummy. He’s not too happy once he’s stuck lying on the ground, but he does enjoy the process of leeeeeeaning forward until he can stretch himself completely out. Henry seems to really dig standing up in his excersaucer, which we’ve dubbed his “disco” thanks to its music-themed doodads and the music that it emits.

All in all, he’s a happy little guy with an adorable, puckish grin, which usually emerges as he’s watching his big bro’s antics in the tub or at the dinner table. The two brothers really seem to get a kick out of one another these days.

Drumroll, please! Henry Seamus Nack turned 8 months old today. He kicked off his celebration by snacking on his first fistful of Cheerios and cracking into a Yo Baby banana yogurt. (Which, based on his intestinal distress later in the day, seems not to have agreed with him very well.)

In addition to taking on Cheerios, we’ve been introducing more “table food” like rice, guacamole, and banana pieces. He gobbles them all down happily and waits impatiently for the next bite. I think he’s teething again because he’s drooling like crazy and chewing on anything he can get his hands on.

Physically, he’s been making lots of progress. He’s an avid practitioner of what we call the “Judo CHOP!” This is where he raises both tiny hands then quickly blasts them down to his waist and does a little grunt at the same time. We tend to see it when he’s excited about something–food, new toys, grabbing my sleeve and shoving it into his mouth…He’s sitting up like a champ, and as he reaches for things just beyond his wingspan, has started to roll onto his tummy. At which point, after getting over the initial bewilderment of being on his tum, he either gets mad because he’s not sitting anymore, or rolls over to his back (the better to see those scintillating light fixtures!). He’s babbling–he’s entering his Dadaist period (dah! dah dah dah!) and is also working on “ma ma ma” and “va va”.

He continues to be fascinated with and amused by his big brother–especially in the bathtub, where there’s a lot of splashing and laughing. For his part, Finny has taken to intoning “No, NO, Goon-IE” when Henry’s taken something he was playing with. All in all, it’s a good time to be Henry, and based on the number of big grins accompanied by his twinkling little eyes, he seems to be enjoying himself.

Finny had his big-guy 2-year checkup today with Dr. S. Our hale and healthy boy checked in solidly on the 97th percentile for height, weight, and head circumference. He is 37 inches tall, which strongly suggests that he will be over six feet tall when he’s fully grown. He is a whopping 33 pounds 4 oz., and his head is 51 cm. around.

Dr. S. was impressed with not only his size but his verbal acumen and his skills at pretend play. She asked if he spoke in sentences of 4-5 words, and I said “yeah, well, a lot more than that, actually. It’s really like talking to a normal person,” and gave her an example of one of his typical sentences these days: “Mom-o get Finny some lunch and put Goonie in the  hopper.” I believe “Wow!” was her response. She also liked hearing that Finn’s already got quite the imagination–calling me “the caboose” and his brother “little freight car” or “screech owl.”

Our boy had to get three shots today, but he was really a champ about the whole thing–only crying a little bit after the first two. Once I picked him up and gave him a squeeze, he was fine and later remarked “Finny got some shots and cried a little bit.” Now he won’t have to worry about shots until he’s 4!

Old Man Finnegan is officially just one month from turning “The Deuce” (!). Don’t tell him, but Mom-O has scored a whole set of great Thomas gear for his upcoming party.

Speaking of trains, “Engineer” pretty constantly insists on referring to each member of the family by our railroading handles:

• Finn: Engineer
• Dad-O: Conductor
• Mom-O: Caboose
• Henry: Little Freight Car
• CoCo: Station Master

He’s way into rattling off crazed, run-on compound sentences like “Engineer and Conductor hang out in the Thomas tunnel and Caboose and Freight Car in the TV room!”  Super good times.

Big Henry is just that! At six months, he clocks in at 19 lbs. 7 oz, 25 and 3/4 inches long, with a head circumference of 45 cm. This means he’s a little chubby for his height, but I’m guessing a growth spurt is coming on since he hasn’t stretched out much from his 4-month measurements. Compared to Finn at 6 months, Henry is 1/2 pound lighter and a little over an inch shorter, but his noggin is slightly bigger.

He was an absolute dream at Dr. S’s office and was quite flirty with the cute nurses. He only squawked for a second after his shots, then we sailed home in the Ocho so he could load up on cereal and milk. Dr. S. thinks we can start weaning him off the Zantac now, and start offering him water in a sippy cup after he eats solids. We’re still waiting for an appt. with the pediatric urologist so we’ll keep him on the antibiotics until we know more.

Mr. Henry Seamus Nack turned six months old today. We can hardly believe it! Time has flown since he’s arrived on the scene. He’s gotten so big, and just lately he is so much more animated and alert than even a month ago. We love his giggles, his mischievous little grin and sparkling eyes, and his wonderful talent at sleeping through the night. He has started making a lot of sounds, prompting his big bro to say “What’s Goonie talkin’ about? Crazy baby!”

We go in for his official check-up with Dr. S. on Monday, so we’ll post his stats then. He’s growing like a weed, and is a big fan of his rice cereal. He cannot keep his hands off the spoon when it nears his mouth. And boy does he have a strong grip! If he’s this excited about cereal, I can only imagine his enthusiastic reaction to other, far tastier foods in the near future. So Happy Half-Year, Henry! And we’ll lift a teensy baby-spoon to the next six months!

[Click the image for a larger version.]

He seems pretty excited about his new discovery, no?

