Our Teddy Graham

Our 7-month old teddy Graham just celebrated his first Halloween. He didn't mind wearing his costume, but he hated the process of putting it on. I'm not surprised about that. These days he hates to be restrained for things he finds annoying (diaper changes, sitting for long periods of time at a restaurant table, outfit changes, etc). On Friday night, our little bear made his debut for Fall Fest at church. He was underwhelmed. He and I weren't lucky in the cake walk, but he did get a balloon to take home. Graham is interested in balloons. He's been gazing at my "Happy Anniversary" balloon for weeks, and the curly ribbon tied to it makes it that much better!

Graham has only been crawling for a little over a week now, but he's not stopping there... he is learning to pull himself up into a standing position! So far he's only done this completely on his own in the crib (scary!). Drew and I had just lowered his mattress to the middle level, and the next day when I put him down for a nap, I looked at the video monitor and saw him standing there with his hands on the edge! It made me so nervous that I couldn't do anything until I saw that he had finally plopped back down to sleep. I think he uses the bumper to crawl upward until he can reach the rail. He's really keeping us on our toes now!

The Cast is Off

We've had a lot going on the last couple weeks. The most significant is that my grandmother, Mama King, passed away last Wednesday (Oct 20). She was 87 and dealing with some medical problems, but we all thought she had been fairly stable lately. She always made it clear how much she loved us, and we will miss her so much! I'm glad she was able to spend a little time with Graham, but we all would have enjoyed more time with her.

Last Tuesday Graham finally hit the 3-week mark to have his cast removed! We had been counting down every single day. He seemed pretty calm until the nurse turned on the really loud saw to cut off the cast. He screamed through that, and than again during the follow-up x-rays. The nurse said everything healed really well and the bone is now probably stronger than it used to be. Just a couple days after the cast was removed, Graham officially crawled! He's still not very steady sitting independently, and he doesn't care to practice that skill now that he's on the move! At Graham's delayed 6-month well visit (we waited for the cast to come off), the doctor said he looks healthy. His length and head circumference are around average, but his weight is only at the 5th percentile. That seems like a problem to me, but the doctor wasn't concerned. We're still feeding him some beginning solids, although they shouldn't be called "solids" because they are total mush. He likes oatmeal cereal in the morning, but hates the vegetables we've been trying at supper. Well...he did like sweet potatoes, but that was it. I don't know how much longer we'll be attempting the other veggies before we treat him to fruits.

On October 15, Drew and I celebrated our 5-year wedding anniversary. We got up early for a romantic breakfast at Cracker Barrel before heading to Ocean Isle for the weekend with our Sunday school class. We rented an oceanfront duplex, which was perfect because we were able to divide the 10 couples into a "with babies" and "without babies" side. We had a great time! It was slightly stressful to manage Graham's schedule and night wake-ups, but it turned out to go pretty smoothly. Drew and I feel like it's good to do things like that so we don't turn into antisocial, homebound parents with an inflexible child.

Tar Heel Baby Summit

This past weekend, a group of Drew's college friends came into town to hangout with each other and all the new babies. This event was declared the "Tar Heel Baby Summit." In the picture, there's 13-month Jack, 3-week Eden, 8-month Madeleine, and 6-month Graham. We kicked off the event with a group dinner on Franklin Street. Fun, but with 12 adults and 4 babies, it was slightly chaotic for the parents. Saturday the guys enjoyed tailgating and watching the football game from awesome box seats. The older babies got to play together at our house for the afternoon, which was cute. Graham and Madeleine even decided to hold hands for a little while. Sunday we all got together for several hours to hangout, eat, and baby-watch. Graham was pretty laid back, and would quietly try to socialize with the other babies by crawling after them or touching them. We attempted to put him down for a nap at one point, and he let us know loud and clear that he was NOT interested in sleeping through all the action. So, he won that battle and we skipped the afternoon nap that day. It was a great weekend -- seeing old friends and meeting new additions.

Graham is handling life in cast like a champ. We think his leg is completely healed because he will kick it around like crazy, and even chew on the little toes poking out the end of the cast! Somehow he is moving faster than ever. He can scoot himself across the den floor in less than a minute, headed straight toward dangerous things like tables, electrical cords, etc. I'm afraid it's time to baby proof the house.