The Baylor Family Blog

Things Eli is up to these days:
–crawling everywhere
–attempting to climb stairs
–pulling himself up
–blowing lots of spit bubbles (sometimes filled with mouthfuls of rice cereal)
–squealing
–picking up blocks
–knocking over towers of blocks
–sucking on anything and everything
–drooling lots and still no sign of teeth
-sleeping through the night
–preferring daddy and mommy most of all, though he is starting to slowly warm up to others
–eating formula and rice cereal
–climbing all over mommy on the floor
–enjoying time in his booster seat, whether eating or playing with toys
–pulling off his socks
–trying to figure out how to get his shoes off
–has flown on 3 airplane flights
–wanting to do whatever daddy and mommy are doing
–wanting to hold whatever daddy and mommy are holding
–squirming like crazy on his changing table
–discovering anything he can put his hands on in the big new world all around him
–listening to music
–growing into 6-9 month sized clothes
–splashing and loving bath time
–playing the piano with mommy
–smiling and sticking out his tongue
–riding in Baby Bjorn
–playing with laundry baskets (and pulling laundry out of the basket as mommy folds clean clothes)
–and so much more!

I did bring Eli to the GI specialist just before Thanksgiving. His weight had dropped even more. The doctor was concerned, despite knowing he was just getting over the stomach flu. We are now concentrating his formula to add calories and adding rice cereal to each bottle to help manage his acid reflux. The doctor also had us start him on a special oil to add calories, but we have since stopped that as it made Eli throw up. Eli had a tough time adjusting to the changes in his bottle, especially the fact he has to suck harder to drink the thicker formula. We have had to tweak amounts and adjust the size of the nipple openings, but he is now doing much better with feeds.

I brought Eli to get his very first blood draw from his arm that day…he screamed his head off, but was immediately comforted in my arms. Part of Eli’s blood work was related to allergies. The doctor thinks Eli may have developed an allergy to oatmeal, peas and carrots. The doctor wants me to introduce butternut squash to Eli prior to returning to the specialist in December to see how he tolerates it.

We have already noticed that Eli has put on some weight (how much, we don’t know). His vomiting, choking, and spit up episodes have decreased dramatically. Fortunately, he is still on track with all other areas of development. So we are very thankful for some solutions and a doctor who is so knowledgeable!

So that’s the scoop on Eli…we love our little guy so much!

My side of the family had a lovely Thanksgiving meal on Thursday. Then Friday was the Davis Christmas! We packed two big holidays into two days…quite impressive indeed! This was Eli’s first Christmas celebration…and to our delight, he was awake and in a great mood the whole time (though he took a great nap after the festivities that day!). My niece Callie did a marvelous job handing out the presents to everyone! Eli got spoiled by his grandparents and aunts and uncles and great grandma! Though he got some really cool and fun new toys, he was most intrigued by the wrapping paper, ribbon (before daddy and mommy took it away), boxes, and tags! Since then, he as taken to his new toys like a charm Here are some pictures of Eli on that cold Christmas day in Wisconsin…

Eli’s Great Grandma Davis (now nicknamed GG) spent Thanksgiving with us this year. This was her first opportunity to meet Eli. It is always lots of fun getting to spend time with Grandma!

Although crawling around on the wood floors at my parents house is harder than the carpet Eli is more familiar with, it didn’t hold him back one bit! He did slip and slide more…and sometimes found himself going backwards. In the above picture, he managed to slide himself backwards right under the couch!

Eli has become quite the helper these days, especially with all the packing and unpacking that goes with travelling. He will crawl right up to the suitcase, pull himself up and start taking things out of the suitcase. Most of the time he did that when I was trying to pack the suitcases (not unpack them!). Fortunately, he hasn’t learned how to open the big lids. Though, he is quite intrigued with zippers these days.

Eli’s first experience with a sit-n-spin! He was quite intrigued with it, though he doesn’t have the coordination to make it spin yet!

Eli soaking up love and attention from Uncle Kevin and Aunt Jennifer

Eli showing Grandma how to send text messages on the cell phone (thanks for sharing your phone, Callie)

Eli quickly found the control to my mom’s wheelchair and drove her around the basement. I think we all understand why 8 month old babies aren’t allowed to have their licenses yet!

Grandpa holding Eli and Callie

We spent Thanksgiving in Wisconsin with my parents and brothers and their families. It was great being together in one place, as we all live in different states now (ironically, none of the states even touch each other). Anyway, this was Eli’s second visit with his cousin Callie who is 11 months older than he is. There were some very cute pictures as the two were quite interested in each other. Callie was getting a taste of the future as she’ll have a baby brother in March. Eli’s natural reaction to exploring his cousin, much to her dismay, was to suck on whatever body part he could get his mouth on. Matt and I got a taste of whats ahead for Eli as we watched Callie running through the house, recognizing letters, soaking up words and phrases like a sponge and so much more. Lots of fun…here are some pictures

On Saturday, the three of us loaded up in the car and headed up to Denver to celebrate Grandad Baylor’s birthday. Perhaps Baby Boot Camp worked because Eli was quite the little trooper all day, despite having his afternoon nap delayed and being surrounded by lots of people! Eli and his cousin Nathan enjoyed playing with rocks on the sidewalk after lunch…I’m so looking forward to the two of them being great pals as they grow older!

Here is a picture of Eli with Grandma and Grandad Baylor after lunch. Grandma Baylor couldn’t wait to get her hands on Eli! After lunch, they brought Eli to Build a Bear and Eli got a monkey named Jasper and a reindeer named Rudolph (whose nose lights up!) I’ll post some pictures of his new stuffed pals later!