Today “little” Henry turned five months old! To celebrate, he napped for 1.5 continuous hours, then accompanied Finn and I to “tiny playgroup” at our friend Tara’s house. The rest of the day was spent doing tricks in the crib (rolling over) instead of sleeping. He is so amazed at his own rolling skills that he absolutely refuses to stay on his tummy during playtime. He just instantly lurches to one side and flips over.
He’s following in his big brother’s footsteps and is becoming totally fascinated with lights and light fixtures. He marvels at the Christmas tree and I catch him gazing up at the lamps in the living room quite a bit. He’s also every bit as big as Finny was at 5 months–he’s already sporting his six- to nine-month wardrobe! His little thighs look like turkey drumsticks!

Our littlest guy has a lot going on these days. Henry’s been very actively working on his core strength in order to start rolling–arching his back, kicking his legs, and tipping his torso over, diligently practicing.
Today it all came together for him, and he was triumphantly rolling from tummy to back. He can roll both to the left and to the right! Next up: rolling back onto his tummy, or a continuous roll from tummy to back to tummy. We’ll keep mama’s milk on his training table, and make sure he’s got enough room in his ever-smaller PJ’s to get good momentum going.
I think he’s also teething again–he’s making some really weird expressions with his mouth, and is chewing on anything he can get into his tiny maw. The drooling and fussing seem like good evidence as well. We’ll let you know if any new chompers appear!

Finn turns 21 months old today, and is taking it somewhere new on a daily basis. We’ve been looking at lots of ABC and number books, and Dad-o and Finny have been spending some quality time with the Sesame Street gang, singing “C is for Cookie” and counting things with, of course, the Count von Count. We were wowed when Finny actually recognized the letter C and a couple others in one of the library books. He even knows, courtesy of Kermit, that a capital B looks like a fat man with his belt too tight. “B… Belt too tight!”
We were also excited when he counted to three (instead of his usual “two!”) one day. So imagine our surprise when Finny was running around the other evening, chattering about various things, when, almost under his breath and without fanfare he exclaimed:
“onetwothreefourfivesixseveneightnineten… Eleven!”
I totally missed it, but John and our sitter, Laurie, caught the tail end of it. Luckily for me, he did it again a few minutes later and I got to hear it that time.
Now, he still really can only go to three or maaaaaybe four when we’re actually counting objects together, but he sure has the syllabic sequence of numbers one through eleven down pat as a thing unto itself. It’s almost like a little chant he does every once in awhile.
Oh, and when we ask “And what comes after 11, Finny?”, his reply is “Six!”

This week has been loaded with mini-milestones for both boys. This means that Mom-o has to start getting crafty to outwit her little guys when needed!
For instance, Finn has started to understand and repeat the sequence of numbers from one to five. He has also started to buy into the idea of just eating “a couple more bites” of something before he is allowed to get down from the table. It’s great because now we don’t face flat-out resistance to eating his dinner, he cops a plea bargain. This is where Mom-o takes advantage of the little perp, saying “two more bites” and then working on our numbers as he continues to eat. “One bite! Two bites! What’s after two? Three! Four! Do you remember what comes after four? Five!” After he eats a decent amount of dinner I ease up on the counting, but I figure learning and eating is a good combo!
Henry, too, is working on a lot of things. He’s grabbing and pinching everything in sight, including my skin while he nurses. I’ve introduced Ollie the owl in hopes that he’ll grab and twist *him* instead of me, and it works sometimes. Henry’s also turned a corner on napping, it seems. I am now able to dispense with the rocking and holding before putting him in his crib. Now I just put him straight in while he is awake but ready to sleep, and he does the rest. He’s also starting to nap for a decent amount of time (anything over 60 minutes is fantastic), and can resettle himself if he partially wakes during the nap. Yesterday he had two big long 2-hour naps instead of three 30-minute ones. *That* is a development worth celebrating!

Our ever-bigger little guy, Mr. Henry Seamus Nack, had his 4-month check-up visit with Dr. S today. Here are the stats:
25 inches tall!
17 pounds even!
43 cm head circumference!
Still spitting up like a champ (a bigger dose of Zantac is now required)!
Further wowing the doc were the strength of “Goonie pushups”, his newfound ability to lock his knees when placed in a standing position, his 2 lower teeth (no more visible on the horizon right now), and his enjoyment of the normally-dreaded hip joint rotation test. Most babies hate it, but Henry started laughing! And maybe Henry caught on to Mom-O’s pre-natal yoga moves while in utero since his cobra pose is so good! Entire torso off the ground.
He had 2 more shots, and cried quite a bit, but manned-up fairly quickly as we made our way to the reception desk. The doc wants to go ahead and have us schedule another renal ultrasound to check in on how his kidneys and ducts are doing, because if we can, it would be nice to take him off the antibiotic. So we’ll do that within the next few weeks and post the results. Worst-case, minor surgery on his renal ducts, best-case, the problem has resolved itself.

Our little Henry turns four months old today! His birth feels at once like it was yesterday and a thousand years ago. (Ah, back then Finn & I would spend all morning exploring the “antenna truck.”) The little guy is tracking our movements like crazy, locking his legs for some “Proud Stander,” and grasping onto things like it’s his job. (I know: yesterday he locked onto both sets of my crow’s feet, digging in & trying to pull my nose into his mouth!)
Meanwhile big bro Finn is becoming even more of a character. Eating his weight in green beans tonight, he eyed one with a long stem and said, “Macaw! Eat the beak! Come *heeeere*, Macaw!! (haaup!).”
Despite Finn’s new penchant for inspecting things with a tape measure (“Dad-O’s leg, 30 pounds!”), we don’t know Henry’s stats yet. We’ll get the full 411 on Thursday when Margot takes him to the doc. (Eyeballing it, we can say that a standing Hen comes up to roughly Finn’s shoulder line, and that Finn is perhaps 35″ tall.)