May 12, 2010

I'm all for the Snow but....

IT'S MAY 12!!! What the heck is going on? I was so organized in William's clothing-department (because his closet may as well be a full clothing department at this point) and had summer clothes for size 3-6 months. As a result he only has 2 shirts that fit him right now that have long sleeves! That's ok, it means he's getting a lot of use out of his "mommy's little bear" shirt which happens to be one of my favorites.

Why is it one of my favorites you ask? Because we discovered we had it months after I started calling him my little bear. He's my hungry bear, my sleepy bear, my happy bear, occasionally my grumpy bear, my silly bear, my cuddly bear...you get the idea, he's my little bear. Then I went into his closet to pack up his 0-3 clothes and shift the rest around when I noticed the "little bear" shirt. LOVE IT :)

I realized as I was blogging yesterday that in my attempt to make my blog well rounded and not 100% about William (even though he consumes 98% of my thoughts) I had actually been omitting all of the William-updates. But at this age is a huge mistake because he's up to SO much! So - welcome to William's World. It's kind of like Elmo's World, except a much happier place for mommy!

William had his 3 month birthday last Sunday and yesterday was his 14 week birthday. Austin and I indulged in a yellow cake with chocolate icing in honor of his 3 month birthday, and I had a piece yesterday too. We can pretend it was for his14 week birthday, but really it was just because I wanted cake. On his 3 month birthday he weighed in at 13 pounds 10 ounces - my growing boy! He gained 2 pounds 4 ounces in the last month. No wonder his clothes quit fitting! I don't personally think the "percentiles" are worth anything, nor do I understand what the purpose of following them is, but because I like graphs I chart his weight on a graph every month. He is consistently following the 50th percentile for weight...good job? We'll say so, but I'm pretty sure I'd say that no matter what percentile he was in :)

William is learning so much right now, and its amazing to watch him as he absorbs and discovers new things. I have been whining a lot to Austin that it isn't fair that I had to come back to work right as all of the major development was starting. I'm missing it all! He has been giggling literally since the day I came back to work, and he just giggles more and more each day. It is absolutely the most precious sound my ears have ever heard. He has also recently learned that he has the ability to grasp items and shake his rattles. He amazes himself and I love to see the look in his eyes as he shakes his arms and hears the rattling. At first he would only grasp the rattle if placed in his hand, then he would grasp it if I held it right in front of his hand, and now he can grab it if it is sitting in front of him. I've only seen him do it once, and I'm pretending it was his "first" but I'm sure he'll nurture the skill and get very good very soon.

Another thing that William loves more and more each day is bath time. He has always been a pretty big fan, but lately he seems to like it even more. He kicks his feet, getting mommy all wet, slaps the water with his arms, and is so content to lay in the water. As part of his bedtime routine, which I vow helped teach him to sleep all night, we give him a bath every day. We can't wash him every day or his skin would get too dry, and we don't need to, but we get him in his tub, rub the water on him, and wash his face every night. He gets his full baths on Tuesdays and Saturdays, but on "small bath night" we usually let him just lay in the water for awhile because he's so happy. I can't wait until he's big enough to sit up in the tub and I can sit in there with him!

Last weekend we had planned to go over to a friend's house to play games (where Austin and I kicked butt in taboo!) so we tried to do William's normal bed time routine, after which we were going to walk 3 streets down to Corrine's house. Only problem: William was NOT ready for bed. He was wide awake, looking around, giggling and having a good ol' time. So we decided to just take him down there and hopefully he'd fall asleep in the car...again, no luck. Corrine asked if I'd like something to lay him on to entertain him/help him get to sleep and she brought out a play mat. I'd seen playmats before but had opted not to get one for a few reasons. But - those reasons may have just fallen by the wayside because William LOVED it. Her playmat played music and had a light show (which adds $ signs, of course) and he was just mesmerized by everything going on. It didn't put him to sleep, but he did have fun! He did eventually start to have his tired eyes so we put his playmat away, I swaddled him up and he was out in no time.

One thing that will take some getting-used-to on my part is his name. While I was pregnant people always asked me what we would call him, as if calling a child by their given name is unheard of. People still like to ask what his nickname is. Maybe because Brandon, Brian and I have always been Brandon, Brian and Amanda...and maybe because Gene and Austin were always Gene and Austin...the concept of changing a baby's given name or calling them a different name all together just seems kind of weird to us. If I wanted to call him Bill I would have named him Bill. To each his own I suppose. Anyway, I knew nicknames would come up naturally, and i knew his friends would probably shorten his name so its not like I'm not ok with it. Heck someday I may come up with some other name, you never know. It just wasn't planned. I don't mind what other people call him, within reason of course, I just didn't have any preset notions to call him another name. While I don't mind people calling him other names however, it always throws me for a loop when people call him "Will". And by "people" I mean nearly everyone. I guess its the common nickname for William now, whereas in my dad's day the common nickname was Bill. Its a nice enough name, except I don't think of my baby boy when someone says Will, I think of Will Hansen from high school! Nice guy, but when someone asks me "What's Will up to?" my initial reaction is "Man I have no idea, haven't talked to him since high school. Oh WILLIAM...well, he's grasping his hands and sticking out his tongue and having a wonderful day." So I guess I just need to remind myself periodically that my baby is also Will Wallis. Not nearly as masculine as William Wallis, but precious just the same.

Well, there's a smorgasbord of an update/blog for ya. Clearly my mind is not in one place today huh? Kind of all over the map! Weather, clothes, birthday, development, nicknames - you got it all. I'll try not to wait 3 months before I let you in on his development next time :)

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