6 Month Wellness Check

Hi everyone,

We had Max's check up last Friday (I know, I'm getting slow posting... sorry). We started with weight and length as usual. Max is 27" long and weighs 21 lbs. He's a hefty one! His length puts him in the 90th percentile and his weight has now exceeded length as he jumped up into the 95th percentile. Our dr wasn't too concerned as Max will be burning lots of calories since he will be at the crawling stage soon. We are trying (stress trying) to do solid food three times a day. Max is still not loving the solid foods, but we are just trying to start good habits right now.

We put off his shots until Monday since we were leaving for Houston later that day. He did very well, minimal crying and he was recovered and smiling within minutes of his final sticking. He was slightly fussy yesterday, but is right as rain today. He has been doing better at night, although getting him down has been difficult. But once down he has been sleeping through to around 6 am before needing to eat and getting in bed with us. I can handle that though!

Sunday was a special day for our family as we celebrated Curtis' birthday and his first Father's day. My mom was here (she followed us home from Houston and gave us those big puppy eyes that you just cannot say "no" to) and we had lunch at Chuy's following church with some friends. I hope he had a great day.

The girls at Curt's office threw a lunch party on Monday so went along.

Sleeping at Chuy's.

Our big boy!

6 Months Old!

Wow... I can't believe Maxwell is now 6 months old. The months have gone by so fast. Sigh! I can now relate to every other mother on the planet who watches their kiddos grow up too quickly. We celebrated the day by going to the zoo here and Max slept through half of it. Good thing his admission was free, other wise he wouldn't have got his money's worth!

Max has many new tricks to report. He is now sitting up by himself for 30 minutes or so at a time. We bought a lot of new toys for him that encourage him to sit up and play and may bring a few more home from Houston this weekend. He is also starting to imitate our movements a little. Today at lunch, Curtis was talking to him and shaking his head back and forth making Max laugh. Right after we see Max shaking his head back and forth. Maybe it is a random incident, but he seemed to mimic us each time we did it. So much fun!

He also has teeth!!! The lower two central incisors have broken through and we have see the top two working their way down. This definitely explains the recent rash of fussiness and frustration we have seen from him. We have dodged some of the other side effects that can accompany teething (like diarrhea) and I will be glad when these break on through and give us a little reprieve, albeit short. More teeth to come!

We have had some difficulty getting Max back into his regular routine since getting back from Florida. He does not want to nap in his crib anymore and although he may start the night in the crib he will usually end up in bed with us a some point in the night. I'm hoping that maybe he will get over his crib refusal once these teeth push through. I also had a friend tell me that when babies are conquering a new skill (such as sitting up) they may have difficulty sleeping. Whatever it is, I would like to get back to the way things were pre-Florida. I used to love sleeping with him (and I still do sometimes) but he doesn't lie still anymore so I usually get kicked in the stomach and/or chest all night. Not so conducive to sleep. I also need nap time to get some thing accomplished, such as homework. Right now he is in his swing, but is wide awake.

We have Max's 6 month appointment on Friday so I will update on Sunday hopefully. We will be in Houston Friday and Saturday with my Mom, aunts Nancy and Bennie, and cousins Katie, Camille and Madaline. Should be fun! As always, I leave you to enjoy some pictures of Max.

OK, you may need to use a little imagination, but the little white line is his first tooth!

Max at the zoo, taking in the fun.

Sitting up with his penguin. He likes to push and kick it!

"Look Mom, no hands!"

More Photos from Florida

Home Sweet Home

Hi everyone. We have returned safely home from our travels and have begun the slow process of settling back into our routing. Max is not sleeping well on his own for either naps or at night so we are starting over from scratch with these issues. He has had a stuffy nose which bothers him when he lays down, but we just can't seem to get him comfortable in his crib. I have rocked him multiple times this afternoon, but the second I lay him down he starts crying. The one time I did get him down the dogs started barking and woke him up. Grrrr!

Max was wonderful on the plane ride both ways. We had multiple people tell us how good he was and I was very proud to be his Mommy. The other bonus of air travel is that the pressure from the plane seems to have opened up his clogged tear duct. Wouldn't that be a wonderful relief and a surprising side effect of our trip.

We had our professional photos done on Thursday at sunset. They said it would be a week until they posted them online. When that happens I will send you all the link. We can either order prints from them, or we are buying the rights to the photos so we can have prints made anywhere. I hope they turned out really well.

Anyway, here are a few of our photos from the trip... enjoy. More to come!

This is a Royal Poinciana. They were blooming all over the island... beautiful!

Our last night and last sunset!

Hold it up uncle Dave... don't let our trip be over!
Sadie tried too, but it didn't work.