And Eli has completely taken off with crawling. He is into everything now…its a lot of fun, but definitely full of changes!

The week is young, but has been filed with a roller coaster of emotions already! With Eli being sick last week, routine went out the window. He was unpredictable, but unsurprisingly when he couldn’t keep food down. He cried more often, likely because his tummy hurt and he was hungry. With the start of this week, I had a determination to get back into a routine. Baby Boot Camp, I jokingly am calling it. Eli, on the other hand, has had a tough time giving up the special “sick baby” treatment and has fought against me! Its been a few very hard days of listening to seemingly non-stop screaming unless I did exactly what he wanted me to do, how he wanted me to do it, and when he wanted me to do it. He wanted to sleep in my arms, play with his toys in my arms, bounce in my arms, and so on. However, my arms and my back are exhausted…and furthermore, giving into him isn’t the best for Eli, either. Matt has come home to a screaming son and a wife at the end of her rope! But all it takes it for Eli to smile or giggle or crawl over to me and grab at my face to melt my heart again. Somehow, I can’t stay frustrated at Eli for too long. I’ll find myself looking through pictures of his life on the computer, and my frustration will melt away. Thankfully every day is a new day. Yesterday, Eli didn’t want to sleep in his crib. Today, he has given up a little of the fight. Who knows what tomorrow will hold. I will continue to do what I think is best for our family and try and rise above my selfish desires to do so. Being a mother isn’t easy. I’m learning a lot…and I have a lot to learn! But I love my boy.

Following up from my previous post, Eli has been tolerating full strength formula and his feeds are back to normal. His pediatrician must have been right, Eli’s tummy just takes a little longer to heal. I think I mentioned it already, but we see his GI specialist on Friday. Please pray this visit goes well as we have a lot of questions and concerns in this area. Thanks!

P.S. The above picture caught my eye today. It was taken while he was still in the NICU at the hospital. He’s grown and changed so much since this was taken. I’m so thankful that he was able to come home so quickly despite all the events surrounding his entry into this world!

So it seems as though the three of us have all survived the stomach flu. We tried started Eli back on full strength formula this weekend, but he quickly informed us that he wasn’t ready for that. But he is doing well on diluted formula and has even been increasing his feeds to his close to his normal amount. We gave him rice cereal for the first time in over a week yesterday evening. He seemed to enjoy it and held it down great. So today, I’m going to try and give him full strength formula and see how he does. Eli sure does have a sensitive tummy!

Now that the stomach bug has made its way through, we have another bug we are fighting: a nasty cold. Matt got it at the end of last week, and now Eli seems to be fighting it, too. Somehow, though I’m home all the time and caring for my sick boys I seem to get it last (or hopefully not at all!). So I’m still healthy at the moment (but fully expecting to have lots and lots of snot and congestion soon!). I want to sterilize our house…hehe!

My goal this week is to do everything I can to get Eli’s body and mind back into his routine. Since his eating has been off, his body seems to be off with sleeping. Its been a bear to get him to sleep and stay asleep. And he has been waking frequently because he’s hungry…even through the night. So we are exhausted from lack of sleep at all hours of the day and night.

I moved Eli’s GI doctor visit to this Friday due everyone being sick last week. So I’m praying the two of us are healthier come this Friday. I am really looking forward to chatting with this specialist on Eli’s sensitive tummy, reflux, allergies, and struggle with solid foods. This doctor has been a great help to us in the past with Eli’s allergy issues.

Though Eli still isn’t as active or interested in toys as before this stomach bug came on, he started liking to look at the world upside down. Kinda fun We are working on video that we’ll put out on the blog someday…no promises on when since life has been so unpredictable as of late! But here’s a sample picture of it…

If you didn’t hear, the Bumbo chair was recalled. But not for lead reasons or defects in how its made. It was recalled so the manufacturer can put the warning label that’s already on the back of the chair, “Never use on a raised surface…” in a larger font due to a lawsuit from parents who have injured kids who have fallen out of a bumbo chair on raised surfaces. Apparently, now not only do manufacturers have to put every common sense warning known to mankind on their products, but they have to consider the font size, too. Nice. Because we like the smaller font size, we are keeping our bumbo chair just the way it is:)

I thought the following pictures were fun to see how Eli’s changed in his Bumbo chair…enjoy!

November, 2007

August, 2007

May, 2007

Sigh. Our little boy finally laughed again today. It was such a beautiful sound to my ears. We’ve managed to get some smiles out of him in the past few days, but no laughs. Last night after he threw up, he turned over and started crawling. He hasn’t done that in a week, either. This morning he sat up and watched me get ready instead of laying listlessly or crying. These are such encouraging signs as we’ve watched our little boy struggle all week. I’m not convinced he’s recovered as he threw up multiple times yesterday, was up a lot last night, and still isn’t taking full-strength formula. But I’ll take some encouragement

Matt is amazing. When he got home from work on Wednesday night, I pretty much placed Eli in his arms and crawled up the stairs and got sick for hours. With no time to transition from work life to home life, he stepped right in and took care of his sick wife and baby. He cleaned up way too many messes that Eli and I made. He managed to conduct meetings at work via phone while holding his son. He cleaned and did lots and lots of laundry. On top of all this, he seems to have a cold, too. I’m so thankful for him…I couldn’t have made it through this week without him!

And I’m finally feeling better. Exactly 24 hours after the bug hit, my strength returned and I felt so much better. I still feel a little weak today…likely because I’ve hardly eaten anything in almost 2 days. But I’m strong enough to care for Eli.

Unsurprisingly, we haven’t taken many pictures this week. But here are a few I found on the camera…enjoy!