Maverick 9 month check-up

All about Maverick: Maverick was 9 months awhile ago and had his check-up March 1. I forgot to update his stats: he weighs 17# 11oz (10-25%), he's 27.25" long (25%), and his head is 18.25" (75%). He's been crawling since Brody's birthday around 8 1/2 months. His crib has been lowered since 2/15/13 after we found him pulling himself up and dangling over the rail. He has never been great with bottles/nursing formula/breastmilk and he continues to be a stinker. Although he can feed himself, he'll only drink half an ounce before moving on to more exciting things. Often he loves meal time, but really he'd prefer to eat Puffs non-stop. He babbles ma-ma-ma-ma and da-da-da-da, but when he's eating Puffs and he runs out he will say ma-ma in a specific and determined way to let us know that he wants MORE NOW! He's still not a great sleeper. He's such a little bird with eating that I feel like he takes after my eating a little bit very often! I admit we still feed him a small bottle some nights when he won't go back to sleep in the middle of the night. When we get ready to give him the bottle he gets so feverishly excited as if he's famished! He is very good at going down at night. I sing him "You Are My Sunshine" every night in his bedroom before laying him in his crib and he often goes down without crying. It took 1 night of re-sleep-training him to get to that point. The first night he cried 40 minutes, the next night he cried 1 minute. Best thing I ever did! The nights when he sleeps from 7pm to 6am are glorious, there are just to many nights when he's up at 2am too. He is a stinker about getting diapers changed and getting dressed. He's so quick about flipping over and oddly he does it just to flip over and bury his head in the floor out of excitement. I'd have everyday be pajama day if it weren't for needing baths! He LOVES bath time. He splashes non-stop from the minute he sits in the tub. Brody doesn't quite understand why he can splash and get me drenched when I don't allow Brody to do that. I cannot wait for summer to arrive when we can sit in the water at the splash pad. play in the water table, and sit in little warm wadding pools. I know he's going to love summer and swimming!

Why do I bother sometimes?

Brody & Maverick try on outfits for family pictures.  At 9 months old, Maverick is already perfecting the uncooperative role!

And because Maverick got to stick his tongue out, Brody wanted a picture where he got to stick his tongue out too!

We have a few events coming up that will require Brody & Maverick to be in nicer looking clothes. Well when they outgrow outfits so often I hate to invest a lot of money. As luck would have it, Easter, a Park wedding and our family pictures are all happening in a span of less than a month! Which means one outfit for Maverick and that's it, score! Brody is another story, but I'm savvy and I have that taken care of. So "Why do I bother sometimes?"...the question is what possesses me on a day after work when the kids get home at 5:50pm and we have dinner to get ready, mouths to feed, baths to take, story books to read, and boys to tuck in by 7pm and 7:30pm, why on Earth would I chose to play "dress up" and try on outfits for both boys to make sure they fit and photograph decently?? I don't know what it is about some kids, but Maverick does not want to have any part in getting shirts on, EVER! His outfit had 3 layers of shirts, what was I thinking? How can a string bean of an infant wiggle and flip around so ninja quick?! Did I mention that Brody must immediately take tags off just to try clothes on (which is a little annoying unless you plan to keep every item). Lesson learned. Thanks for "cooperating" boys! I have now noted that I indeed have 2 boys and so all future clothes will just be purchased and we will make them work without trying them on!

Capturing my Maverick at 9 months

Bright blue eyed Maverick in his giraffe hat.

Maverick is trying to yank off his giraffe hat!  Hilarious capture of his facial expression!

Ever tried capturing a quick picture of a crawling 9 month old on a high bed?  Well don't, it's next to impossible.

My sweetie

I love capturing their features up close when they're so young still.

Maverick playing with daddy.  He loves sticking his hands in his own mouth and anyone else's mouth.  His drool sure makes it less than appealing though!

Swimming Lessons

Swimming with the noodle to help him float.

