Caden – 8 Months

Another month, another slew of milestones for Mr. Caden.  It always amazes me at how much he can change and learn in a few short weeks.

• Caden loves the water!  We spent the afternoon with Oma and Opa a few weeks back and hopped in the pool for a while.  Kamy was a bit unsure about the water, but Caden was happy as a clam to be in it.  Such a smiley baby!

• Instead of just two teeth, Caden now has EIGHT.  He cut six teeth in the last few weeks — four across the top and two more on the bottom.  We’ve been joking that he must be tired of baby food and is ready for steak, why else would he need so many teeth all at once?  =P  He didn’t seem to have much trouble teething either — just the standard dribbles and wet shirts, but no added fussy-ness or fever or anything.  I guess if some of those less pleasant side effects would show up, it would happen when cutting six at a time.  Look at all those teeth!

• One if his not-so-great habits we’ve been working to break is biting my shoulder.  Since he’s cut so many teeth all at once, he’ll bite my shoulder when I’m carrying him.  Let me tell you, it hurts!  His little teeth are super sharp and he can break the skin and leave bruises through my shirt.  Initially I tried scolding him, using a harsher voice to tell him no, and pushing him away, but he wasn’t getting the message.  Instead I’ve been giving him a pinch when he bites me.  The first few times were pretty mild and he didn’t get the message, but a few firmer pinches seems to have dissuaded his chewing on me.  My shoulder sure appreciates it!  While my shoulder is safe now, he chews on everything else in sight — including Kamy’s water bottles.

• Caden is doing much better sleeping at night.  I’m still getting up with him once per night, but it’s only to re-swaddle and nurse him quickly before putting him back down.  Lately he’s been waking up sometime between 2 and 4am, and since he’s going to be between 7:30 and 8pm, I’m happy with him sleeping 6-8 hour straight.  I haven’t quite decided when I’ll let him go all night yet (ie – ignore him when he wakes up).  I am still swaddling him at night, but it’s mostly for routine and to help him know it’s bed time and not just a nap.  He promptly busts his arms out before I even get out of the room.  We also dropped the crib down several settings so he can’t climb out.

• Caden is super mobile right now.  He’s figured out this whole crawling-thing and can scoot across the floor in no time at all.  Lately he’s been doing a combination of a “normal” crawling motion and inch-worming along — lifting himself up on his arms and pushing forward with his toes.  I love watching him do his inch-worm crawl, though it does look like a lot of work!  He loves to be in the middle of whatever Miss Kamy is doing and will make a bee-line for her if she’s sitting on the floor playing with toys or reading a book.  I can’t count how many times a day I hear “not for Caden” or “too little for Caden” when he comes over to her.  He also loves to climb over Charley, who is amazingly patient with Caden and will even plop down right in front of him to get attention.

• Mr. Caden LOVES to stand up.  He can and will pull up on nearly anything — couches, chairs, baskets, and pant legs included.  He gets this huge grin on his face when he does it too — he’s so proud of himself!  Once standing, he’ll sway back and forth and bounce with his knees a little too.  It’s pretty funny to watch him lever himself up to a standing position.  For a while he wasn’t sure how to get back down once he was standing up, but he’s getting pretty good at plopping down on him bottom in order to move on.

• With all the constant motion that comes with a wiggly baby who now knows how to crawl and pull up, plus a growth spurt, Caden is a skinny little thing right now.  He’s gotten pretty lean through his torso too.  He’s sitting around 17 pounds, so he hasn’t put on much extra weight either.  If he’s lucky he’ll end up with Kamy’s build, but we’ll have to see!

• Caden picked up a nasty bug at church a few weeks ago and we ended up taking him to an urgent care doctor to be seen.  Since both kids seem to get the germies from church on Sunday, it’s usually Thursday night or Friday morning before the fever shows up.  I called my pediatrician and talked with his nurse to get some guidelines for what to watch for and at what point I need to bring him in to a doctor to be seen (as it’s moving into the weekend, of course this would mean a trip to the ER since doctor offices aren’t usually open).  She advised that as long as we’re able to control his fever with medicine and keep it below 103*, he’s probably okay.  Well, after giving him medicine at lunch time, his fever only went up and was nearing 103*.  Instead of waiting until Friday night when everything is closed and the only option is sitting in an ER overnight with a sick baby (can you say “low priority”?), we drove into Longview to an urgent care center.  We were glad that we went — his fever was up to 103.3* when we got there so we’d have come in anyway.  They tested him for RSV (negative) and did some chest x-rays to check for pneumonia (negative).  Unfortunately his fever continued to climb while we were being seen and the dose of infant Tylenol they gave him didn’t drop his fever.  After giving him another dose of ibuprophen, his fever finally broke and he started to feel much better.  The doctor prescribed two medications for him — though we decided NOT to give either to Caden as one was not for children under two (um, hello?!) and the other was a broad spectrum antibiotic (and we thought he probably had a virus).  After confirming with the on-call pediatrician what we had done, we felt much better about going home and letting him ride it out.  He had a lingering cough for the next week or so, but he’s back to his happy healthy self now.

Overall, Caden is doing so much better.  He’s getting used to the nursery and even making friends with some of the consistent volunteers.  He’ll smile at everyone and will let people other than Momma hold him at times.  Daddy can fix it at night when he’s upset and doesn’t want to go to sleep.  Now that he’s becoming less of a baby and moving toward toddler-hood, he really seems to be evening out temperament-wise.  My little boy is growing up!