41 Weeks Old & Happy Father's Day!

41 weeks old

Today is Matt's first Father's Day. Cael was up for the day at 5:45 this morning, and that was after being up at 1:30am. Of course I was going to let Matt sleep in, so after keeping Cael in his crib for as long as I could, we were up at 6:45. He's been getting way better at keeping himself occupied for a little while in the morning while he's in his crib. Matt says that sometimes he'll get up for work at 6:45, and he'll find Cael just sitting in the crib playing quietly. That's really good to know.

For Father's Day today, Cael and I made Matt 2 picture frames - one from Popsicle sticks for a picture, and another for Cael's hand print. The one for the hand print was a plain wooden frame that I bought for $1, and decorated it with dad-themed, and sports-themed scrap-booking stickers. I then bought a non-toxic, washable stamp pad, and put Cael's hand print on a piece of blue scrap book paper, and cut it to fit the frame. I feel I could have decorated the frames a little better, but I'm still happy with how they came out.

Happy Father's Day

We also got Matt a fender flare kit and an emergency soft top for his new Wrangler. The fender flare kit should be here tomorrow or Tuesday. Finally, I took some pictures of Cael holding the letters "D" and "A", and spelled the word DADA with 4 pictures. I arranged them, and then ordered a mug from CVS that says "Happy 1st Father's Day 2012" on it. Matt loves to drink coffee on his days off, so it will be perfect. I was originally going to do another picture frame, but then saw an idea for a mug, and thought it was a better choice. I can't wait to pick it up from CVS in a week, and give it to Matt. I love how the pictures came out. These are the pictures I used, but it's arranged in a straight line from left to right, not on a diagonal like in this picture.

His sleep at night has been very inconsistent. One night, he'll get up at, say, 1:30, 4:30 and then sleep until 8. Then, the next night, he could sleep through the night until 5:20, and be up for the day at 6:30. And when he gets up in the middle of the night, only nursing seems to soothe him, and get him back to sleep. It could be a combination of a growth spurt (not sure how long that lasts), and teething.

Speaking of teething, Cael finally cut an upper middle tooth. His top middle-right tooth finally broke through, and its neighbor isn't far behind. It's so exciting to see him with so many teeth, although I'm not looking forward to the teeth grinding that I'm hearing about. It makes me shudder. And I'm also afraid of being bitten during nursing even more now. It hasn't happened (yet), and I hope it never happens.

Cael started doing some new things this past week. For starters, if I ask him to come give me a hug, he'll stop what he's doing, and immediately crawl over to me with a big, grinny smile on his face. He'll pull himself up to where I am, reach up for me to grab him, and then he'll tightly wrap his arms around me. It's the.greatest.feeling.EVER. I love his hugs so much - they just melt my heart. Another thing he'll do, is if I'm standing up, and I say to him "Want to come up?" he'll crawl over to me, pull on me so he can stand, and then put his arms up to me to pick him up. It's so amazing that he's understanding what I'm saying. Then today, he started using the back of his hand against his mouth, to make his voice shake (for lack of a better description). I can tell he's trying to mimic how I use my hand over his mouth when he's making sounds. He's so smart already, and it's only a matter of time before he'll figure it out.

Mommy and Cael in the pool

Floating in the pool

I'm kind of sad that he can't wave or clap yet, but I'm working on it with him. I'm also trying to get him to say "mama" or "dada". He's a lot more chatty now, and has added the "B" consonant sound to his sounds, so he'll say "babababababa". He'll get there, though. I'm not concerned at all.

I love this suit!

Yesterday, Cael and I spent about 2 hours outside by the pool. I was finally able to get some pictures of him in his floaty, and of him and me in the pool. He's definitely getting more relaxed each time he goes in, which I'm happy about. We were only in the water for about 20 minutes, and then sat out on the deck in the sun to dry off, with my mother-in-law. Cael loved playing on the deck, and watching Grandpa mow the lawn. He was so fascinated by him, and wouldn't take his eyes off him. After being in the sun for a little while, we moved to the shaded gazebo, where Cael continued to play. He really enjoyed being outside.

As far as Cael's birthday party in PA, I have no idea what I'm going to do theme-wise. At first, I wanted to do Where The Wild Things Are, but now I'm leaning more away from it. I think I might just do a theme of colors, like what I did with his bedroom. I might go to Party City to look around and see what they have. Maybe I can get some ideas from there. I've also been looking on Etsy and Pinterest a lot lately to try and gather some ideas. I still have 3 months to go, but it's going to fly by!

Peek-A-Boo

Relaxing in the sun. Sorry for blinding you

with my paleness

Look at all that hair!

We started using the toothbrush