Colds, avocado, and toes...

What do these three things have in common? Jack has experienced them all this month! :)

Wow. I can't believe how quickly this year is flying by. It's almost the end of April! I have so much to catch you up on. He just gets cuter by the day. Jack had his four month check up on the 9th. He did well with his shots. He weighed 19 pounds and was 27 inches. 96th percentile all around. Big healthy boy. He' s happy fella too, always smiling. At daycare today, they told me they call Jack the "gentle giant." I thought that was cute.

However, this little stinker still isn't sleeping well. And by not sleeping well...I mean he's getting up four times a night. To eat, to snuggle, to get rocked, for paci. You name it, I try it. Exhaustion doesn't begin to cover it. At work, I lose my train of thought, can't find the words I'm looking for, and get headaches frequently. I'm getting desperate. We may have to start, dare I say, crying it out. :(

We've tried a few more solid foods. Not every night. Maybe once a week. He didn't seem to care for the oatmeal. We tried a little avocado and that went over a little better. It's so fun to watch him "eat" or, I should say, push food out of his mouth with his tongue and make funny faces :)

Captions are as follows: "Here ma, let me help you with that."

"Whoa! What the heck is this? Are you trying to poison me!?!"

"I think I'm gonna be sick!"

"Wait, what? Papa eats this? Well, in that case, I'll give it a try. Not so bad!" :)

At daycare the other day, he gave his little head a good scratch. Made me sad.

But this shirt pretty much sums it up...

Jack has just recently started noticing the dogs. He absolutely loves them. He watches them eat in the evenings. He laughs at them and always reaches out for them. If he's sitting in my lap, he leans towards the dogs, to the point that he'll propel his body forward, onto his belly to reach out for them. I keep telling Kramer he should count himself lucky that Jack isn't crawling yet.

Jack is enjoying playing with toys more everyday too. He can get his little fingers around them and brings them right to his mouth.

The poor fella has had a cold for several weeks now. I think he's on the mend but for a while, we were having to prop him up to sleep. I believe this was a nap. Don't worry, we were very close by...

Last week, Jack "officially" found his toes. This relationship is still in the early phase but he is grabbing and holding them more and more. Only a matter of time before they find their way to the mouth. The pictures below were the first time he tried to get them up and grab onto them.

"Mom! Check these out!"

Love those sweet piggies!

Playtime when I got home...

Chewing on buzzy bee that Aunt Cristell got him for Easter :)

Smiling at daddy. Jack really loves his daddy. It's precious to see them play together and I look forward to watching them get closer. In the pictures below, he's wearing Dad's hat. I have very high hopes for these two buds :)

He's "little Justin" in this one...

Justin and I have been house hunting. It's taken up every weekend for the last several weeks, but today, Justin found out that we'd have to refinance the mortgage on the condo to be able to rent it out. So...maybe a new house isn't a reality. I bit of a bummer but it will give us more time to save up for a down payment. We'll have to wait and see.

Just cute pics

Not much to write in this one...just cute pictures :)

Playing on his mat. Playing in his chair.

Reading books already :) I love how he uses his little doughy feet to hold onto things too. He'll do that when I pick him up out of the crib or when I'm rocking him. He just wraps those chubby feet and legs around my arm. Melts my heart!

Oooo...sparkly butterfly wings. Thanks Aunt Tara for the book!

Chewing on Mr. Sunshine.

At first, Jack didn't really know what to think about this chair. He has definitely gotten the hang of it now. He'll grab onto toys, spin the ball with beads in it to make noise...he's quite proud of himself.

Few pictures of his first oatmeal.

Short and sweet. :) Hope everyone has a great week!

Easter Weekend

This little boy is changing faster than I can write about it. Every day is something new. Yesterday, in the tub, he was grabbing his feet. Not sure he's officially "found" them yet, but it's coming.

He's also losing his infant reflexes. The last moro or startle reflex he had was on the changing table about a week ago. It wasn't even a big one. Just a little startle. I've tried since to see if he can still get it by pretending to drop him, which only resulted in giggles and big smiles :) Super cute!

We went to Aiken over Easter weekend. We planned on celebrating John's 21st birthday and planned on going to the meet and greet for Jack, hosted by the ladies at my church. Unfortunately, Uncle Sammy lost his battle with cancer earlier in the week and his funeral was on Saturday. We had to cancel the lunch, but worse, I was so sick with a stomach bug, that I couldn't even attend the funeral!

Jack did great in the car. I was a little surprised at just how well he did! We stopped halfway in Orangeburg when he was ready to get out of his car seat. We got home by lunch on Friday and had a little time to catch up with Dad, Katie, and John. Then K, J, Justin, and I went to dinner at Mellow Mushroom. John got to order a beer and even got carded :) Then we went to a bar and proceeded to fill John and Justin with liquor. I was the DD. Finally, we went to a hookah bar. John really enjoyed that. I, however, started to feel queasy. Jack stayed home with his Mima ;) They had a grand time!

Long story short, by 1 am I was puking. And by 7am, I was in the ED for fluids and phenergan. My Easter weekend was pretty much shot. I was and still am pretty bummed about the whole thing. I feel like I missed Jack's first Christmas because we were traveling and I was so exhausted, as he was only 4 weeks old. And now I feel like I missed his first Easter because I was sick. Or at least I couldn't enjoy them like I wanted to. Oh well, there is always next year.  I am just so thankful that my mom and Katie were able to take care of Jack while Justin took care of me! Can't imagine trying to do all that without them! And I am so thankful that he didn't get what I had! He is still fighting off the congestion though, nine days in and I hope for some relief for him soon.

This is what it looks like when he grabs the camera ;) Cute huh?

Since I still wasn't feel well on Sunday, we stayed an extra night. Justin stayed too. That sweet fella couldn't stand the idea of leaving me and Jack in Aiken. We left Monday, just after lunch. Grandpa came home from work to see us off. 

Jack did super great on the car ride home too! Just one stop halfway in Orangeburg and a little playtime with Daddy before we hit the road again.

Jack is such a big boy in his activity chair. We still used the folded blanket under him so those little sausage toes touch the ground. He really can play in it though! I am amazed at how quickly he learns. There is one spinning wheel that he just rolls and rolls and rolls. And he drags the green music symbol in the picture below along its track and spins it too. He is so smart!

The next picture was blog worthy...the largest poo ever known to the Archie house! Blow out through the front, up the back. Holy smokes! What a mess! He made Daddy proud :)

Last night, we tried oatmeal for the first time. He seemed to enjoy the texture and pushing it out of his mouth. There may have been a swallow or two for the twenty plus spoonfuls :) He sure was cute trying it though. My attempts with the oatmeal tonight were not as successful. He was wanting the real deal.

More playing...

And pictures with Daddy from this morning. That boy sure does love his daddy!

Not sure the video below (as usual). Hope you all had a great Easter weekend! I'll try to post pictures of him in his cute little outfits soon!