Being Sara

Xander is finally shifting out of this phase, but it was pretty funny for about a month - Daddy was the man, and it didn’t matter what we were doing or where we were, if Daddy wasn’t in the room and/or paying attention to Xander, he was upset. It didn’t matter if I was playing with him, or feeding him, etc., if Daddy was home and happened to walk through the room, and didn’t stop to play with Xander, then he would cry - even if Daddy did stop to say hello and kept going, Xander would cry when he walked away. I suspect this was more a man thing than just a Daddy thing - when Xander visited my parents, he did the same thing when my father walked out of the room. I worried for a little while that we were entering a stranger anxiety phase, but he’s still fine when we leave him at day care. He gets mad if he’s alone in a room, but I’m starting to become an acceptable substitute for Daddy again

baby, babies, parent, parents, parenting, mother, mothers, motherhood, phase, development, developmental milestone, favorite parent

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This last Sunday (the 28th of July) we were visiting Zach’s mother for her birthday. While we were there, Xander finally got up the courage to take a few unassisted steps! We talked him into doing this a few times that day, but I haven’t been able to talk him into it since. He has started using his walker this week - and the smile on his face when he’s motoring around the living room is priceless! Now we’re just wondering how long before Xander starts wobbling along on his own…

baby, babies, parent, parents, parenting, mother, motherhood, baby steps, baby’s first steps, walk, walking

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Around 6 months I bought Xander some sippy cups in the hopes to start transitioning him. Xander thought they were great fun to chew on, but didn’t really understand their purpose. I continued to give him the sippy cups every few weeks, but continued to get the same results. Now that Xander is getting closer to a year old, I thought that maybe we should increase our efforts. I did a little research on Baby Center, but found that sippy cup training isn’t as easy as it looks. One of the mothers who commented said that her child did the same thing with traditional sippy cups, but understood how to use the kind with straws right away. Inspired, I purchased a sippy cup that had a straw, with the hopes that Xander would just understand what to do with the cup. I should have expected that Xander would have just as much fun chewing on the straw as he did chewing on the older sippy cups. So now we’re back at square one. If anyone has any suggestions on how to convince my kid that drinking out of sippy cups is way more fun that chewing on them, I’d love to hear them!

baby, babies, parent, parents, parenting, sippy cup training, bottle weaning, sippy cup

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Now that Xander is motoring around the house at impressive speeds, his shins have started to get bruised. Last night I was looking at his legs I realized that this is going to be a permanent state of affairs for the next several years - I can’t think of a little kid who doesn’t have bruised shins on a regular basis. And that made me sad - it’s starting already, he’s turning into a little boy, and soon I’ll start to forget what bruise-free shins look like.

Speaking of bruises, boy is Xander turning into a bruiser! He doesn’t realize that he can hurt other people, but he’s learned how to pinch, and slap, and if you’re not paying attention, a well-placed head butt from the boy could give you a bloody nose! I keep trying to teach him “gentle” and mimic the behavior for him, but it’s not sinking in yet - any suggestions?

baby, babies, parent, parents, parenting, 10 months, crawl, crawling, shin, shins, bruised shins

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We have all heard that infants naturally possess the ability to swim. I was unable to test the theory when Xander was small (and I’m not sure I could have just let him go in a pool of water…) but now that the weather is finally warm, we have been able to take him into the water. Xander’s first trip was on Father’s Day. It was not as big a hit as I had hoped. The weather was a bit cool, and the water was rather cool as well, and Xander did not think that jumping into that cold water was any amount of fun.

Over the past few weeks we’ve had three or four more opportunities to go swimming, and each time Xander gets more and more comfortable in the water. Our last two trips, he’s actually put his face in the water - and keeps putting it in, almost as if he wants to taste the water. We’ve been having lots of fun with Xander in the water, and I’m hoping that the little guy continues to enjoy water play.

babies, baby, baby swimming, beach, infant, infant swimming, infants, mother, motherhood, mothers, parent, parenting, parents, swim, swimming, water

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