The Clayton Column: Nine Months and Mobile!

This post is a bit delayed (Charlie turned nine months old last Saturday), but we were away for an adult getaway weekend in Kansas City with the Ashers and this week has been nothing short of hectic. Jack and Charlie stayed with both sets of grandparents while we were gone (one each night) and they did great. This was our first weekend away from Charlie and we missed both of them, but it was nice to get away. We had a relaxing weekend with shopping for the gals, golf for the guys, sleeping in (kind of) and staying out late (sort of). Anyway, onto the Charlie update.

Boy, has this little guy changed this month!! He went from being content to sitting where you place him, to a frustrated babe who wanted to move but couldn't quite figure out how, to an army crawler, to sitting up from lying down and finally to a full-fledged crawler (officially as of Monday - two days after he hit the nine-month mark). Those last three things (army crawling, sitting up and crawling) all happened within less than two weeks. Now he is ALL over the place and into everything. The fun part is how extremely happy this new found freedom makes him. He was a happy guy already, but now he's just always smiling and giggling.

June 10:

June 12:

He's also pulling up on everything and doing some cruising as well. We even found him standing in his crib Friday afternoon before we left for KC. Hot shot. This guy is fearless and he holds on to one piece of furniture with just the tips of his fingers as he stretches to reach for another piece nearby. He's often successful but when he's not, he just plops on his bottom and then tries again. He is determined!

He sprouted a second tooth on June 1, so he now has the two bottom middle ones. A third tooth is just about to break through on the bottom - any second now - and at his check-up today the doctor said his top gums look a little swollen, so we might be getting close there too.

Speaking of his check-up, that went really well this afternoon. We had to wait a little while, but we ran into Jason's cousin Gigi and her son in the waiting room, so that made the time go by quickly! Charlie now weighs 22 lbs, 9 oz, which is the 78.5th percentile. He is 29" long, or 73.3rd percentile. His head is still very large at 48.5cm - they didn't give me a percentile, so I'm assuming 95% or off the charts or something. All he said was "yep, still big." Charlie's on track with all his development. He had to get one shot (Hep B) but the brave little man didn't even cry. Wowzers!

Charlie's really into feeding himself these days and is getting tired of pureed foods. He still hasn't had any formula - we're getting so close, but I hate to jinx my milk supply by getting too confident that we'll make it the full year! I'm still nursing him in the morning and at night and I send two 6 ounce bottles of breastmilk with him for the day. He eats three meals of food per day and day care has even started giving him a snack in the afternoon. I gave them the OK to start dabbling with the food they provide and apparently he's eating like a champ at their mini table and enjoying whatever is placed in front of him. Today his paperwork said he had a chicken quesadilla for lunch - wow! He's still relying on the raking action most of the time, with the pincer grip mixed in, but he's able to get most of his food in his mouth. Don't get me wrong, he still makes a complete mess when he's eating, but we're used to that.

I think those are the updates for the month - it was definitely a big month for our big guy! As you can see our monthly photo shoots are getting more and more challenging. Definitely not a one-person job anymore with Mister Squirmy!