9 Months?....No Way!

Yesterday we went for Griffin's 9 month check-up (though now he's about 9 months and 1 week). Besides being a bit under the weather (pesky cold and the croup), Dr. B said that he looks great! Here are his stats:

• Height: 29 inches (75%)
• Weight: 18 lbs. 14 oz. (25%)
• Head Circumference: 45.5 cm.

We were a little worried about his weight gain, or lack there of, but Dr. B said she wasn't worried at all. She said she could tell that he was a very active child and that was probably the reason he wasn't gaining much weight....he burns a lot of calories through out the day!

Here are a few pictures of our skinny-minny from the last few weeks...

Here are a few of the things Griffin is doing as a 9 month old...

• Talking up a storm!....we just don't know what he's saying. The noises that ARE audible though are priceless...he's saying "da-da-da" and "ma-ma-ma"...we're not sure that he knows what he's saying, but I think he's definitely close to realizing that those names are associated with us. So neat!
• Learning to wave...at least I'm going to call it a wave. Sometimes he even gets the timing right and does it when someone says hi or bye to him. It's a funny, spastic, arm up and down kind of wave.
• He's intrigued by other kids...he loves to look at them and "talk" to them.
• As I mentioned above, he's still as active as ever...if he's awake, he's on the move!
• This is kind of weird, but he loves to pick the rocks out of the fireplace. It's bad because his tiny little fingers love to pick away at it and little rocks fall out....then he tries to EAT THEM! Needless to say, it keeps Chad and I very busy trying to keep him from doing it.
• I've said this before, but he loves the outdoors. Only now he's not as content to just BE outside...now he wants to get down and explore everything...which would be great if he wouldn't try to eat everything. haha!

Okay, that's our boy in an itty-bitty nutshell. All 9 months of him! We love you Griff!

Halloween!

We had the BEST Halloween! I can't even imagine how fun it will be in years to come when Griffin gets excited about dressing up and trick-or-treating. He seemed to enjoy it this year too, but I guess it's kind of hard to tell.

We started the day with by going to our neighborhood's fall festival with our friends Daniel and Jennifer. Griffin was a giraffe and Leah was a pumpkin. They were so cute!

Griffin was pretty tired after the fall festival, so we went home and napped. But after that, we decided to go out to a fun playground where we could enjoy the awesome fall weather. We had fun swinging and sliding!

After the playground and dinner, we got back in costume and headed out for some trick-or-treating! We only went to one house, but Griffin had fun playing and eating candy with his buddy Tate.

I love this picture of the boys snacking on Twix....in the wrapper! Maybe next year they will get a real taste of candy.

The next day (on actual Halloween) I took Griffin over to my parents church for another fall festival! He got to ride a pony for the first time and seemed to have fun. It was funny to see a giraffe riding a pony. haha!

We had such a great weekend making memories with our little man. This was our first "first holiday" with Griffin and it makes me really excited for Thanksgiving and Christmas...it's so fun to see everything through his eyes and see how he reacts to things. It's just so neat!

Sweetness

I've got a lot of things to blog about, but I wanted to make sure to get this picture on here. I just think it's such a great photo of Griffin and his Great Grandma Herring.

It was taken a few weeks ago when we were all up in Rock Spring, GA for Natalie's baby shower. It was fun seeing everyone and celebrating baby Blake!

Excuse You!

This video is just so fun, I have to share.......

....he still thinks me saying, "excuse you!" is really funny.

Monday Night at the Herring's

In case you aren't keeping up, we now have an 8 month old in our house. I'm not going to lie, the 7th month was probably the most challenging thus far. Lots of....whining? I'm not sure if that's the right word, but I do know that our happy-go-lucky boy was not around as often this past month. Don't get me wrong, I think we're TOTALLY lucky and most people would die to have a son with Griffin's disposition, he was just a little bit "off" this past month. I'm going to chalk it all up to teething. I've heard it's really painful for the kiddos.

