Liam's First Christmas

Christmas is sweeter with a child. For sure. I can only imagine how fun Christmas will be when Liam is old enough to figure out what's going on and we can start some sweet family traditions.

But this year, since Liam is so young, Christmas was as low key as possible. We put up a tiny tree that honestly didn't make it out of the spare bedroom most nights to be put on display. And that was the extent of my Christmas decorating! I'm planning on decorating a lot more (but still not doing too much) next year. We'll just have to figure out a way to keep the cats from eating the tree. By the way, this December our cat Eleanor figured out how to open the door to the spare bedroom where the tree was kept most of the time. So I still had to deal with hairballs with shiny green tinsel in them. Gross. The door to that room is strange, and you just push on it to open it. She learned how to throw her weight into it enough to get it open (no crazy doorknob turning cat tricks here).

My parents came to visit the day after Thanksgiving, and brought Liam his first Christmas present: a Leapfrog activity table! He loved playing with that thing for about a month. Then it started acting up and I took it back. Of course, Target didn't have anymore, so I couldn't get him another one.

At the end of November, FBCR had Baby's First Christmas, which was a sweet little gathering for all the families who had babies celebrating their first Christmas. Liam got to see his church friends, most of which could already crawl then. He could just sit there and look at them go. Poor kid. I think he enjoyed it anyway! Closer to Christmas, we took him to the Richardson library to see the Christmas village and the lights. Unfortunately, he fell asleep on the way there, and just really wasn't happy when we took him out of the warm carseat and woke him up to be in the cold. We didn't stay long!

This year, we didn't get Liam much in the way of presents. Three reasons why: he's a baby and really has everything he needs and doesn't yet know what he wants, money is tight, and I knew he'd get plenty of gifts from other family members. We got him a new board book that's personalized with his name and picture in it, and we got him some teething rings. He loves to chew on them! That was it from us.

Christmas Eve, we packed up and headed to Louisiana to celebrate Christmas with family. Liam was a good little traveler and did well in the car. We had Christmas that evening with my family. As predicted, Liam got the most presents! He got all kinds of toys, some clothes, the movie "Dumbo" and a Fisher Price sing-along CD. His favorite was the sock monkey from his Aunt Melissa and Uncle Tony. We call him Socky. I think he enjoyed opening presents, but he had refused to nap that afternoon, and I could tell he was very tired. He didn't smile much but was very well-behaved.

The next day, we went to visit my great-grandmother, Liam's great-great-grandmother. We had a really nice visit with her and she held Liam some. He's quite squirmy these days and hard to hold on to. I'm very thankful for that visit because she passed away last night. It's sad that Liam will not remember her at all, but he's blessed to have had a great-great-grandparent for a little while at least. Most don't get that privilege.

After that visit, we went to the parents' house of my friend Amanda for JAAG Christmas. Liam got to meet his AAG aunties for the first time! JAAG stands for Jennifer, Amy, Amanda, and Glenda, and we started calling ourselves that our freshman year of high school (just easier than saying all of our names). It stuck, and people still refer to us as JAAG. This was our 17th annual JAAG Christmas, the first one being in 1995. Amanda and Ian got Liam some new All-Stars for him to grow into. Amanda's mom played with him a bunch. Everyone loves Liam!

The next morning, on our way back to Dallas, we stopped by Glenda's parents' house so they could meet Liam. We had a fun time visiting. Liam was very quiet at first, but opened up a little after awhile. At least he was well-behaved.

That was Liam's first Christmas! Now for pictures:

Liam and His Band...The Encore So Far

In preparation for Liam's second band, we're going through the process just like we did with the first one. He had an evaluation as if he had never had a band before. Next came the DSi scan. That was done Wednesday, December 14th. And once again, just like last time, I didn't take any pictures. So I still don't have a picture of him with the stocking over his face smushing it. It still didn't bother him. It only took two people to get the pictures done this time as opposed to three. Liam is a pro now and they only had to take three shots to get a good one.

After a three week break from wearing a band, he got his second one on December 28th. We didn't have nearly as many skin issues the first week like last time, so he got to start wearing it full time pretty quickly. It also doesn't seem to bother him to have it on this time either. We're back in the routine of cleaning the band and his head each night.

Yesterday (January 4th), he had his first adjustment appointment in the new band. His head had grown a millimeter and there was already progress on the back of his head! In just the first week! That's huge because with the first one, it was 3 or 4 weeks before we saw any growth or progress. He is now on a two week adjustment schedule, so we only have to go every other week.

