Nine Months

Levi has now turned nine months and I am wondering where those nine months have gone! Wow... way too fast. We had his well check at the end of the month and here are his growth percentiles from that appt:

• Weight: 20 lbs. 4 oz. ....52nd percentile
• Length: 30 inches ....89th percentile
• Weight for Length: .....38th percentile
• Head circumference: ....75th percentile

He didn't have to get any shots this time, so he was excited about that. February started out to be a good month for all of us and then ended not so good for Grant & Levi. Levi is really mobile now and can get to his destination so fast that I barely turn away and he is gone! He is loving this.  He has recently started standing on anything he can find that will support him. His favorites are his leap frog table, balancing against the couch, the oven, and drawers/cupboards. Some of those things make us a little more nervous than others, but he is VERY careful when he tries to switch positions. It is actually really funny watching him do this.

He recently discovered that there is usually fun stuff to grab on this end table!



On the Saturday night before Valentine's Day, Grant & I went out to dinner at Bonfire and Levi got to hang out with Grandma and Grandpa Schmidt. It was a nice night out for the two of us and we beat the Valentine's rush! Levi has a Valentine's Day party at daycare and he came home with a very cute decorated bag full of Valentine's and candy. As well as a Valentine's poem for me, so cute! We decided to get Levi something fun for Valentine's Day as well, what better than a cupcake! He didn't know what to do at first, but once he figured it out, he played with it for a long time!

Everything was going well this month until the next week. Levi started getting sick again, with his cough keeping him up during the night. So at his well check I mentioned this and it was just a cold so his Dr. said it would take it's course. So we went home. I stayed home with him Monday and Tuesday and then when he woke up from his nap I noticed his top two teeth broke through. So he was having a rough day with his cough, a temp, and two new teeth! Poor kid. Wednesday I went to work and my mom stayed home with him, he was still coughing pretty bad but he was in a good mood. 

In the middle of the night Wednesday/Thursday morning, he started coughing harder and started wheezing where he couldn't catch his breath.  This was scary for us! We took his temp and he had another fever so we decided it was time to go somewhere.  Grant had a big exam in the morning so I called my mom to go with me to Children's and I told Grant I would keep him updated.  After being there for three hours, getting xrays, a bunch of dr's opinions, they said he had RSV. So they sent us home with a nebulizer and some prescriptions. We did the nebulizer every four hours and we noticed him getting better with every treatment. It was a very long week for us and we couldn't have done it without all of my mom's help! Saturday we were supposed to have an over night sitter and go to a friend's birthday party, but we decided Levi wasn't totally healthy yet so we asked Grant's mom to come over and stay with him for a few hours so we could make an appearance at the party. It was so great to get out, we needed it big time after the week we went through! Thanks Grandma Schmidt for that. :)  Grant started getting sick Saturday night/Sunday as well, so I was praying I wouldn't catch anything from the two of them.  So far, so good. Here are a few pictures of the sick ones..

I had to take Levi to his follow up appointment on the next Monday and it turned out he also had a double ear infection! This poor kid just couldn't catch a break. It was a blessing in disguise though, being on the antibiotics for one day made a huge difference and he was back to normal the next day.  Thankfully, because Grant ended up going into the Dr. as well.  He got the bronchitis from Levi and he was hurting pretty bad. He still isn't fully recovered and is having trouble sleeping being stuffed up.  My fingers are crossed we will end this week with a healthy household! I want to open the windows SO bad.

After Levi was over his sickness spell, he was back to normal playing all over! It was so good to see him happy again and wanting to play.

Another tooth broke this weekend so he is now up to five.  He is starting to eat a lot more of the food we eat and he doesn't like bottles too much anymore.  He loves french toast! Whenever he hears music he starts to dance, if he hears the door upstairs open he crawls over to the gate and waits to see who it is, he will chase balls all over the house for hours, he just loves to play with everything! It is fun to see him get more independent everyday. He recently discovered what is in the end table by the couch, so he usually opens this up everyday after daycare.



