Nicholas March Through May

So as you can tell I am no longer doing a monthly "update" for Nicholas. I've started grouping albums on Shutterfly by three months at a time because I definitely take a lot less pictures than I used to. Here's what the little dude has been up to:

Likes:

Food. Milk. Water. Eating in general. Loves it. He usually has a morning snack (cheerios, a plum yogurt smoothie pounch) with milk, then breakfast and more milk at day care. Then lunch and milk, an afternoon snack (usually cheerios/crackers and yogurt), then dinner and milk. I've stuck to two cups of organic whole milk a day, and water if he is asking for more food which he also drinks a lot of.

Food faves: Broccoli, grilled chicken, shrimp, cheese, Annie's mac & cheese (I tried this for the first time with him recently and would have been shocked if he didn't like it). Cheerios, whole wheat pasta, crackers, Plum yogurt dippers, graham crackers...I'm sure there's more but you get the idea. I also made homemade raspberry sorbet and he liked it even though it is very tart. I've held off on giving him juice and am trying to stick with just milk and water for as long as possible.

Dexter. The poor dog. We are trying to teach him to be gentle but Dex defintely gets smacked at least once a day.

Baths. I make it a point to get him to splash as much as possible and soak all of us and the entire bathroom.

He loves going for walks and being outside. Sometimes when Nick picks him up at day care if he is on the playground he'll run away from him because he doesn't want to leave.

New and noteable: This kid has a ton of teeth. By 7 months (I think!) he had 8 teeth and then right after he turned 1 a bunch more poked through. I don't know how many are in there and he smacks my hand away when I try to brush his teeth (and he cries through it). At least one molar is in - at least I think that's what it is because the tooth looks gigantic and it's in the back.

He lets me know if he is hungry or thirsty - by either banging on the pantry door or the refrigerator. If I say "do you want a snack?" he goes to the pantry and nods his head yes, and same for the refrigerator.

If he's cranky and I ask him if he wants to take a nap, he goes to the stairs and stands at the gate.

He still doesn't have any words, at all. He says "da" but not "ma" or really much of anything else. We talk to him a lot and read to him at night, but nothing yet. In the back of my mind I'm a little worried but I'm glad that he understands us and can hear us...so I know the words will come.

He reached the dogs water bowl on the cabinet the other day and drenched himself (woopsie!) so we are being even more careful about what we leave around.

Sleep:

Pretty great. He's down by 7:30 and sleeps through until 6-6:30 for the most part. Sometimes it's a little earlier and he'll cry, but it's been consistent.

Naps are a bit sporadic - he usually gets 2 in on the weekends but at day care it's only 1 (but it's long, about 2.5-3 hours). The nap time is scheduled with all of the kids at once so there's not much I can do about it, but he's happy so I'm happy.

We are all doing well but I've definitely been more tired than normal lately. As I'm typing this I'm trying to keep my eyes open. :) Work has been very busy and stressful and it is often hard to find a good balance between that and home life. Nick is also very busy at work which is good, but I know he is tired as well. We had a great date night the other night, it was so good to get out and just relax and enjoy each other. A special thank you to Auntie Marlene for watching Nicholas for us.

Here are some pics: