Seven Months!

I feel like we just wrote the six month post...Jackson turned seven months on Saturday! I swear, each month goes by quicker and quicker! I also feel that his development is speeding up too. He is doing something new almost every day!

Jackson continues to bring so much joy and love to our lives. He is such a happy baby and so much fun to be around. He seems to be very social, always smiling at the people behind us in check out lines or at the table next to us in a restaurant. We've also been getting together with some other babies and he seems to really love watching other kids and trying to interact with them.

Here are a few of the new things that Jacks is doing this month:

• He is sitting up very well and can sit and play with toys for quite some time. He still cannot fully pull himself up, but as I write this post he just moved from a crawling position to sitting up!  
• He is moving! Yay!(This actually makes me a little sad - mommy's baby boy is growing up way too fast!). He isn't necessarily crawling but does get on all fours, rocks back and forth and scoots backward. 
• Jackson is a jumping machine these days! If you hold him in a standing position he will bounce up and down forever. It is quite the arm work out! He also jumps much better in his Johnny Jump up and his Jumparoo. 
• We are still feeding him solids twice a day and he loves most foods. Avocados and sweet potatoes seem to be the favorites so far. We will probably introduce a third meal this month. 
• Still no tooth....
• He is starting to self-feed some. He eats banana mum-mums (rice snack) and does very well. We also recently started giving him some sweet potato puffs. He is working on drinking water from a sippy cup  but mostly just chews on it.
• Small objects are starting to get his attention and he is learning to pinch them between his thumb and finger. He is also raking toys and objects toward himself more.
• This boy is also starting to laugh more and more! Being tickled has been making him laugh for a couple of months, but he is now beginning to laugh at more things that he finds funny. For example, sometimes it is just hilarious when mom sings "Old McDonald!"

Abbs and Gramps visited at the end of February. It was a quick trip but he sure did think they were funny. They helped entertain him during his six month photos (we were getting close to nap time and someone wasn't very happy). I'll post some photos from that session later on. 

We also made a trip to Arlington to visit Candace, Jeff, and Caroline. Jackson did pretty well in the car and just loved watching everything Caroline did! She is warming up to him a lot and was helpful when it came to feeding and bathing him. She was also very generous and gave him all of her "baby" books. She is a big girl now and no longer needed them. :)

I'm sure I forgetting some of the highlights of his last month but that is all I can think of for now. Here are a few pics of the past month:

My little jogging buddy!

 He was having a hard time deciding whether he liked the peas or hated them..

He helped mommy put away his clean laundry. 

Practicing his building skills in his workshop.

Such a little cutie in his plaid. 

Being a silly boy with his mum mum! Also the first time in a high chair at a restaurant. 

He loves to prop his foot up on the high chair....he just chills while mommy fixes his breakfast. 

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Two of my favs. This is about as close as Max will let him get! 

This is the day that he "crawled" backward for the first time right under the chair! 

Just enjoying a beautiful afternoon outside with Mommy and Cooper. 

Preparing for March Madness. 

Sleepy boy. Isn't that the sweetest face you've ever seen? 

Our happy 7 month old! 

We are off to TN on Thursday for Easter. Hopefully little man travels well and is able to stick to his routine while away from home. We are all excited for the trip! I'm sure we will have pics to post and stories to share when we get back. 

DIY Stacked Picture Frame

I love a good DIY project and have really gotten into crafts the last couple of years. There isn't one particular craft that I am good at. I just enjoy making things when I can, especially for the house. Before I make myself sound too crafty, let me set one thing straight - I'm not very creative on my own but am pretty good at replicating projects that others have done (thanks Pinterest for the many ideas!). I know I am not alone in saying this - I'm certain that tons of people have stepped up their crafting, cooking, baking, photography, you name it since the start of Pinterest.

Anytime I am shopping or browsing the web for home decor ideas I try to see if any of the items are things I could make myself. I've completed a lot of DIY projects in Jackson's nursery. It has been a work in progress, but I think that I am finally finished with decorating it (ok, there may be one more small project....). My latest was making a stacked picture frame.