He also figured out that there are cup holders in the couch so he started bringing some of his balls over to them and throwing them into the holes. He laughs every time and it's fun to watch him now that he figured it out.

That is about all that is going on around here. I am hoping I continue to steer clear from all of the bugs going around and I hope that both Levi and Grant can stay healthy as well.  I am sure this next month will go by fast, time can slow down at any time now!

January & Eight Months

Instead of buying ourselves Christmas presents this year, Grant & I thought it would be fun to take Levi to a waterpark since he loves being in the water. So on January 2nd, which happened to be Carter Lou's 4th birthday, we took both Levi and Carter to a waterpark hotel in Owatonna. They both had a blast! It was a lot of fun and we can't wait to go back when Levi is a little older. They have a great section for littlier kids and then slides and other stuff for bigger kids.



It was hard to talk Carter into leaving the water, but I was able to bribe her with cupcakes for her birthday!

Then it was back to work for the week. The weekend brought on another battle for Levi, the start of another ear infection. He was up all night that Friday so we brought him into the clinic Saturday morning.  Thank goodness for Saturday clinic hours! She said he definetly had another ear infection, but since he also was coughing again and had a runny nose, she said the antibiotics would do no good at this point. So she gave us the prescription in case he didn't get better in the next week and told us not to fill it unless he didn't get better. He ended up getting better, so no need to fill it. The pillow under the mattress trick works great! He sleeps so much better when we do that when he is sick.  Poor little guy....

He has been SO active this month! He was starting to crawl pretty good about the third week in January, and I left for the weekend for a bowling tournament. When I got back on Sunday, holy cow, we have a crawler! He crawls everywhere and to anything he can find. He is very proud of himself when he reaches his destination, he looks back and smiles at us. His favorite place to crawl to is the patio door so he can look outside.

With all his crawling, he is now pulling himself up on everything! So I just had to buy him his first pair of Nike's.  They are so cute on him! He likes taking laps around the kitchen so I don't think it will be too long before we also have a walker. With this being said, this last weekend we had to baby proof the house! Baby gates and cabinet locks took up most of our Saturday. We didn't have any hardware on any cabinets or drawers so Grant was a trooper and spent the day installing all of those first. 

He still doesn't have any more teeth, but I swear he keeps giving us signs there is one on the way! He is so drooly and has to have something in his mouth at all times. He won't let me look in there, so I cannot see what is going on.  He is still a great eater, he is starting to eat more of the foods that we eat and he has a lot more snacks that he can eat now as well. He knows when I open the pantry that he is getting a snack, so he quickly crawls over to see what he gets.  Grant was creative and made him a salmon and carrot puree, Levi loved it, I did not love it! I could not handle the smell... Grant will be feeding him that from now on!

This last weekend we also decided to switch him out of the infant carseat.  It was getting very heavy for me (He is now 18 pounds) and his legs were dangling off of it.  When we were in the car he kept kicking the back of the seat and was trying to sit up in it, so we decided it was time to make the switch. I knew that there was a weight limit on the infant seat, but I did not know there was a height limit.  Little did we know, he had reached the height limit a few weeks back... So good thing we switched! He loves his new seat since he can now see out the window and see what is going on. He looks very tiny in this one compared to how big he looked in the infant one!

His hair was driving me nuts again, so I took him for his second haircut last week.  Sarah did a fabulous job as always, and he sat super good for her! Here is a before and after look...



He started this week out with a cough again, but he seems to be over that. Needless to say, we are more than ready for this winter to be over! Grant has been busy with school, his second semester started on the 18th of January. He did make the Dean's list first semester, and Levi & I are very proud of him for all his hard work! He has also been working, playing hockey, and he found some time to go ice fishing with his dad as well.  I have been busy with work, work meetings, and wedding stuff. I think we are finally at a point where a lot of the wedding stuff has been accomplished! We sent the "Save the Dates" out this last weekend so now we can relax a bit. Another month down, I cannot believe how big our "baby" has gotten.  He has his nine month well check on the 28th so we will see where he is at!



Seven months, just a little late!

