Crawling, Standing, Walking, Running!?!

Is it time to practice sitting and pulling up or nap time?

Tofu - yum!

Miles and his cute girlfriend, Nova.

So sweet!

One of the hazards of being close in age to your cousin and having a lot of hair for a baby!

The requisite "cousins" picture. Aren't they getting big?

Reading a book after a bath.

Tonight I'm thinking "where do I start?" It's been a busy week. Here's a quick rundown:

Monday - Before Miles, I was a devoted yogi - going to classes a couple times of week. Since he's been born it has been hard to muster the energy to go but I turned a corner this week and am going to make yoga classes a new part of my weekly routine. For some reason I opted to reintroduce myself to yoga by going to a Monday night yoga sculpt class - which is basically yoga on steroids - using weights with the room heated to 110 degrees. On top of that I was only a few minutes early for the 7:30 pm class (after Miles went to bed) and I had to lay my mat down between a group of Swarm Dance Team members. So here I am with my post-baby, pale body amongst young, tan, in-shape, perky dancers in skimpy yoga outfits. Let's just say it was great motivation for me and I'll be back this week for another beating.

Tuesday - Ahhhh - my lovely husband gave me a spa evening for my birthday. What better way to recuperate from a grueling yoga class than a lovely massage and facial! I told Mike he could do this for me every birthday.

Wednesday - My bookclub got together to discuss "Beautiful Boy" - a good read and a fun time chatting with girlfriends!

Friday - Rach and I headed to Babies R' Us for some quality sister/baby time and shopping. Miles got a new sleep sack (size large) and some more baby food combos like butternut squash with apples - yum! That evening our family visited the Deiterings - Jill, Shawn and 15 month old Nova. They made a lovely dinner for us and we had a great time talking and watching the little ones roam all over and play.

Saturday - Our family enjoyed a delicious sushi lunch with Rachel, Graham and Corey at our favorite sushi spot - Little Sushi on the Prairie and then the boys stayed home to play and nap while Rachel and I got fitted for our bridesmaid dresses for Matt & Janelle's wedding. The fitting went well and the dresses are beautiful. The countdown is on until their September 11th wedding - we can't wait!

Sunday - Today was a nice family day - we cleaned, did laundry, grocery shopped, played, went for a walk and did yard work. Miles went down at his usual 6:00 pm bedtime and Mike and I enjoyed a quiet dinner of grilled chicken, salad and sweet potatoes. We had a wonderfully busy week and are ready for more adventures (Miles' first Easter) this coming week.

New with the little man
Miles is now a very proficient crawler and is not satisfied with staying on the quilts we lay down for him. He wants to constantly be on the go! We thought crawling this past month was a huge step and now he is excelerating his gross motor skill development by pulling himself up to a kneeling position and even standing! Mike and I could hardly believe our eyes - we seriously think he'll be running soon. He also tried tofu for the first time this week. Daycare reported that he didn't like it but I got him to eat some this weekend and he wanted more. He continues to practice eating finger foods - organic rice krispies and the tofu - but most of it just gets pushed around his highchair tray or ends up in his hair, stuck to his face or in his bib. It's good practice though! We made another homemade babyfood this week - sweet potatoes - and now have a nice store of it in the freezer (along with the broccoli that he refuses to eat) to pull out when we need it. Miles has also been jabbering up a storm lately. We even heard what sounded like "maaaaaaa!"

Miles' 8 month photos are in. If you'd like to see them go to www.legacystudiosmn.com and click on "ordering" at the bottom. Type in your email and the password is miles. The pictures are super cute!

Ferberization
So over the last month we've applied the Ferber method to Miles with great success. Basically, the Ferber method recommends that you always put your baby to bed drowsy but awake and to let them cry so that they learn to sooth themselves to sleep. Miles normally goes to bed at night without a problem - it has always been the night wakings that have gotten us up several times each night to either feed or comfort him. We've used this method and although we've had to torture ourselves with listening to him cry for 30+ minutes a few nights he barely cries anymore at night and has actually started sleeping through the night! I only got up to feed him at night once this whole week - and that was after he had been sleeping soundly for 9 hours. He now is consistently sleeping from about 6:00 pm to 6:00 am. Although it has been hard to hear him cry those few nights that he just didn't want to go down (especially because he's not a crying baby) we are firm in our belief that we're teaching him a good life skill - to be able to sleep well at night - and are so happy that we are now also getting good night sleeps. We're a happy, busy family now.