8 months!

Where does the time go??? We can't believe that Josh is 8 months already. There is no checkup this month, not until 9 months, so we don't have any official stats for Josh. Unofficially, Josh is getting very close to 20 lbs, and is outgrowing his clothing height wise...so he is certainly still growing! This past month Josh has started babbling and has just learned how to open drawers and cabinets. He can shuffle his feet a bit when he climbs onto something but he hasn't ventured further towards walking. It has been really noticeable how much better his problem solving skills are. He will now go around an obstacle to get to something he wants, or be able to follow where we put something out of his reach and go get it. He loves our bathroom or the refrigerator and makes a b-line for either as soon as the door is open. He is still not particularly interested in solid food, although he has started crying when we won't share something we are eating which I think is a good sign. We have been sending pureed food to daycare for "lunch" and feeding him finger food at dinner. He does a really good job of picking up the food and getting it into his mouth. He is not doing as good a job of swallowing, but we hope that will come in time. We hope that the combination of pureed food and finger food will help him get more excited about eating :-)

Unfortunately this past month also included his first illnesses which were difficult for us all. The hives from his allergic reaction to antibiotics are still on and off, but we hope that they will clear up soon. His eczema continues to be an issue and I have done everything I can to cut out any possible offending food (dairy, soy, eggs) but it is difficult when even my multivitamins have soy in them! For Rosh Hashanah I "cheated" and ate dairy and eggs (how could I resist matzoh ball soup???), and his eczema did not seem to get any worse. I've gone back to soy/dairy/egg/peanut free diet since, but I'm hoping to reintroduce dairy again as soon as the hives clear up :-)

Josh going to daycare was difficult on us all but we are adjusting to it. He really likes some of the toys they have there, and always seems happy to play with them when he arrives. When we pick Josh up he crawls over to us as soon as he sees us and puts up his arms to be picked up.

Josh continues to amaze us every day.  His personality is really coming out and it is amazing to see him be a real person. Here are some cute videos of what he is up to. We are looking forward to what the next few months have in store :-)