Callie & Diego: 10 Months Old!

Diego is ten months old, double digits! Yet he still is a whiney baby. I think at this point it's time to chalk it up to personality rather than any issue. He is overall better and will play by himself for short periods of time, but he is still very needy and cries a lot. I hadn't taken any photos of the kids together in awhile as Callie doesn't always cooperate but I convinced her to put on some fancy clothes for some photos today. Her dialogue, I should say monologue through this entire photo shoot was that she was in a wedding and hence her flowers and she was setting up the chair to have an aisle. Where she gets these ideas is beyond me. She is feeling better, we only needed the inhaler once today which is great since it makes her such a crazy rowdy kid. Diego has a cough and a lot of booger now, so hopefully by the end of the week we will all be well.

So let's do Callie first. What is Callie up to at 2 years 10 months old? She has a vocabulary that outdoes most 5-6 year olds and she is always talking. It's rare that she is quiet. Even when she is by herself she is talking and singing. She likes to sing made up songs and is actually pretty good at singing about her day or things she knows. She is very creative and likes to role play and play pretend. She models everything she sees so I have to be careful what I say and do. She just has started to be manipulative, for the first time I caught her lying to her dad asking for something I just said no to. He said what did your mom say and she said mom said it's ok, which was absolutely not true. She has learned to open all the doors in the house including the front door with deadbolt so we installed a special lock way at the top above even our heads to keep her safe. She has been getting out of her bed and room at nap and bedtime which is a real problem. This morning she woke us up yelling from the bottom of the stairs at the gate. I've been reviewing with her the rules of staying in her room until it's time to get up. Hopefully I can get this in her head soon. Callie's current favorife show is Sid the Science Kid (at least for this week) and she loves books about the body, science, the way things work, anything explaining why. She often is explaining things and says, "that's why." She also makes excuses for why she cannot do things and they are very funny. She says my knee hurts so I can't help you pick up my toys, or My baby is so heavy and my back hurts carrying her. I am sure she gets this from me talking about D. She has become incredibly picky about food, her food groups consist of dairy and bread basically. It's so hard to get her to eat most things right now. She always says I don't know what I want, give me options. This is hysterical to me and she says it and shrugs her shoulders all at the same time. She is learning her letters and points out every R or C we see on any sign,truck, shirt, you name it she finds it. She attempts to sing the ABCs but gets them mixed up a lot. I'll try to get her on video singing this week. But enough about Callie, this post was about D!

Diego at 10 months... He loves to bang toys together. He likes to make music banging on the piano and with the drum. He can pull to stand, transition to standing using a small step or stool, and can stand for about a minute at a time without falling. He wants to walk really bad. He likes for you to hold his hands and walk around with him and he is beginning to take a few steps by himself. Ill try to get this on video too. Compared to Callie he is much more cautious. Callie learned to walk by just going, she couldn't stop or control herself and her falls were so crazy. Diego goes slower, tries to balance and falls more gracefully, generally not getting himself hurt,unless he falls onto something. He draws really fast now, but still does a side crawl with the right leg bent sideways beneath him and the left leg with the foot on the ground. He looks pretty funny but it's effective enough.

Diego really prefers solid finger foods rather than anything puréed and of course I have a whole cabinet full of baby food. His favorite food is Grandmas beans and he will pick them out of a pile of food. If he puts something in his mouth he doesn't like, he will take it baby out and make a face. He is a pickier eater than Callie was, mostly preferring fruits and beans, some breads, muffins, pancakes. He seems like he drinks a lot of water but really he just chews the spout on the sippy cup and gets all her clothes soaking wet, so we change him quite a row times everyday. He still wakes at least once a night to eat, although I swear he doesn't need to eat as when he wakes in the morning he can go for a long time without eating. I need to work on weaning him off the night feeding, or just go cold turkey and do cry it out. We haven't retested the dairy or reducing his medications lately, there has been too many other things going on. He takes two 90 minute naps but only in his bed. He cannot sleep in the stroller or car instead he just cries when he's tired.

He has no words that mean anything yet. He says da da da, ba ba ba, ga ga ga and babbles some other random sounds, in the middle of the night I swear he calls MaMa, but other than in the middle of the night I never hear it. It sounds so clear sometimes I think it's Callie, but it's not.

He has 7 teeth and one more on the way in. He's pretty chubby with fat thighs and a belly and he's working on a double chin. Most of his 9 month clothes are already too small and even some 12 months are tight, like this outfit he wore for photos today. He has a great laugh and can be pretty funny sometimes,at least when he is a happy baby.

So that's the best I can summarize these two monkeys for the age and phases we are in. I'm in the chicken with my head cut off phase still and never get time to myself. I go to bed early as I get woken up early and in the middle of the night and I chase these two around all day when I am home. It's exhausting to be a mommy but I love these two to pieces even when it's difficult at times. And a smile or a laugh helps me forget all the "other" not so happy times when we have meltdowns or cry fests.

Enjoy the photos!