gerber baby

i get comments all the time that jake looks just like a gerber baby. so i have entered jake in the gerber baby contest. if you have spare minute, please go vote for him. voting doesn't open until july 5th and it ends on july 31st. you can vote one time every day. here is a link that you can use to go to him directly and vote. then you go to galleries, find the search bar, type in jake (city - landrum) and he'll pop up. by the way, i entered the picture at the top of my blog. happy voting!!!

first trip to the dentist

yesterday jake had his very first dentist appointment. i had asked a lot of people for suggestions on what dentist to take him to. in the end, i decided to go with greenville pediatric dentistry. that's where i went when i was a child, and i have such fond memories of going there. dr. bray was my dentist, but he's retired and sold the practice to his daughter, dr. april. she was wonderful. she also has a son who's 13 months old. so she just sat and chatted with me about random things. i thought that was very nice and that shows that she's not just there for the business. she truly cares about her patients and their families. we talked about adding brushing jake's teeth to his bedtime routine and possibly trying to take the paci away around 18 months - 2 years old. she said just from talking to other moms that taking it away during that time frame seemed to be the easiest time for all involved. so onto the actual check up. children get 20 baby teeth. jake already has 16 of those. so all we have to wait on are his 2nd molars (which shouldn't come until he's 2). his teeth and the spacings between looked great. the only little concern she had was that the little piece of skin that is above his top teeth that connects to the top of his lip was rather low. therefore, it's causing a gap between his two top teeth. so she said it might go away on its own or either when he's older and his permanent teeth come in he'll have to get it clipped and have braces. she also said that if he was to fall and hit his mouth, that little piece of skin may tear and she said there would be a lot of blood (but that would be a blessing in disguise). but other than that, it was a great first check-up. jake doesn't necessarily like for people to look in his mouth, but he did a lot better than i expected. here are some more pictures from his first visit.

16 months

today, my not so little boy, turned 16 months old. he is a wild, but sweet little boy. jake is constantly into everything. (in a teacher's words....he's very busy....a busy body.) one minute he's in the kitchen pulling out all the tupperware, measuring cups, or pots and pans. the next minute he's in the living room pulling out all his toys. then before you know it, he's somewhere else in the house pulling something out making yet another mess. i've finally learned to just leave it all and clean it up when he takes a nap. i've learned to sit back and enjoy this time with jake rather than trying to keep a clean house. while we are doing all this playing and making all these messes, jake is constantly laughing. if you are sitting on the couch, he will try to push you off and when you "fall" off the couch, he laughs and laughs. he also thinks it's funny when one of his toy cars run over our feet. jake also likes to trick us. he'll offer us a bite of his food and then quickly take it away and eat it himself. he laughs at that too.

jake weighs 26 lbs. and 11 oz. he's probably around 33 inches long. we went to get jake a new pair of shoes from stride rite because his other shoes were getting too small. jake needed a 6 double wide shoe. the lady in the store thought jake was 2 years old. when i corrected her and told her he was only 15 months (at that time), she couldn't believe how big he was. we just laughed it off and joked that we definitely have a football player on our hands. jake goes through these stages of eating and drinking. one day he'll eat non-stop and another day he'll drink non-stop. then, of course, there are those days where he won't really eat or drink. his favorite foods right now are mixed berry yogurt, yogurt bites, bananas, cheese puffs, rice and gravy, blueberry waffles with syrup, and pringles multigrain chips. we also went and got jake his third haircut. his hair grows so fast!

jake is also very smart! (i know....every mom says that about her child) jake is very observant. he knows how to turn on the t.v. and then turn it to the aux. channel to watch his sesame street sing along dvd (which is what you have to watch if you plan on coming over to our house). we've even had to try to hide the remotes. as you can see below, that didn't work. see? i told you he's observant and smart.

when we read his ABC book, i always ask him "where is the ___?" he can correctly point to the baby, ball, banana, bus, kitty, puppy, and keys. he also has a musical book. there is a picture under the flaps in this book that matches a sound button on the side of the book. jake matches the pictures and pushes the correct button. some of his new words are:

keees - keys

nana - banana

pee-pee - pee pee

peeese - please

WOW - wow (he drags that one out....it's really cute)

jake is growing up so quickly. before i know it, he's gonna be 2! i'm so fortunate to be able to spend the summer with my sweet boy! i certainly LOVE every minute of it.