This band was made to last 12-14 weeks. Hopefully he won't have to go that long, but it'll be ok if he does as long as his head improves to where it needs to be. He's not getting another band. This is it, so we have to make it count!

Pictures from his first day with the new band:

Liam at Seven Months

This first year is flying right by! Pretty sure it's socially acceptable now to start planning his birthday party. It's Beatles themed (!) because he's too young to have a say in it :)

At seven months, Liam is a delightful little boy. He's so much fun! He's also super busy, always moving and messing with something. He has a great belly laugh now and he's still super ticklish. I love hearing his laugh. He's starting to show some affection. He reaches out to me and will kind of give me a hug, which is his arms out and laying his head on my shoulder. I'm pretty sure he's attached to me :) I'm definitely attached to him. I'm so thankful I still get to be at home with him everyday. If he sees me looking sad for some reason, he will look at me and start laughing. I really think he's try to cheer me up!

I don't know any official stats since he doesn't have another check up until nine months, but he weighs at least 20 pounds and is probably about 30 inches long. He is wearing 9 month size clothes now.

As I mentioned in the previous post, he "talks" a lot. I wonder what he's trying to say. He still loves the ABC song, and he likes it when I count for him. I get huge grins for that. He likes to be read to, but he wants to be touching the book the whole time. After I finish, I give him the book to play with because he loves to turn the pages and pick up the book and turn it back and forth.

Sitting up is no big deal now. He's a pro at it and has been for a long time. Of course he still tumps over sometimes, but not very much and it's usually because he's looking up at something and loses his balance. He loves to play with his toys, especially his Leap Frog toy my parents got him for Christmas (they gave it to him the day after Thanksgiving). He loves pushing the buttons and there's even a book-like page to turn back and forth. I'm afraid it's going to break soon he turns it so much!

He is mobile, but still isn't crawling. Rolling is his main mode of transportation, and he can cover a large area in a very short amount of time. He's constantly getting up on his hands and knees and rocking back and forth, and then he scoots backwards. So he's got backward crawling down. Whenever I see him wanting to go forward, I get the song, "Forward Motion," by Relient K stuck in my head, because he definitely struggles with forward motion. He does get frustrated sometimes that he can't go forward to get something he wants, but that's good. The frustration is what's going to make him crawl before too long. I'm kind of hoping he waits until after Christmas to crawl. That would just be more convenient for me! It really could be any day now, though. We really need a gate because we do have stairs in our apartment that go down from the living room to our front door. We are planning to move in a few months to a place without stairs inside.

He hasn't pulled up on anything yet, and I'm actually thankful for that. He's tried to in his crib, but when he was already in  a sitting up position. He doesn't attempt it from laying down. He does try to sit up using his own strength when he's laying down, though. He can actually halfway pull it off and get himself into a position where he's propped up on one of his arms. If I stand him up, he will lean on the couch and stand up by himself, but he usually starts trying to bounce by bending his legs and loses his balance. He loves to bounce! If his feet touch the floor in any way, he's trying to bounce.

He is eating a lot of different solid foods now. I'm making all of it except carrots. When he gets carrots, they are organic jarred carrots because of the nitrate levels. I'm hoping to start making his own cereal soon. He typically gets oatmeal these days instead of rice cereal. I think butternut squash is the best deal going for baby food. It's easy to cook, easy to mash up, and one squash makes a ton of food! He has had sweet potato puffs and he likes them. He will pick them up and keep them in his hand, but he won't put them in his mouth after he picks them up. It's so weird because these days, pretty much anything that winds up in his hands goes into his mouth. But not those! He's still not very interested in a sippy cup, but he does love to drink from a regular cup that I hold. The other night when he was getting a bath, he picked up the cup in his bath and put it up to his mouth to get a drink of water. I stopped him because the water had soap in it, but I was impressed! He still doesn't have any teeth, and I don't even feel any on the verge of coming in.

Now it's time for pictures. He's a little cutie!

Talking Liam

At almost seven months old, Liam is quite the talkative baby. He loves to babble on for long periods of time. Sometimes, he even babbles really loudly. He just loves to hear himself talk. Which is crazy, because I'm a quiet person, and to a lesser extent, so is Will.

Of course, the vast majority of his sounds are just babbles, syllables strung together in an incoherent pattern. But sometimes, he does say actual words. Words I've heard him say include:

Hey - This is pretty much the only word he uses properly. He only says it to me, Will, and if he sees one of the cats. He loves saying, "Hey!"

