garrison's new tricks

Lately Garrison seems to be blossoming. He has started doing a lot of new things all at once.
-he now can give 5! (it makes him very happy)
-said "go" and pointed to the door.
-waves
-daddy, says it like Da---dee.
-throws a ball from on the couch to you on the floor.
-climbs all over the furniture, a little too skillfully. We're trying to train him to get down feet first.
-he demonstrates some surprising ingenuity a couple of days we sat near him as he worked and worked to get a blanket piled on the floor by the couch. Then he grabbed a pillow and added it to the stack. Then he got on the couch and started to lunge face first off onto the pile. Obviously we stopped him as made the lunge.
-He ate his first pb&j
-He ate homemade chocolate chip cookies (by me)
-He gets that it is appropriate to clap when someone sings
-He can strum the strings on a guitar with his thumb
-He seems to have "sensitive" skin, we use a lot aquaphor healing ointment
-He can climb all over things, but can't walk yet, my theory is that he has his own priorities
-He wakes up every morning happy, until you try to change him. then he gets upset--not fun.
-And in the middle of all of this he's trying to work in two new teeth (the pointy ones on top) to add to the twelve (including molars) that he already has. These seem to be bothering him and he's drooling up a storm and wants to bite everything. He has a little biting ball that I try to get him to use, but pretzel sticks work sometimes too.

All in all time is whizzing by, just like garrison was in the picture above. I rarely have a moment while he's awake that we're not laughing and having a good time. He's still got a great sense of humor.

catch up vol. 1

I haven't written in so long I figure I've got lots of stories to tell, so I'll try to get started and fill everyone in one the comings and goings at casa del pequeno g (really, he answers to that better than he does garrison.)

We had a nice time with my mom and dad here. Garrison got to spend a lot of quality time with his grandparents, and I got some writing done! We had some good food and nice walks. As always, the visit was too short. I'll put up a slide show from the visit in another post.

So quitting bottles hit a snag the week of my last post. I didn't think G was getting enough to eat or drink, and he was crying all the time. The last time he did that was when he was essentially starving when he was a baby--I knew his cry was out of hunger. I had saved one can of formula, and I made an executive decision to use it. I realized that he had a fever at some point on like Friday, so we canceled band practice and stayed home and took some baby tylenol. That helped, as did watching like 3 or 4 straight episodes of hola bebe. Then he got this rash. It looked like german measels (not raised bumps, just red spots). So we figure he's reacting (not allergy) to the MMR shot. It gets worse over the course of a couple of days, and spread down his tummy, as it said it would. His eyes were red and swollen. It was a little unnerving. We didn't take him into the doctor, because as the rash got worse, he seemed to feel better. I was just giving him bottles first and then solids, and I think that helped rehydrate him and just made him more comfortable. After he recovered we got back on a more moderate weening schedule. We try to limit bottles to morning (before 9 am), and eat 3 meals + 2 snacks. We're transitioning to milk from formula gradually too. I think that was too abrupt for him. All of a sudden it's 6:30, he's hungry and he has to have cold milk from a sippy cup?

Fourth of July was quiet, but Rali and Adonis stopped by for a while. G slept through the fireworks. We listened to lots of them going off in our neighborhood. Even thought he felt kinda poopy he dressed for the occasion. G's a patriotic little fellow.

G has lots of new teeth. He's got one molar (lower right) and is working on at least 1 or 2 others. Finally the 3rd and 4th bottom front teeth are coming in. He's had 2 bottom teeth for the longest time. His smile is wide and getting very toothy. Note the new molar coming in on the lower left side (his right) in the picture

6 teeth

I've been trying to get a good picture of the new teeth, but they're still little nubs, so it's hard to capture. This was the best I could do.