Justin at 9 Months

Justin turned 9 months today!! He got to spend the morning having a little playdate with his buddy, Knox. Of course I didn't think to get a picture of them, but here is a little about what he's been up to this month.

Justin is on the move! He went from belly-crawling to crawling in less than a week! I can tell he is going to be all over the place very soon! This play piece of cheese and the chair are what got him moving the first day!

He loves to crawl over to Evie's little table and chairs and pull one of the chairs or the whole table back and forth. Eric calls it his afternoon arm work-out. heehee He wants to pull up on everything. I've even seen him trying to pull up on the wall!

He loves to eat and try new foods. Sister even took a turn feeding him one day.

     He definitely likes the sippy cup!

 Poor thing gets to play with dolls, tea pots, and lots of girly stuff sometimes.
 Here he is having a tea party with Evie.

He is just such a happy little guy. He wakes up happy most of the time and is so easy to put down to sleep (most the time!). I had to take him with me to the vet yesterday. I wasn't sure how it would go since he and Max are such buddies and I didn't know if he would get upset seeing Max at the vet. He did great and just sat in his stroller and laughed the whole time! I am so thankful every day for his pleasant demeanor and I pray he stays that way! ;-)

He thinks it's fun to drop things and of course, have mom pick them up over and over (especially from his high chair). I guess he's learning cause and effect.;-)

He doesn't have any teeth yet, but I think those are coming soon as the drooling has increased lately. Everything goes in his mouth!!

He has quite a good grip and likes to pull hair. Poor Evie has been the victim of this when he actually pulled some of her hair out!

He is finally sleeping all night on a regular basis. (Although I know since I just wrote it here and he is about to start teething that that will most likely change soon!) I will enjoy it while it lasts, though!

He is babbling a lot now. It mostly sounds like Nana-Dada-Yaya-Gaga. Still working on Mama.

Didn't you know this is the new way to hold your paci?  I guess he even has a little sense of humor!

Baby Dedication

On January 8, 2012, we participated in our church's baby dedication.
We dedicated Evie and Justin to the Lord and vowed to teach them about Him. What an honor and a huge responsibility this is! This is the most important job we have as parents. We are so thankful to have such a wonderful church family to help support us in raising our children.
The verse that we chose for both of them is Zephaniah 3:17-
"The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."
We pray that they will always feel God's presence and trust in Him.

Valentine's Photo Booth

Two of the moms in our play group at church put together a photo booth for our Valentine's Party. They had a cute background and made creative props and took our pictures. It was so fun! Thanks A &A!
Here are some of the best ones of Evie and Justin:

This is typical of what I get of her sometimes!! Just gotta laugh!!

Evie is actually very fond of Luke (and sometimes calls him Lukey), but wasn't fond of him being so close to her I guess. As Ashley said, he learned at an early age how fickles girls (especially 2 year olds) can be!

Justin laughing

Here is a video of Justin laughing at Evie during dinner one night. I think you can hear all of us laughing at one point.
Excuse the carrots on his face! He sure does think his sister is funny- and she really is!
She actually speaks very well normally, but, I don't have a clue what she was saying this night.

Just hit the play button to play it.
Justin's 8 month post is below.

Justin at 8 Months

Time just continues to fly by!! I can't believe it is March and this little guy is 8 months old!

Here are things he was doing this past month for my memory:
*He is rolling all over the place. I will put him down on the blanket facing one way and come back and he is at the other end of the rug facing the other way. For this reason, changing his diaper and getting him dressed has become somewhat of a wrestling match. It's not necessarily that he doesn't want to do those things, he just wants to move. As soon as you lay him down, he tries to roll over (to the left). He sleeps on his tummy most of the time now. He will do a 360 on his tummy when playing to get to what he wants.