Hi - I've also heard this variation of Hey. He doesn't say it as much, though, which is strange because whenever we wave to him, we say "Hi" instead of "Hey."

Da Da - He started putting these syllables together a long time ago. "D" sounds are some of his favorite sounds.

Daddy - He will occasionally bust out the Daddy while he's streaming together D sounds. It's so cute!

Dad - Just recently he started saying Dad, with the D sound on the end. He was up for about an hour in the middle of the night last night, just as happy as he could be. He kept saying "Dad" over and over. Will was not amused since it was waking him up!

Of course, I don't think he associates any of these words with Will just yet. But it's still precious to hear them.

Cat - That's also a new one. He hears the word cat a lot, and the other day he said it.

Speaking of cats, last week, Liam also kind of meowed last week and for a split second Will and I both thought it was our cat Squirt. It sounded just like her.

Bye Bye - B sounds are also fun for him, and he usually says Ba Ba over and over, but sometimes it does sound like Bye Bye. I've also heard him say what sounded like "Bye bye Daddy." Another funny string of babbling he said one day sounded kind of like, "I don't want to," but of course, he didn't really say it.

My question is, do any of these count as a first word since he's not really associating them with anything specific (that I can tell)? I haven't counted them as such since I don't know if they really count. But if they do, then his first word was "Hey."

Perhaps he will be an early talker. I've been trying to get his babbling or "talking" on video, but when he sees the camera, he just stops! I love his talking!

Liam and His Band...Progress Pictures

This morning, Liam had his evaluation for his second DOC Band. It was just like the first time pretty much in that they took pictures of him from several angles and measured his head. In the update in the previous post, I mentioned that if the insurance claim for a new band is filed before the end of this month, we only have to pay 30% of it. So we are trying to get things done quickly, hence this evaluation today.

Looking at the pictures, you can definitely tell progress has been made. You can also tell that he still needs more time in a band. Also, you can see that's he thinned down some! And he has more hair. Cutie pie.

Original Headshot: 4.5 months

Today's Headshot: 6.5 months

September

Today

September

Today

September

Today

Liam and His Band...The Final Adjustment

Today was Liam's final adjustment for his DOC Band. At an adjustment, they shave off some more of the foam to make room for his head to grow. Today, they took off almost all of it in the two places he's been growing. That means he will officially outgrow his band by next Tuesday. However, his head is unfortunately not finished with its transformation. He has made great progress and it looks way better than it did, but it still needs some work. Next week at his exit appointment, they will take pictures of him and do another 3D image of his head. Then we'll truly be able to see the progress.

So we have a decision to make. Barring some miracle growth spurt, his head will still need some work. The therapist said his rate of head growth has been on the low end of the spectrum that they typically see for kids his age. Overall, it's grown about 8 mm, which isn't much. But we can't make his head grow at a faster pace. That means he needs another band. However, we really cannot afford another band. We couldn't afford this one, but the burden was eased by some very generous friends.

That means he will not be getting another band, especially not right away, and possibly not ever. We will see. It's possible to take a break and get another band later. I wouldn't mind him having another band and all that goes along with it: the daily cleaning of his head and band and the weekly adjustment appointments. The past seven weeks (really more like 9 if you count the appointments before he got the band) have gone by quickly.

I will feel bad if his head stays like it is, though. It's still flat on the top left on the back of his head. The bottom half of his head has rounded out nicely, though. I think it wouldn't be a problem as long as he has hair, but if ever goes bald (either by choice or not) it might look a little funny.

UPDATE:

Well, we realized that since we have met our out of network deductible with this first band, then getting another one before the end of the year is the cheapest way to do it. According to someone at Blue Cross, we would have to pay 30% of the second band. He really does need one. I honestly think another month or 6 weeks would be enough to get his head looking right. So now we're trying to fast forward things a little bit, and he has an appointment for an evaluation tomorrow. It will be just like the first one where they took pictures and looked at his head. So scratch what I previously wrote about not getting another band for awhile. It's actually now or never on a new band!

Liam at Six Months

Six months already? Wow! It's kind of hard to believe. I can officially start planning his first birthday party now, right? Still too soon? Ok, I'll wait another month or so. Not that I just can't wait for him to be a year old, but I think his party will be so cute!