Time is really starting to get the best of us since we have had stuff going every week/weekend for awhile now! Switching gears back to December, Levi turned seven months.  It was a pretty busy month with Christmas travel, etc and he was fighting another cold. That nasty cold followed him around for two months, he just couldn't catch a break. But with Christmas, it didn't seem to bother him! He loved seeing all the new faces he doesn't see on a normal basis and more importantly, loved playing with tissue paper and wrapping paper.

First, we went out to Willmar to Grant's Grandma Betty's house. It takes about two hours to get there so it is a perfect ride for Levi when its around his naptime.  He ended up going to bed Christmas Eve night before it was time to open presents, so he was the center of attention in the morning opening his gifts.

He got a ton of great presents and he thanks everyone! Then Christmas Day we drove back to Farmington and went over to my parents house for awhile.  Levi got a ton more great presents which is why we had to buy a toy box with the gift card we got from my grandma and grandpa! He now has a toy box full of fun toys.

December was a fun month with Levi, his personality really started showing. He loves rolling around and sitting up to see stuff now. Still only has the two teeth from October, we sure thought he would have more by now with how red his cheeks get and all the drooling and biting! But I guess they say the longer they stay in his gums the better.  So time will tell. :)

Fun with Levi!

Little Levi has been a busy little boy this month and Christmas hasn't even happened yet! We are all very excited for Christmas to come, just watching Levi play with the wrapping paper when I have been wrapping presents is priceless. This weekend should be a good time.

We started out the month with Levi's second cousin Ellie's first birthday party.  There were a lot of people there for him to see and he liked playing with new toys that were not his. :) Ellie may not have been as excited as he was to share these toys!



Not so sure I want to share....




These taste good!




I want one of these for Christmas, but in blue please!


That was on Saturday and then on Sunday we went to help Grandma and Grandpa Schmidt pick out their Christmas tree at Hampton Hills Tree Farm.  Levi did great! It was pretty cold out, but it didn't seem to bother him.  We just put his car seat in a sled and off we went!



Here we go!




Checking in, he was doing great!




What is going on!?




Found one! Too windy over there, had to move to get away from the wind.




Then the next weekend we had the BIG snowstorm! We were pretty much snowed in for the whole weekend.  We did venture out on Saturday for a few hours to go to Logan's (Pat & Kelly's little boy) first birthday party in town. We only stayed a few hours, but it was a fun time!

Levi has been getting very active this month! We cannot just lay him on the floor and expect him to be "right there" when we get back. He tries to either find where you went or move to find a new toy to play with. He is army crawling now or just rolling to his place of interest.  He favors backing up versus going forward, but he is starting to attempt the forward way now.



I am trying to get to you but I can't!

He went to one physical therapy appointment for his "torticollis" with Grant last week. He had a good appointment and we are already seeing improvement.  We have been doing at home exercises with him and he is getting better at tolerating them. He has another appointment on the 3rd of January and that will probably be the last one he needs. This Monday he started getting a bad cough again so Grant took him to the Doctor. We actually had an appointment already scheduled for his ear re-check so it worked out perfect.  His ears were better and she said it was just a cold virus, nothing to treat it. Figured that, so we just are elevating his crib mattress again and he has shown improvement this week thankfully.  His cough was hard to watch and hear!

Other than that, he has been LOVING his Johnny Jumper. That is by far his favorite thing to do these days. He had a sleepover with Carter last weekend, she was loving helping Levi with anything she could think of that he needed. (Often times more than he needed of course :) ) And we went to visit Santa as well.  He didn't cry, he didn't laugh... just typical Levi, stared and was expressionless haha.




Hard to get him to STOP jumping for a picture!



Loves his new toy from Grandma Thurmes



I told Carter to get close to him for a picture but she said he would jump on her :)




I love chewing anything I can find!



Levi's first visit with Santa.. Couldn't get a smile in, too many people behind him to look at!



