Alexander, Declan, and Brendan: August 2014

6/16 - 7/15

Declan,

You are 11 months old now! You are growing so fast and so much is changing day by day. You are really branching out on the foods you eat right now:

Mommy is loving cooking pasta for you and you love eating it. You especially love my Bolognese Sauce!

Sometimes dad is working late or out of town, so we go out to eat. Chick-Fil-A seems to be a hit with both you and Alex and the workers there always help me out. You love the chicken and the cheerios they have!

On the 4th of July, we served you watermelon chunks, BBQed squash, and pieces of our burgers. Yum, yum!

And you are a good little St. Louis boy who just LOVES Imos Pizza!

One day we even gave you a whole piece of watermelon and you just dug right in!

I can no longer eat an ice cream bar in front of you without you demanding for me to share:

And dad has been enjoying making you breakfast in the morning! Yummy eggs and banana!

And of course you are working on figuring out the sippy cup as well:

So as you can see, you are getting a lot of real food and you are doing great with it. It's a good thing too, because the Thrush came back this month. We went in again to get treated with the Gentian Violet. When we got home from the doctor's office, Alex did not like the purple all over your mouth, so he tried to wipe it off:

Since that obviously did not work, we got you in the tub. (If you look at the banana and eggs videos above, you will see that even this didn't really work, but it at least lessened the intensity of the purple).

Lucky for you, that was the end of the thrush for you, but it was not for mom. I got it back shortly afterward and had to take medicine to get rid of it. When that medicine didn't work, I had to go see the doctor to see if there was something else going on. Unfortunately not only was the Thrush back and I had to be put on stronger meds to get rid of that, but there was also another infection and I had to get on ANOTHER medicine too to get rid of the infection. That medicine did NOT allow me to breast feed you. So we had yet another challenge. Luckily I had enough of a freezer supply to keep you on breast milk and as you read above, you were eating a LOT of food too. But it was very hard on both of us emotionally. After a VERY rough 10 days, we were back in action. I was so grateful that you still took the breast and that we will be able to wean naturally rather than abruptly.
You and Alex had a bit of a rough time at the beginning of the month. You were both sick for the 4th of July. Poor Alex had croup and I am so thankful that you didn't get that. But you did have a bit of a cold and just weren't feeling well. We were a pretty sad sight on your first 4th of July:

But once you were both feeling better it was back to summer fun! We met up with my friends Anna and Emilie and went to Meramec Caverns. I strapped you to me with the Moby Wrap and we had a nice day walking through the caves. You were mesmerized by the lights shining on all the different places in the cave and you really seemed to have fun. We took a boat ride on the Meramec River too which you also loved.

We have also gone to the Sylvan Springs Spray Pool quite a bit since it's brother's favorite place. He calls it the "Water Park". You have really started to enjoy yourself there crawling all around and splashing in the fountains. You even met a little friend there one day whose birthday is the day before yours!

You and Alex are such buddies and it is so heartwarming to see you guys laughing and playing together. Alex likes to have you sit in his chair with him, but you are so "on the go" lately that you will not sit for long anymore. Alex thinks this is hilarious! It's so fun to see you guys laughing with each other:

It's so much fun to see you guys together. And you are coming along quite well with your walking. Alex just loves to let you hold onto him as you walk. I don't have any good videos of this cause you stop whenever I get out the camera and you don't do it on command, but I do have these: As I mentioned earlier, dad has been out of town for work a lot which has necessitated me taking both of you boys to the stores with me. This has worked out fine for the most part. You love sitting in the car cart next to Alex. You also like to sit in the side by side one at Costco.

