Santa!

We took Kyler to the mall this morning to sit on Santa's lap. I highly suggest doing this on a weekday morning. There was absolutely no line! Brett and I thought for sure that Kyler would scream when he sat on the big guy's lap - he is afraid of strangers sometimes. So we set him on Santa's lap without turning him around and he was so happy. Even when we turned him around to get a look at Santa he was just fine. Santa's comment: "Wait til next year." Haha!

The Reason for the Season

Nativity scenes are one of the only pieces of Christmas decor that have a direct correlation with the birth of Christ (the reason we started celebrating Christmas in the first place, in case all the commercialism has distracted you). This is the one my mom bought me as a little girl and I display it each year.

I remember always wanting to play with the figures which are breakable. One of the wise men has a glued-on head which I assume occurred when I was playing with him as a child. Kyler is too little this year to have much interest (unless I bring him to the figures and then he tries to grab them and put them in his mouth) but I know by next year this will be something he really wants to get into. So I decided for his first Christmas season, I would get him a toy nativity scene.

I gave it to him as sort of an Advent gift rather than waiting until Christmas (since I will be packing all the Christmas stuff away by the time we get back home in January from our visits to family and friends). He was way more interested in the nativity set than I thought he would be. I thought he would want to play with the packaging more than this toy but I was wrong. Kyler was very excited about his new toy.

 

I got it down for him to play with and right away the pieces started going right to his mouth. I think the sheep is his favorite because of the texture. He also liked the angel's wings and is fascinated by the stable for some reason.

As he picks up the different people and animals I tell him what each of them is. It means nothing to him now but hopefully this will be a way to teach him what Christmas is really about. When he puts Baby Jesus in his mouth, I tell him that he is giving the baby kisses (seems more appropriate than eating or chewing on Jesus). The only one I struggle with is what to call Joseph. He isn't really the Daddy but Brett thinks we should just tell him that for now since Joseph helped raise Jesus. We can explain to him later that God is really the Father of baby Jesus. I agree since the other option is to say he is married to the Baby's mama. ;)

And here is a picture where you can see the stockings hung from the chimney with care. Yes, the dogs have stockings and Brett and I do not. The important thing is that Kyler does have a stocking and it will be STUFFED this year. Oops... it is just too hard not to buy things for this little guy. And he has been a very very good baby so Santa should be good to him too.

A Tooth!

Kyler cut his first tooth today. It is his bottom left one. The other should be coming through any time now. Thankfully, Ky hasn't been all that fussy while teething (so far).

The leaves are falling...

And they are so much fun to play in! We just had to stop Kyler from trying to eat them.

6 Months

It has already been half a year since our little man came into our lives. Here is a recap of what's going on with Kyler at 6 months.

• He can sit supported and is learning to keep his balance sitting without support. He can scoot backward a little but doesn't like staying on his tummy for very long.
• He is a big eater. He loves his cereal in the morning and eats about 4 cubes of homemade baby food for lunch and dinner. He eats takes between 4 and 8 ounces of formula every few hours and holds his own bottle.
• He usually wakes up once each night after sleeping for around 6 hours. He goes to bed around 10:00 and wakes up between 7:30 and 8:30. He takes two naps each day for about an hour or so each.
• He is growing out of the 2nd size of cloth diapers and I am going to have to order the next size. He is wearing mostly 6-9 month clothes now (and most are hand-me-downs from my cousin Nolan).
• He is all boy. He loves electronics and always wants our phones, computer, and remotes. When he plays toys he shakes them around really hard and sometimes they go flying quite a distance. He is liking noisy toys and "big kid toys" like his little dump truck.
• He still loves books. He is starting to get into the ones that have textures in them. When we sit in the rocking chair he reaches for the pile of books. He flips through pages of his board books.
• He really likes the dogs, especially Baxter. He is getting better at catching them and they are learning to avoid Kyler.
• He is making new noises. He sometimes puts different sounds together, making an incoherent sentence. His newest sound is "bababababa." He has started laughing quite a lot too.
• It looks and feels like he finally has a tooth about to come through.

We are really looking forward to Christmas - Kyler loves paper so he will probably actually sort of unwrap some gifts (until the paper makes it to his mouth). And we can't wait for him to start crawling (although we have yet to babyproof hardly at all).

He has a doctor appointment on Monday so we will include an update with his vital statistics then!



Update: Kyler weighs 16 lbs, 8 oz and is 26" long. Head circumference is 17. All fall in the "25-50%" range in terms of percentile. Poor guy got 3 shots this time. He did good though and just ran a slight fever for a couple days. That and his irritability may have been due to his cold and the fact that his gums are swollen and we are expecting teeth to pop through any time now. We also went to the K-State basketball games with him Monday and Tuesday (late nights) so he was a tired boy.

What's so funny?

The other night Kyler and I were on Skype with Grandpa Charlie and Grandma Tammy when he started getting a little fussy. To distract him for another couple of minutes I grabbed one of his toys and tapped it on his highchair tray. Little did I know that Kyler would find this laugh-out-loud hilarious. He needed a diaper change so we had to stop and I hoped he would still think it was funny when Brett got home. Sure enough he was really giggling this time. We couldn't figure out why that was so funny to him but Kyler got us laughing too.

Kyler and the Peas

After he had the stomach flu a couple of weeks ago, Kyler stopped eating his peas (that's what he up-chucked at daycare). I kept offering them to him occasionally thinking that he still wasn't feeling well and they just didn't taste good. But I'm pretty sure he hates them now just like his mom and dad. It was also mildly entertaining watching him take a bite...

Another Cold

I think we need a good hard freeze (although I hate for it to be that cold). Kyler has another cold and this time it seems to be a little worse than the first one. His nose is runny and stuffy and he's got some congestion in his chest too. We haven't gone to the doctor yet - I really don't want him on antibiotics more than absolutely necessary - but we are keeping a close watch. He's been acting and eating fine and no fever and he hasn't really been coughing either, just some raspy breathing. We got some baby vaporub this morning and have been running the humidifier in his room the past couple of days.

On a similar note, we were sad to get a letter in the mail last week saying that Ky's pediatrician was leaving. She has been great and very patient with my requests to break up vaccinations. We will see her one last time at Kyler's 6-month checkup and then we will have to find someone else. Bummer!

Lunch Time

Here is our typical lunch time. Kyler just woke up from a nap and is ready to eat!

"Yum!" Right down the hatch.

Distracted by the doggies...

Angry face means "Hurry up with that food, Mom!"

"Just let me do it."

Messy face!

But he loves getting cleaned up...

A drink of water from the big boy cup.

And an after-lunch cocktail.

Did we make you hungry?

So Much Fun

Kyler is getting to be so much fun. He is actually starting to think Brett and I are funny and entertaining (rather than just the dogs). He laughs at us and squeals when we tickle him. He's definitely got a big personality.