SEVEN MONTHS!

Porter is seven months old today. I was talking to Jared last night and we realized that Porter is closer to being one than a newborn. We both couldn't believe it. His first few months went by pretty slowly with his Reflux, but warp speed has resumed in the last few months. 

At seven months, Porter is:

-so much happier all the time. The Reflux medicine has made a huge difference in his attitude. He's happy so much more now. Besides sleep, the biggest difference we've noticed is his ability to just be content on the floor. He has always been easy when we are on the go. He loves his car seat and looking at people and being held. It has always been home where we have had trouble with him. With the medicine, he is always pretty easy. 

-sleeping through the night! This is huge because he had not slept through the night once until we started the Reflux medicine. I think the longest he had gone was 6 hours, but more often he went 90 minutes or 2 hours. We also moved him out of our room which helped. Now he eats around 9:00 and goes to sleep and wakes up anywhere from 7:00-9:00. He puts himself to sleep now which never happened before. He usually takes 3 naps a day: 10:00, 1:00 and 7:00. Sometimes the 10:00 nap starts later and kind of merges into a mega-nap with the 1:00 nap with just a short nursing session in between. We are trying to get him to drop the 7:00 nap because it seems counter-productive to bedtime but he is pretty fussy without it. 

-nursing 4.5 times a day. He eats when he wakes up, then between 11 and 1, then around 4, then at 7:00 and then has a short session around 9 right before bed. He doesn't usually seem hungry at the last session, but I want him to keep sleeping through the night so we stick with it. He has baby food for dinner most nights (but not always...) and likes prunes the best. He has mastered the sippy cup and the straw sippy already which is awesome since we had to work with Pax on the straw sippy until he finally got it around 15 months. 

-sitting well on his own and is good at letting himself down gently when he's done sitting instead of collapsing. 

-very close to crawling! He gets his knees under him and pushes but he usually ends up going backwards. This is another exciting one for me since Paxton just army crawled. 

-starting to really like his Daddy. When he hears him, he looks around until he finds him and then just breaks out in the biggest smile. At dinner last night he looked right at Jared and said "dada" but we are definitely counting that as a happy coincidence. 

-wearing 6 and 9 month clothes (and some 12 month because Pax was bigger than him during his first winter so the winter clothes are mostly 12 months). He is in size 3 diapers. 

-very interested in balls, cars, and toys that make noise. He loves his big brother and they already have a game where they shriek back and forth with each other. They both think it's hilarious...

-rolling and scooting all over the rug. Every time I look away and then look back down, he has moved more than I expected. He will do whatever he can to get to a cup or an iPhone. 

-getting in his two top teeth right now. The tip of the right tooth is almost to poke through. He's definitely an early teether. 

He's still so snuggly and loves giving kisses. He always holds onto my shoulder when I pick him up which I think is precious. Nursing is still going well which makes me really proud of both of us. These next few months make up one of my favorite baby stages where he is still tiny and dependent but is also really social and starting to do fun things. I'm excited to see Paxton watch him learn to do new things. Paxton was so excited when Porter started rolling over all the time and I can't wait to see his face as Porter learns to crawl and pull up and walk.