8 Months

It's been another fun month in the Moran household.  And a BIG month at that.  Jackson learned all sorts of new and exciting things leading up 8 months.

• He started army crawling...
• ...and just today, he did a bunch of REAL crawling, which was so fun to watch as it looks like he's prancing around on all fours, very proud of himself.  Hard to explain, but will try to capture it on video over the next week, as we're both off work to hang out with him while daycare closed until the new year. Guess it's really time to baby proof...
• He started sitting up in his crib.  One night last week, we checked him out on the monitor after we heard a few sounds, and he was sitting upright, only to lay back down and return to sleep a few minutes later. The last few mornings, he's been sitting and either smiling or crying when I've gone in to get him up.  Pretty adorable either way.
• Even though he didn't need the pacifier when falling asleep at night before, he started waking up occasionally around 4 or 5 a.m. wanting it, and then he'd quickly return to sleep until his wake-up call.  That started to get old pretty fast, so we started attaching it to his sleep sack (since putting it within reach, unattached, caused it to continually get knocked out of the crib as he thrashed around in his sleep) and over the course of just a few days, he learned to put it in his mouth all on his own throughout the night as needed.  It's so cute to watch.
• He's been pulling up to a stand at daycare and even Corey got to witness it yesterday.  Apparently we have low enough furniture/toys here for him to do it at home, but I'm sure that will happen soon enough and we'll  need to be ready (read: baby proofed).
• His very first tooth appeared and boy, is it sharp!  Still hard to see, so no photos yet, but trust me, it's definitely there.
• He's figured out that he can feed Roxy some of the Cheerios we put in his Exersaucer - it's so cute to see him share his snack, for her to snatch up. 
• He's starting to exhibit signs of separation anxiety --- at daycare he puts up a bit of a fuss when Corey drops him off, reaching up and trying to get Corey to pick him up, until he's distracted by a toy or another baby.  When we try to hand him over to other people that he knows (our friends, family), he will sometimes start fussing and reaching towards one of us.  Sad, but kind of cute (for the moment).
• He's been sleeping a little more --- normally, he wakes up by 7 a.m. or 7:15 at the latest (when we are waking him at 6:45 to get ready for daycare) but last weekend he slept until 7:30 one morning and 8:45 the next morning (bedtime was at 7:30 both nights)!  On average though, he sleeps about 11 hours at night and gets about 3 hours of naps at daycare (or 3-4 hours of naps at home).

Only four months left until he turns one, which seems crazy when I think about the fact that I've been back at work over four months, and it doesn't feel like that long at all!