Babies on the way, babies getting bigger.

No, I am not pregnant again (Not yet, anyway. ;)), but three people close to me have announced their pregnancies in the past week. All babies due in January '16. Just days after Oliver turns one. Which leads to this freaky but inevitable line of thinking: Oliver is going to be one! This mama is not ready for that. But by the time I am welcoming these babies into the world, by the time I am seeing their faces for the first time, and sharing in their parents joy - my own baby, who was such a tiny little thing just a blink of an eye ago, will have a whole year of life under his belt. Is it possible that I have baby fever again already? Maybe, just a tad. ;)

Part of the reason may be the stage that Oliver is at right now. In the last 2 weeks he has pushed from one milestone to another. He started rolling from back to front the day before he hit four months. A couple days later, he was pushing up on his hands and knees for the first time. Now, he 'knee-crawls'. It's this adorable half-crawl thing. See, he's figured out how to shuffle his knees back and forth in order to accomplish forwards movement, but he hasn't yet gotten the hang of moving his arms while still maintaining a hands and knees position. So he moves his legs, pushes forward, and then throws himself flat onto his tummy to pull his now-trapped arms out from under himself, then he gets back up on all fours and starts over. It's super cute, and pretty effective. He gets where he's going; and he's getting FAST. We have an area rug in our bedroom, it's the only part of the house that isn't hard floor. The rug is about 6 1/2 x 5 ft. I can't keep him on it. I am constantly moving him back to the center (he won't crawl on the floor, I don't know if it's because it is slippery, or cold, or hurts his knees, but he won't do it. He gets to the edge of the rug and then gets pissed).

I have mixed feelings about this boy getting mobile. It's nice in a way, because he's happy playing on the floor for quite a while now, which is a nice change after 4 months of "How dare you put me down! I must needs to be in your arms at all times!'. On the flipside, though, now he always wants to be on the floor. He is so restless now that he has discovered he can get around. Sit on the couch and play in my lap? Fuggedaboutit. We went to the Texas coast this weekend to see Derek's grandparents and he was down on the floor pretty much the whole time. He loved it, but it wore him out. Of course - there's no telling him that. Naps are for babies, guys. 

He still has no interest in learning to sit up on his own. He's got the balance for it, but he immediately tries to either stand up, or lean forward to get onto his hands and knees. (You can't move while you're on you're hiney, see.) Both result in a pleasant looking face-plant.

Oliver had his first tastes of lemon and avocado this week. He was pretty into the lemon. The avo? Not a fan, although he got really excited about the spoon. He also was not too interested in the banana we tried a couple weeks ago, so I think we'll be waiting a while longer before taking the plunge to foods.

Also, we pulled out the convertible carseat before we left town. His infant carseat was used when I got it and expires the end of this month. Plus, it's ever so heavy, now that the weather is warm I am never pulling the whole carseat out anymore. So we decided to graduate to the one that will grow with him. He loves it. He sits up higher in the car in this one and I think he can see more out the window. The only downside is that I don't have a handle to hang toys from anymore which, it turns out, is fine because his current favourite toy is a water bottle.

I'll leave you with this cuteness and let you get back to your holiday weekend.