poor baby

last thursday we took jake back to the doctor for a re-check on his ears. dr. chea asked if i thought he was any better. i told her he'd been pulling/playing/hitting both ears quite often during the day. she took a look and he had developed a double ear infection. now....let's back up. jake has been on antibiotics since right after his birthday in february for an ear infection. so he's had an ear infection for about 4 months now. we've tried different medicines to get rid of the infection and nothing has seemed to help. so dr. chea gave him another round of the same medicine he'd just come off of a few weeks prior. she also had the nurses come in and give him a shot of a new antibiotic (one in each leg because he needed a larger dose). so just to be on the safe side, we waited for 20 minutes to make sure jake didn't have an allergic reaction to the new medicine. she also referred us to an ENT. we're going to see the same doctor that clipped jake's tongue when he was a little baby. so hopefully we'll be able to tell these ear infections goodbye!!!

on friday, we met up with melissa (my cousin) to get pedicures for her wedding. i was holding jake in my lap while i was soaking my feet and my mom came to get him when the lady was ready to do my pedicure. as momma picked jake up, i noticed his back was broken out really bad. we figured it was just his eczema. so after my pedicure was finished, i looked at his back a little closer and i knew that was NOT eczema. it was a rash all over his back and his bottom. i called the doctor's office immediately and told them i thought jake might be having an allergic reaction to something. so they told me to bring him in. long story short.....dr. chea thinks he might be allergic to penicillin. therefore, we immediately stopped taking the antibiotic she prescribed and switched to a different one. my poor baby isn't feeling so well and prayers are totally appreciated!!!

bottomless pit

i'm pretty sure it's safe to say that jake has a "bottomless pit" today. he has eaten non-stop today. for breakfast he ate yogurt, a whole blueberry waffle, and diced pears and he drank all his milk. about an hour later, he wanted some yogurt bites. (now if you don't know...jake knows sign language for "eat" and he goes and gets what he wants and signs "eat"). so he brings me the bag of yogurt bites and signs "eat". so i gave him 1 cup of them. then he found his cup and signed "more". so i gave him more milk and he drank it all. about 30 minutes later, he wanted a mixed fruit cup AND more to milk to drink. where in the world could all this food be going? oh, but we're not done yet. about an hour later, he wanted more yogurt bites and he finished off the bag. (fyi - that's a whole bag of yogurt bites today). finally it was nap time. i figured he wouldn't be hungry again for a while or he'd at least skip lunch. so i hopped in the car to bring josh a receipt that he needed and he took us out for lunch. we went to one of jake's favorite places to eat. mcdonald's, of course! i got jake a chicken nuggets happy meal. he ate 3 of the 4 chicken nuggets and a few fries. he drank some milk and water. seriously, where is all this food going? we get home from running our errand and i know jake will make it until supper time with no 3:00 snack. so i just offered him some juice. he drank it all then wanted "more". as i was getting him more juice (half water, half juice), he went and got a cup of yogurt. i looked at him and said "really jake? you want more food?" he laughed and shook his head yes and just kept doing the sign for "eat". he devoured the cup of yogurt (feeding it to himself, i might add). literally 5 minutes later, he found one of his lil' entree's meals. (for those of you who don't know...it consists of chicken, noodles, carrots and a side of peas) he brought it to me (as i was folding clothes) and signed "eat". gosh kid! you've got to be full by now!! i asked him if we could wait until supper to eat with daddy. he looked at me like i was crazy...and signed "eat" over and over and over. then he proceeded to open it all by himself, and stood in front of the microwave and waited for me to come (while hollering "ma-MAAAA"). so he ate half of it and was ready to play again. and that's where we are now. i must assure you that jake does not eat like this every day. in fact, he's never eaten this much ever!!! i'm not sure if he's about to have a growth spurt or what? but gee-whiz....i'm pretty sure "bottomless pit" describes jake perfectly today!

p.s. - just an after thought....perhaps it's time that we put up a gate in the doorway of the pantry! just sayin'

splish-splash

when jake was a baby, he hated bath time. well...he's grown to L-O-V-E it! daddy has taught him how to splash the water in the bath tub and that sure does make bath time fun (and messy). so now that the weather is very warm, we decided to let jake play in his little pool outside. it was an instant hit! he had so much fun! here are some pictures from that fun, fun day!

and here's even more proof of how much our little boy loves water. one evening, we'd been playing outside and jake was sweating so much that his hair was beginning to get wet. josh decided that it would be funny to see if jake liked water sprayed on him. so he got out the hose pipe and put it on the mist spray. well.....jake thought it was hilarious! he would take a few steps backwards and then come back for more. he loved feeling the water on his hands. once again, it was a fun, fun evening!