But the older you get, the more active you get and I can't keep my eye off you for even a second in the cart now. We were at Target one day buying big boy underwear for Alex and I was bent down helping him pick some out. It wasn't even 30 seconds later and Alex said, "Mommy, look, Declan is standing!" Sure enough, you had gotten out of the seat belt in the cart. This is how you did it:

I've got to keep my eye on you. You are quiet about it, but you always seem to get into something when I look the other way. Gram says you are getting more and more like your Aunt E each day!
Declan, you are such a fun little baby! You have so much energy and you are always into something. You play hard but you also sleep hard lately. You have been sleeping though the night consistently and have been taking either 2 short naps or one long nap each day. You are very passionate about everything you do. You clap all the time especially when Mickey Mouse comes on the TV. You love to play Pat A Cake and lean back to get thrown into the pan before we even "roll it up". You love seeing the cat and you even say meow when he comes around. You also like to pull Sunny's fur and torment that poor kitty, but he takes it like a champ. You also have started to wave bye bye and sometimes you even says "Bye Bye". It's awesome! You have started to get very attached to me and you cry each time I drop you off at daycare.
You are such a fun baby and I can't believe you are almost not even a baby anymore. One more month and I will be calling you my little toddler. Time flies! Can't wait to spend it all with you! Here are your 11 month photos:

I love you so much my sweet baby Declan! Love, Mom

(May 16 - June 15)

Declan,

You are 10 months old now! We have continued to do so many fun things with you! Summer is finally in full swing and we have been taking advantage of it as much as possible. We started going to the playground after school/daycare. You love trying to crawl up the slide and you love going down the slide on mommy's lap as well as with mommy just holding your hands. You laugh so loud when you get to the bottom. You especially love to sit on the side by side slide with Alex:

Speaking of Alex, he still loves doting over you and he has been having so much fun pushing you on the swing when we are at the park:

We went up to St. Martin for the school picnic this year too. You had so much fun watching the parade go by. You were in awe of each passing vehicle and all the people walking in the street:

As the summer heat rolled in, we decided to break out the water table. You absolutely love the water table, splashing and laughing as you hit the water. You love having our friends, Braden and Cate over to play with you too!

The other summer fun thing we started doing this month is going to Sylvan Springs spray pool. You are not so sure of all the fountains just yet, but seemed to enjoy crawling around and watching brother run through the water.

We also celebrated Father's Day with Dad. You got him a Carnivore Cookbook and a potato slicer so he can make his homemade fries more easily. You also gave him a really awesome card with picture of you and Alex on it. It was a great Father's Day and you had a great day with dad.

You are such a happy baby. You laugh at everything! One night you were laughing at Alex and Poppy playing with a train. It is such a joy to hear your laughter. I can't help but smile every time I see this video:

You absolutely love to eat still and you are REALLY starting to just dig right in and make a huge mess of yourself. It's so much fun to see your appetite grow and grow. You are still eating puree's for the most part, but we have added in some puffs and arrowroot cookies a bit as well.

Since you have been making such a mess, we have also been doing bath time quite often lately! And luckily you LOVE it! Bath time has certainly changed in the past couple months. When we first started putting you in the big tub, you just layed there kicking. Then you started sitting up just long enough for us to wash you. But now you are crawling around, splashing and having so much fun in the bath!

You also started walking this month. You took your first steps by yourself and you love to push all the walking toys around the house. For now crawling still gets you places faster, but it won't be long till you are walking all the time!

You also still love to hang out with your brother in the morning. We love to put you two in the crib together!

And much to daddy's delight, you now fit into Alex's Old Scrapyard outfit:

As much fun as we've been having this month, we have also hit a couple rough patches. You got a stomach bug so you weren't feeling so well for a few days. We had to feed you clear liquids (i.e. Pedialyte) until you could keep something down. Since breastfeeding was such a comfort for you, this was a problem since I couldn't give you breast milk. I was searching for something to comfort you so I pulled out a pacifier. Well I didn't realize it, but you have never actually taken a pacifier at all. So when I tried to put it in your mouth, you didn't know what to do with it. It was kind of funny to see a baby who had no idea what to do with a pacifier! You thought it was just another toy to play with!

Another rough patch we hit was thrush. You and I both got it. It was a much bigger deal for me than for you as it didn't even seem to phase you. I, however, was in a lot of pain. That breast feeding pain I blamed on you getting teeth on last month's post turned out to not be your teeth at all. We were treated with Gentian Violet. You looked so funny and so cute with the purple all over your mouth!