Cereal and videos

For the past few days we've been offering Malcolm some (highly milked-down) rice cereal after his evening bottle-feeding. He's generally been happy to play with the spoon, but would make a "yuck" face if any got in his mouth, and would push the spoon away and clamp shut. We didn't want to force the issue, but were wondering when he would decide this stuff might be edible and actually seem interested in trying some (after all, he's almost six months old!). Tonight, he made the same "yuck" face when we put some on his lip, but then opened up for the spoon! He kept opening and lunging for the spoon while making the yuck (or maybe just skeptical) face at each spoonful! Funny little guy... most of it ended up on his chin, but we think some made it in. It's amazing to think that in just 6 months he will be eating the same foods as we are!


And I have two videos to present (these are especially for Grampa, who requested recent videos). First, Malcom splashing in the bath tonight! He just figured out how to do this last night!

Malcolm learns to splash in the bath! from Alison (& Andy & Malcolm) on Vimeo.

And second, a very cute boy giggling in his Bumbo a couple of weeks ago. For some reason he decided that me bobbing my head up and down was the funniest thing ever. It was very nice, especially since Daddy gets more of the giggles usually... I'm glad to have the laugh for posterity, because it is such a cute little heh-heh-heheheheheheh.

Malcolm's giggles from Alison (& Andy & Malcolm) on Vimeo.

6 month update coming later this week...

Things Malcolm has been up to...

since turning 5 months... (i.e. Mommy doesn't have time for a lot of text...)

Attending his first non-relative dinner party.

Learning to sit (pants and sweater by a knitting friend of mine).

Sitting in the bath.


Chewing his toes.

Helping me prune the roses.

Turning 5 and a half months!

and, after all that tires him out...

Napping without a swaddle*!
(doesn't the cuteness just slay you? :)

* we put him to sleep initially on his back, but since he can roll over (oh yeah, add that to the things he's been up to, though he does it inconsistently), the AAP says he can sleep on his side or his tummy now. He seems to prefer the side or 3/4-rolled positions. This is just for naps, right now, but we will be attempting un-swaddled night sleep soon!

FO: Matching hats!

Pattern: Circular Bicolour Prime Rib (Brioche) Hat by Megan Mills
For baby size, started pattern after first set of decreases (though the adult is pretty small unstretched and actually could have fit him, just very loosely!)

This was fun! Since only one color is used per round (despite the striped appearance), it was fairly easy to pick up and put down as baby allowed. I used Cascade Fixation (the green) and some brown Madil Zaffiro, the other ball of which had become Andy's Coding Gloves. The pattern has a lot of stretch, and the Fixation of course is part elastic, so Malcolm's should grow with him - until it runs out of length! Both father and son needed spring hats, and I'm hoping these will serve for a while.

Next up - gift knitting; not sure what after that. I am trying to knit from stash for a bit as I have more yarn than I really need at the moment (don't we all?).

5 months!

Wow, time sure flies. I'm pretty sure it was just the other day that I was posting that Malcolm was two months old...

This 5-month picture is late because a) my Mom was in town and we spent time with her rather than blogging, and b) I went back to work last week so wanted to spend time with Malcolm rather than blogging. b) will always be the case from now on, but I should manage to sneak in the odd blog after he goes to bed (but there goes the knitting time!) or during naps (if only they'd become > half an hour). Or, you know, during my breaks at work. Heh. Work was pretty quiet since my boss was out sick for the first couple of days, so I still got to come home early; and Andy and I availed ourselves of the free babysitting which Grandma offered, and went into Portland to our favorite restaurant (though, I'm not sure I enjoyed it as much as previously, I think they're trying a little too hard). Of course we mostly talked about Malcolm, but it was nice to go to a grownup restaurant and have time to order appetizers and desserts!

Anyway, the best bear-chair picture this month shows a somewhat grumpy Malcolm - I think he was getting sick of being posed in the chair. He has taken to whining sometimes - kind of a sheeplike bleating - which is better than all-out wailing but still kind of annoying. But annoying in a cute way, of course. We still get the all-out wailing on occasion, most often when overtired - like the other night in the bath where we had the gall to take away the washcloth he was chewing! Looks like we'll need more washcloths per bath since he has decided they're toys - I'd better get knitting!
Lots and lots of developmental stuff going on recently - not so much rolling (he's only done back-to-front a couple more times), but he's gotten very interested in sitting unsupported. He can do this for a couple of minutes, or more if we gently place a leg or pillow behind and around him. It's a whole new way to play with toys! Here he is sitting (highly supervised by Daddy!) on the kitchen counter and playing with a nearly empty plastic cookie box:


He also grins a ton and giggles a lot, especially for Daddy. One of his favorite games is to be carried by Andy, feet out, and be rushed over to me so I can kiss or raspberry those chubby feet. Here's a blurry action shot - I love this picture for the wide grin!

And one final pic - he is not hating tummy time as much now, though it still becomes crank-worthy after a few minutes. He has figured out that he can grab at toys from that position, which keeps him occupied a bit. Somehow I managed to take a really great picture of him - not sure how, but I got the camera to do that "fuzzy background" thing. As opposed to the fuzzy foreground in many others :D. Just a bit of demon-baby redeye, but that's not a big deal...


I have also done knitting (huzzah!) and will blog about it in another post... As a matter of preview, matching baby-daddy hats are very cute!