This month is flying by! We have been busy with everything I mentioned above and then Grant just wrapped up his semester at school this week. He is more than excited for a month off, he had a very busy semester with a full load schedule, working, hockey, and Levi. Daycare was closed today through Friday so Grant spent his first day off home with Levi. Then I am with him tomorrow and then we are off to Willmar on Friday for Christmas. I was brave this week and went to the outdoor Vikings game with Jess and Adam who are home for Christmas from Boston. We had a great time, too bad the score did not reflect this! But it was an experience to say the least, and we are glad we got the chance to go. I am excited for this weekend and I will post pictures of Levi's first Christmas sometime next week!

Half way to being ONE!

Well, Levi is now six months! He is a growing little boy.  Here are his stats from his 6 month well check:

• Weight: 16lbs, 1oz. ....30th percentile
• Length: 27.5 inches ....81st percentile
• Weight for Length: .....13th percentile
• Head circumference: ....75th percentile

November was a pretty tough month for the little guy.  He had a cough, runny nose, etc for a few weeks so I finally brought him in.  To my shock, he had a double ear infection! I never would have guessed that. He wasn't grabbing his ears or being fussy at all.  So we had him on Amoxicillan for ten days. Then at his well check this week, she looked in his ears and he still had it in one ear. So we got a stronger antibiotic now and hopefully that will work. He has to go back in three weeks to get those checked as well as his second dose of the flu shot.

We had his appointment at Children's on the 23rd. We were finally assured that the bump on his head (from the vacuum attempt at birth) will go down completely.  The Dr said he had never not seen one go away and that it just takes time. So that was good news. And then we talked about his flatness of his head and he wouldn't tell us he needed a helmet or didn't need it since it was purely cosmetic at this point. We decided not to go with the helmet. It is a huge commitment and I can already see his head getting better as his bump is going down. They did however find that he has a mild case of torticollis on his right side. We never noticed this until they pointed it out! Basically, Levi will not turn his head completely to the right. So we have some at home exercises to correct this that we do with him everyday and he is supposed to start physical therapy once a week too, but they haven't called me to schedule anything yet.

Thanksgiving week brought the flu to our family... Well to Grant and Levi.  I am still crossing my fingers I do not get it.  I had flu symptoms for a few hours, but nothing like those two.  We were getting ready to leave for Willmar on Wednesday and Levi started throwing up. We contemplated even going, but we decided to give it a try.  The ride out was pretty bad because of the snow, so it took us a long time to get there. Levi got sick a few times, but he was a trooper, smiling in between. It was hard to see him puke the first time since he doesn't know what is going on and it takes his breath away. So we stopped to clean him up and get him some Pedialyte. He pretty much just drank that all of Thanksgiving Day and started coming around that night. He didn't sleep very much so we were all exhausted on Friday. It was a fun, fast trip. Grant got to get some hunting in with his dad and uncle and it was nice to see everyone, hopefully the next time we are there, everyone is healthy!! We came home Friday night and then on Sunday Grant woke up with the flu pretty bad.  He was out of commission until Tuesday. Since then, we are all good to go, my fingers are crossed it stays this way!!

Levi continues to be a very good eater. We got the okay to start giving him the meats and dinners baby foods now so it is funny to see his reaction when he tries those for the first time. He still LOVES his fruits more than anything though. I started giving him some fresh fruit in those mesh holders, that is his favorite thing to do after daycare.  Well that, or sip on a sippy cup and make a mess :) He is starting to roll over non-stop, this makes diaper changes quite a pain sometimes! But he makes us laugh. He is starting to scoot or roll towards you when you pull a toy away from him too. That is our new fun little game we play with him. So we are not far away from fully baby-proofing our house. Gates will be up soon!

He still just has his two teeth, although, I think another one is on it's way. He is starting to be a drooly mess again. We will see if he will let me look in his mouth this weekend to investigate. Bath time is still his favorite thing ever. He splashes almost all of his water out of his tub by the time we are done. It is a very nice way for him to wind down and get all of his energy out before his bed time bottle.

We didn't take too many pictures this month, but i have a few to share. We also went and got some family pictures taken, although we were NOT impressed. We are not going back to that place!! There were a few good ones though as you will see.

We will see what this month brings us! Levi loves looking at all the Christmas lights and feeling our Christmas tree. It should be a fun month!