Having a blast in the pool!

A turn in a life jacket.

Brody has been taking swimming lessons recently. As I expected, the trip to Arizona helped his confidence and skills a ton! Next week is his last lesson in this class. He's in a class of 3-5 year olds and then one parent per child goes in too. I signed him up for this so that he could have fun without getting so worried about being with a strange teacher without us there. Come April though, he's in a class of 4 kids with a teacher. I hope that he's able to get past his fear of strangers and have fun!

Arizona 2013

Brody and Heather make orange juice with GG

GG with Maverick and Mara

Brody makes Mara laugh.  Mara really seems to dig Brody, he got some really good belly laughs out of her!

Brody swims to the stairs; he really learned how to get around independently with the life jacket.  Mara and Sean are swimming too in the background.

Barry threw Brody into the water and I caught him in action right before he  splashed.

Maverick LOVES water and the pool was no different.  He splashed and splashed.

The Hebel family in front of the orange tree at GG's house (it was very bright outside so the picture has sort of a hazy exposure).

Some of the boys being weirdos.

The Park family with GG by her orange tree.

Sean thought he'd play photographer as he took our family pictures and I decided to cooperate really well.

Maverick staring longingly outside at GG's house.

Maverick cut another tooth on vacation and he's showing off the first four he has, his little bunny teeth!

The scene at Saguaro Lake

 Brody enjoys his sandwich at Saguaro lake (brrr, it was windy!!).

Picking every last orange off of GG's tree with my lovely assistants.

Sunset at GG's park

Brody and Maverick were playing together, I actually caught it on camera for a change!

Tortilla Flat: Brody and Barry went for a little hike up the "mountain".

Brody getting even better at swimming.  He learned to hold his breath and go under really deep.  We were so proud of how fast he learned.

We flew to Arizona last week with Sean, Heather and Mara to visit GG. The weather wasn't the greatest, but we managed to get in some swimming, making orange juice, visiting Tortilla Flat, among other adventures. All three kids were great on both flights! Sleeping for Maverick wasn't the best, but he was teething and he had a cold, not to mention the strange surroundings. It was fun to visit with GG. Brody learned a lot about swimming and we all had plenty of time to relax on our little get-away.

Winter Zoo Visit

Brody enjoyed the giant sand box.

Everleigh and Brody really liked the aquarium exhibits (so did Maverick and Briggs).

We went to the Minnesota Zoo the Sunday before we left for Arizona. Scott and Ami and kids were there too so we traveled through the exhibits together. Brody really liked the giant sand box. They all loved the aquarium exhibits too. Maverick really enjoyed watching the big tank because he could see all the fish swimming by. Briggs loved SHARKS!!

They grow up so fast...

One minute they're learning to crawl (sometime around Brody's birthday right after Mav was 8 months)...

The next minute they learn to pull up on furniture to standing (he learned 2/12/2013)...

Then they're warming up to get in trouble (this was 5 seconds before taking a tumble down and narrowly missing a nice blow to the head on the corner of the tile step by the fireplace)....

The next minute they remind you to lower their crib mattress as they dangle over the edge...

And before we know it, the two brothers will be playing hockey together!  For now Brody plays and Mav just gets excited when he gets the stick or puck so he can eat them.

Time flies in the life of two growing boys! These are just cell phone pictures, but it seems that a phone is always nearby to capture split second moments. Maverick learned to crawl the beginning of February, then February 12 he pulled himself all the way up to standing using the picnic table at daycare (Omi caught a quick picture of this). The boys are busy keeping me on my toys. I just went through and reorganized Brody's toys to eliminate the small ones that Maverick can swallow (after an incident when I caught him trying to swallow a picture hanging tac and had to dig it out of his mouth). Brody really wants to go outside everyday. It's a little tricky to coordinate with Maverick, but Barry tries to take him out sledding, making snowmen, and having fun running around in the snow.