*He is loving eating. He has tried a few bites of steamed carrot pieces and has been able to pick puffs up and eat them well since about 6 months, so I'll be trying more really soft finger foods soon.
*He thinks his sister is so funny and this has translated to funny meal times. He will just start giggling at her and then she will do more to make him laugh. We don't even try to stop them right now. It's so cute how sometimes he will turn his head to the side when he is laughing- like he is shy. It just melts my heart. I hope to be able to post a video of him laughing in another post.
*He can sit up by himself for a long time now. He will roll over if he wants to go get something, but he's pretty stable now. It's fun because he and Evie can sit and play with things together. Of course, she is going through the "Mine" phase about some things, but so far it's not too bad. Although I'm sure it may get worse once he gets more mobile.

*He just started babbling more and we think he said Dada for the first time on Eric's Birthday!
*Naps are getting better as I'm trying to keep him on a schedule of naps at a certain time rather than within a time interval. He usually takes a morning nap, afternoon nap, and a cat nap before dinner most days. I'm hoping this will help him take longer naps.
*Reading books to him is just a funny task. I honestly don't do it as much as I think I should or want to (and definitely not usually before bed time) because he just gets SOOOO excited! He starts kicking and laughing and trying to grab the book. He's always been this way with pictures/books/etc.

*Everything goes in his mouth!! Books, seatbelts, bibs, toys, diapers, socks, etc.
*I think I've said this before, but Justin and Max just LOVE each other! Max comes and sits by Justin whenever he is on the floor playing. Of course, Justin just goes after him with both hands and mouth and Max takes in all in stride and even continuously comes back for more. I guess he likes the attention!

*We have been enjoying the nice weather lately and spending more time outside. Justin enjoys swinging and hanging out in the stroller while sister plays. They both love it when I run around with him and play like he is chasing Evie.

We all love you little guy! Happy 8 months!

Justin at 7 Months

Our little guy is now 7 months old and once again I am behind on posting this. I almost decided to take a break from the blog for awhile, but I went back and looked at the posts since he's been born and I'm so glad I documented what I did because I had already forgotten some things. The whole reason I started blogging is to document our lives and share pictures with family and friends, so I think I'll keep on!!! Plus it makes me sit down and upload pictures and edit them (something that seems to take me forever sometimes!). I need to go back and write about Christmas and some other things, so there will be several posts out of order.

We've had 7 fun months with this little guy so far! It's neat to see his personality starting to shape up even more. It's amazing how we can already tell how different he and his sister are going to be in some aspects. Justin is much more physically agressive, but he is more easy-going when we are out and about. He is also more adaptable with his schedule and can adjust easily. He is sitting better on his own, but still will fall over after a bit so I usually put the Boppy pillow around him. He is rolling over more and more. He isn't crawling, but can reach really far on his belly to get what he wants.

He has started to sleep on his left side. He still LOVES his paci. He is able to put it back in by himself now so I have put several in his crib. The funniest thing is when he will  have one in his mouth and one in each hand and tries to put them all in his mouth at the same time. Some of his favorite toys are his wheelie toy, mini tool bench, books that play music, Mega Bloks and our cat, Max. He loves to be tickled and has such a fun giggle. He is finally starting to take one longer nap some days, but most of the time still 45 minute naps. He's a pretty good night sleeper, but wakes once a night a couple times a week. He is loving food now which is good because in the beginning I wasn't sure how it was going to go because he just wanted to grab the spoon and the bowl.

A highlight of this month was going to Nashville to visit my family and celebrate my Grandmother's 90th Birthday. She means a lot to all of us and is the rock of our family. It was so nice to be able to all get together and celebrate. Justin got to meet lots more cousins and did so good traveling. He got to spend some special time playing with his cousins Anna and Lilly. Of course, Grammie and Pop got some time to love on him, too!

Beauties in Blue

It's looking like both of our kids are going to have blue eyes like their Daddy. I love putting them in blue because it makes their eyes stand out. I think we MAY have turned a corner with Evie as she is willing to let Justin sit beside her and take pictures finally. (Something this Momma is very happy about!) Here are a few from the other day when they were both in blue.