Every month on my Instagram I upload a milestone photo of Eric but it is really rare that I update you all on his progress and development. Part of it is because he changes so much that I find it hard to keep up with myself. The other part is that I just don't really ever have the time!
But I feel like lately he has changed a lot. The little tiny baby we brought home from the hospital who was all nose and was swamped by his going home outfit has gone and now we have a babbling, crawling, cruising toddler. And whereas I am saving making a video update until he turns one, I wanted to share his progress here instead.
Photo: Michael Ivan Photography |
Sleeping
At about eight months Eric took a turn with his sleeping....again. Instead of sleeping through the night he started waking at about 4am again. And sometimes he was fully awake. I would have to sit in his room for about an hour, reading to him and stroking his back until he fell back to sleep. We knew this couldn't go on and that we had to make a change. Ryan did a little bit of reading and we realised that Eric just wasn't going to sleep early enough. So we switched up his bedtime routine.
Now he goes to bed in between 7pm and 8pm. We give him his last feed in a dimly-lit living room, change his nappy and then take him upstairs to bed. Then it's a story, a goodnight kiss, and then he's left to it. Normally he will go straight down but if he doesn't we do practise some controlled crying so that he learns to settle himself. All being well he will sleep until 7am the next morning, only stirring in the night if his dummy falls out.
Cruising & Crawling
Eric army crawled from about six months, but proper crawling didn't fully click until he realised how he could pull himself up into a standing position. To me that makes no sense but something in him must have twigged. However now his movement of choice is cruising. He loves toddling around the place holding on to whatever he can to get himself from A to B. He is also really happy when he's walking clutching on to our hands. On a couple of occasion he has decided to stand up unaided so walking isn't too far off, but you can tell he needs to build his confidence up a bit more first.
Photo: Michael Ivan Photography |
Eating
There isn't really a food we've given Eric to try that he hasn't liked. He was a bit iffy with avocado for a while but I persevered and now he doesn't really mind it. The only issue we have with food is that Eric still doesn't have any teeth, meaning that everything we give him needs to be either super soft, melt in the mouth or mushed up. Trying to come up with creative ideas for lunches and dinners can be tricky (we do use jars quite a bit), but whenever we go out there is usually something on the children's menu that he can eat which is nice because he gets to be a part of the dining experience and eat from a big boy plate.
Talking
We have a very vocal baby on our hands nowadays. For a while everything was "mama" but now Eric can say "dada" "baba" and "gaga" too. We could have sworn he said "daddy" the other day so we are holding out to catch him doing that again. There's no real pattern to when Eric 'talks' but listening to him babble away when he talks to his toys or after you say something to him is the cutest thing.
Personality & More
Eric is still a really chilled out baby but he does have moments of being an absolute monkey. If there is something wrong he will let you know about it. If he's hungry he's grumpy, if he's tired he's grumpy....and heaven forbid you should take something off him he's not meant to have! But these instances are really rare and 99.8% of the time he is an absolute joy. He is happiest when he is looking at his books, or cruising around the furniture, and he still loves cuddles with daddy (although he's starting to want to snuggle into me more which makes my heart melt). He really likes watching The Gruffalo's Child, and more recently Tangled - he thinks Pascal is hilarious. We must have had that film on at least thirty times. I don't mind though - hearing his laugh is so worth it.
It seems like out of the blue Eric will do something amazing. And over the past few months he has clapped along to others doing the same and learnt to wave. He loves doing the latter and will quite happily wave not just to other people and babies but also to inanimate objects (which I'm not going to lie does freak me out a little bit).
At the end of January Eric started going to a childminder. I really needed to have some time to myself during the week to focus on blogging or YouTube or to just do housework. Eric is so inquisitive that I don't really get a minute during the day to do very much. He only goes for one full day a week but this is plenty of time for me to get things done.
Even just writing this I can't believe we now have a 10 month old. It simultaneously seems like a minute and a lifetime since Eric was born and I'm still in awe of the fact that we are starting to think about his 1st birthday celebrations!
He is coming on leaps and bounds, he looks so grown up these days I can't believe he's only 10 months! I love how happy and content he is, he's such a little joy to be around! He also has the brightest smile and gives the best cuddles - I can't wait until he's fully on his feet and racing around!
ReplyDeleteSarah :)
Saloca in Wonderland
It's so strange thinking about him being a newborn now. I found one of his 'up to 1 month' sleepsuits the other day and it looked so small. It really won't be long before we have a toddler on our hands - it's such a scary thought but a stage I can't wait for because he will have so much more independence when the walking clicks.
DeleteJackie O xo