Anywho...just thought I'd document a typical night in the Herring household. Also, Griffin has been LOVING his baths lately, so we wanted to get that on camera too. We've got a new strategy for bedtime (since the fussiness has increased while changing diapers and putting pajamas on - I really think he just can't stand to sit still). We are now doing bath time / diaper time / pajama time BEFORE we feed him his bottle. This way, when he falls asleep while eating (which he often does) we don't have to wake him up to do all of the above.

Here's a glimpse into bath time!



And now here is a glimpse into how much Griffin dislikes getting ready for bed...

(No, Chad isn't torturing him, he's putting lotion on him! haha)

So once he is dried off, diapered and lotioned, it's time for jammies....ugggg.....

But after that, it's usually smooth sailing. Griffin relaxes while Dada feeds him his bottle. More often than not, he is asleep as soon as he finishes.

This way, we can just go put him right in his crib. If he's not asleep, we read to him before putting him to bed. I will say, Griffin has always been GREAT at going to bed at night. He just rolls on over, snuggles with his doggie blanket, and drifts off to sleep. Nothing sweeter!

Teething Biscuits: A Blessing & a Curse

Well, Griffin is definitely teething. Poor guy seems to be in a lot of pain, especially at night! (....no fun for anyone involved.) A friend told me about these teething biscuits and I figured I'd try them out. I bought them in the store and gave him one while I was shopping. It was WONDERFUL and TERRIBLE all wrapped into one hard biscuit.

These things are wonderful because he loves them and it takes him a good 15 minutes to eat (gnaw) on it. (I'm a fan of anything that keeps him occupied for an extended amount of time.)However, these things are also terrible because they make the BIGGEST. MESS. EVER! I've decided that he will only get to enjoy a biscuit when he is trapped somewhere (the high chair or his car seat). ....and the mess is hard to wipe off...not sure why? It's also a bit worrisome that the box has a warning saying that the child should be sitting up right and eat only with parent supervision.

Good thing he's so cute.....

Here is video evidence of the wonderfulness and the terribleness.......enjoy!




Time elapsed between the two videos is about 30 minutes (jk...I wish...probably more like 5).

Oooops! I literally JUST noticed, as I was looking back at this post, that the box says "for babies 9 months and older,".................oh well, even the doctor says G is advanced, right? haha...(oops).

Fall is Here!

This week we saw our first glimpse of fall here in Atlanta and it was WONDERFUL! I am so looking forward to cooler days so G can spend more time playing outside. It's great timing because he is at the age now where he loves being outside and is getting adventurous enough to explore the outdoors.

We decided to go play outside for a bit this week. G was not so sure about the grass at first (I think it was pretty itchy on his sweet, sensitive skin), but he warmed up to it pretty quickly and decided that it looked good enough to eat! (We've got to work on that...I'm trying to get him to understand the phrase "NO EAT!")

Oh, were you wondering if I took pictures of our outdoor adventure? Of course I did........

One of Griffin's new favorite "toys" is my cell phone (or Chad's...he's not picky). On this particular day he literally spent 45 minutes crawling around with my phone, eating it, dropping it, picking it up, etc... I have noticed that some buttons work better than others now, but if it makes him happy...by all means...slobber on my phone all you want son.

Today, Chad had a tennis match at home and since the weather was just about perfect, G and I spent the morning at the courts with him. Griffin had a great time exploring and everyone on the team couldn't believe how much he'd grown since the last time they saw him.

(Doesn't he look adorable in this outfit?! This is the first time he's worn overalls and I think they make him look like such a little boy.) The rest of the day was spent at home...as usual, G was in constant motion and got a really nice bump on the head (also fairly common around here).

...and though his nap wasn't very long this afternoon (not nearly as long as mom and dad would have liked), he zonked out pretty hard for a little bit.....

Doesn't look very comfortable to me, but the kid was out! (That other leg you can't see is underneath him with his foot right up by his ear.)

So, fall....WELCOME and thanks for finally making your way here.