Six months is a fun age. Liam seems to be learning and doing new stuff all the time. He's not a fragile little baby anymore. He's a big boy! Literally. His six month stats:

Length: 29 inches (98th percentile)
Weight: 19 pounds (75th percentile) (There are some hefty 6 month olds out there, apparently!)
Head: 17 inches (They didn't tell me the percentile, but somewhere around the 25th, I think.)

Since his four month check-up, he has grown 2 1/4 inches, gained 2 pounds, 4 ounces, and his head grew half an inch. He's definitely not as chunky as he used to be. He is settling into being a long, slender baby. He didn't gain as much weight this time, and I think it's because he moves so much more now. He jumps like a mad man in his jumperoo. He's constantly rolling back and forth. He's basically never still unless he's sleeping. He does still have his chubby cheeks and chunky thighs, though! As for his head size, I honestly don't think anyone who measures his head gets the same number every time. They all seem to measure it at different places. I watch every week at Cranial Technologies, and there is some variation. Liam's head has obviously been undergoing some transformation since his four month appointment, but I think growing half an inch is really good!

These days, Liam is sitting up very well on his on. One day he was sitting up for just a couple seconds then falling over; then the next day he could sit up for long stretches. It's amazing how babies just literally start doing something well so quickly. He still falls over some, of course, but not nearly as much...plus he's got that DOC Band protecting him.

Liam's favorite song is the ABC song. If I sing it to him, he gets the biggest grin on his face! It has even been successful in calming him down if he's crying. I know it's this particular song that he enjoys because if I sing anything else, he just looks at me like, "Silly mommy. Why aren't you singing the ABC song?" Hopefully he will learn his ABC's at a young age!

As for other languages, we do expose him to several other languages each week. I count to ten in English, Spanish, and Japanese to him every day, and speak the little bits of Spanish and Japanese I know. I usually play some foreign talk radio in the background while we're playing just so that he can hear other languages being spoken. Supposedly (I'm not sure if this is true or not), at around 7 months babies have determined what sounds make up their native language, and they basically tune out unfamiliar sounds of other languages. But if they have heard the sounds of other languages before 7 months (and they keep hearing them), it will be easier for them to learn that language in the future if they choose to do so. Like I said, I'm not sure if that's completely true or not, but it has been proven that young children learn languages better than adults. I think there are other windows of language-learning time in the first few years of life. So it can't hurt him to hear other languages right now. We usually play Japanese, Spanish, French, German, and Chinese. Hopefully, he'll be a polyglot one day!

Liam's food horizons have expanded lately. He's been eating solid food for a few weeks now. So far he's had carrots (nay), butternut squash (yay), sweet potatoes (yay), and apples (yay, after the initial sour face!) along with rice cereal and oatmeal. So we're slowing adding in new foods. My plan is to make his baby food, and I'm hoping to start that up totally this weekend. I made the squash and apples, but gave him jarred carrots and sweet potatoes. He's only getting organic stuff, especially in this first year. On his official six month birthday, we let him try out a sippy cup. He's gotten good at taking his bottle, putting it in his mouth, and occasionally turning it up to get liquid out, although he doesn't do that every time. So I was just curious if he would kind of know what to do with a sippy cup. He grabbed it and put it in his mouth (although everything goes in his mouth these days), but he never turned it up (without assistance) to get liquid out. He preferred to play with it, of course, but I think he did well for his first time.

One of the new things he does is if he's sitting on my leg, he starts bouncing himself up and down (if his feet can touch the floor or couch). It's really cute and a good workout for his legs. I think he's trying to do what he does in his jumperoo. Also, he's quite grabby these days, and nothing within his reach is safe. He gets a tight grip on it, and it goes straight in his mouth (unless mommy stops him, of course). He is always messing with something! He also loves to eat his feet these days. They must taste delicious. He will also occasionally put his knees under him when he's on his belly. I can tell he wants to go places! He already can a little bit. He's been known to end up several feet away and facing the opposite direction from where you put him down.

Liam also has a sense of humor now and laughs at things that are genuinely funny. It's the greatest thing ever! Funny faces, jumping up and down, funny noises...they all make him laugh, along with the tickles. So cute! He also is quite talkative. He's always babbling and making different noises. One of his favorite things to say is "hey." Sometimes he even says it back to us if we say it to him. He also says "hey" to the cats, and then they run in the opposite direction. He likes those cats so much, but they don't want anything to do with him. One day, he'll be buddies with Squirt at least...hopefully.

Now for pictures! He sat up this time! He only fell over a couple of times :)

In all the ones with his band on, his mouth is wide open, so this is the best one!