This past summer while I was still pregnant with Jackson, I saw these frames at Hobby Lobby and thought they would look adorable in his room:

I also had these frames pinned from Etsy.

And finally I found this DIY frame off of Pinterest at Positively Splendid.

My final project turned out very similar to this, although I did change a few things. I painted my stripes on instead of using vinyl. I also had a hard time finding velcro that would work, so I used the 3-M velcro strips. This makes it a little harder to change the picture out, but it is still possible. I am very pleased with the final product! Here are a few images of the process and outcome:

Finished! 

I inserted one of his photos from his recent 6 month shoot into the frame and just love it! What a precious picture. :) 

I replaced another item on his wall collage with this frame and really like how it looks with everything else. LOVE! 

Happy Half Birthday!

I CANNOT believe it....our sweet baby boy is a half of a year old already! I can vividly remember the day he was born and it most certainly does not seem like six months have passed. People always tell you that babies grow and change so quickly. This is something I believe that a person does not fully understand until they experience it for themselves. We now know how fast time goes by with a little one around.

We can truly say that the last six months has been the best six months of our lives. This may sound like a cliche, but it is so true! I absolutely love being a mother and I can tell that Mike enjoys being a father as well. Jackson makes it so easy for us - he is such a happy, easy-going baby. As sad as we are that he is growing so fast, we really enjoy the stage that he is in. He has so much personality at this point. Jacks smiles all the time and has the cutest little laugh. He loves to play. He is also getting really interested in the pets and anything that moves. It is fun to see how he reacts when in a new place - he swings that head side to side and takes in every last thing.

This is no surprise to anyone, but at his six month check up Jackson weighed in at 17 lb 4 oz (45th percentile) and was a whopping 29 inches long (100th percentile!). He is sitting up some now on his own without being supported, although he cannot pull himself up yet. He is pushing up a lot more when on his belly but not crawling. The poor little fella is also teething....you can tell he is in some pain and it just breaks my heart! He is eating solids twice a day now and is nursing 5 times (thanks God!). Jackson absolutely loved his first food - sweet potatoes. He even cried for more!

Not only do I love this age/stage because of how fun it is and all of the milestones he is reaching, but I really love that we finally have a pretty good routine down. His wake up time is somewhere around 8:00. He then nurses and we do solids shortly after. We have morning playtime and then he is ready for a nap by 10:30 and is now taking a long morning nap. Shortly after waking he eats his lunch (nurses) again and then has play time. His second nap is usually about three hours after he started the first. This nap is much shorter. He recently changed from 3 to 2 naps so it us usually the last sleep before bed. Jacks then eats again and then has more playtime. Daddy gets home around 5:00 to play and feed dinner before a bottle and bedtime. Bedtime is now around 6:45-7:00ish. For his bedtime routine, we dress him in his Pj's, read a couple of books, pray together and then give goodnight kisses (I have a hard time stopping!). He has grown to like this routine and knows when it is time for bed. I love that he enjoys it and can go to sleep so easily. It is great to have a routine because it is so much easier now to plan to do things than when his eating/sleeping schedule was all over the place. We also get more time to hang out the two of us. The only downside is that it is hard to go out to dinner or plan things at night.

Again, time is just flying! We will be planning his first birthday before long! We are so blessed to have this little sweetie in our lives. I love him more than anything! It seems just like yesterday that he entered our lives yet I cannot remember life without him.

Below are some photos of our growing boy from this past month:

 He had mixed emotions about trying peas for the first time, but ended up liking them!

 Monthly photo! 

He loves bath time and has gotten really into sucking on a wash cloth - not to worry, we give him a clean, non-soapy one! 

Sitting up like a big boy!  

First sleep over with Miss Linde! The Powells came to visit. 

Such a trooper while Mommy is out running errands. 

 Photos from Jennifer and Derek's wedding. He was such a little party animal! 

 Playing with Daddy and Cooper. 

More from the wedding. 

My sweet little Valentine. 

He is learning to play more independently. 

He is also learning to jump. He has the right leg down. Hopefully the left will catch up, if not he will be really good at left handed lay-ups! 

Love. 

Eating dinner. 

And eating his toes....this is a daily snack!

Here are a few pics from the previous months to compare: