Four Months

Ben is four months old today. Here are his current stats:

Weight - 16 pounds, 7 ounces (78th percentile)

Length - 25 inches, (52nd percentile)

Head Circumference - 42 centimeters (68th percentile)

His body has now caught up to the size of his head, so he's not such a little bobblehead anymore.

Here are some recent pics (like it's been a while).

Not so happy in his first hoodie.

Hanging out in the sunshine.

And here's his four month birthday photo. With all the Carolina blue in this picture you'd think I was a UNC grad. I'll try to incorporate some more Duke blue in the next round of photos.

Acceptance

I'm beginning to come to terms with the fact that Ben is never going to sleep through the night. My only hope is that in seven or eight years he will be able to get up and fix his own glass of milk.

Earth Day

We celebrated Earth Day this past weekend by attending the Planet Earth festival sponsored by Burt's Can't-Beat-Their-Lip-Balm Bees and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in downtown Raleigh. Being the environmentally conscious family that we are, we took two cars to the event. We did have a good excuse, however, as Harold's bluegrass band was playing so he needed to carry his equipment and arrive earlier. I am still gauging Ben's window of fuss-free, happy, public baby time, so I didn't want to chance being stuck downtown in an F3 (i.e., full-fledged fuss) situation. I did dress Ben in an organic "It's good to be green" onesie, so hopefully that makes up for the dual cars. Or it at least shows that I care.

This was our first big family festival/event and I found myself now being the annoying stroller-wielding Mom trying to make my way through the throngs of non-stroller-pushing people aimlessly hanging out. My how quickly one's perspective can change.

Anyway, we had a great time. Ben enjoyed looking at all the people and I think he may even be a bluegrass fan. We'll see if it sticks.

Ben Goes Mobile (Sort Of)

Ben has now mastered the art of rolling over from his back to his belly. He really is quite talented.

This video doesn't capture one of his more graceful rolls, but you get the idea.

He has also learned to combine the back/stomach, stomach/back rolls, which means that he can now gradually work his way across the living room and on into the kitchen if we'd let him. Looks like I'm going to need to step up our floor cleaning.

Catching Up

Last weekend Ben and I went to visit my parents in High Point. Ben displayed his first interest in beverages of the non-milk variety.

He had some good quality time with Teresa - she can always make him laugh.

Ben also spent some time hanging out with his Papa.

His Great Granny found him to be extremely heavy. And he is - we weighed him at home today and he is now 16 pounds. He doesn't feel heavy when I carry him, so hopefully all this baby-toting I've been doing has increased my muscle strength.

We are looking forward to our next family visit. It's nice that they are only a short car ride away.

Feet

Ben is still obsessed with his feet. I'm obsessed with his cute Trumpette socks.

Baby #1

Mortimer M. Puppy (aka baby #1) is 5 years old today. He received his favorite blueberry muffins as his special birthday treat. With this birthday Mortimer now surpasses us in age, dog years-wise. This makes me a little sad.

Here he is as the tiny little puppy he was when I brought him home.

And here he is as a somewhat larger and now middle-aged dog. He's still the cutest puppy ever as far as I'm concerned.

Quite a Weekend

We had quite a weekend here in the Brady household. Friday night Ben slept from 9:30pm to 7:30am, without waking once. This was his first experience sleeping through the entire night, as opposed to the pseudo-sleeping through the night that only lasts for about 5-6 hours before he wakes up to eat. I woke up feeling completely rejuvenated and in great spirits. Who would have thought that I could ever be happy at 7:30am on a Saturday??? Of course he did not sleep through the entire night last night (he woke up at 4:30ish like he usually does), but at least we had that one night. And I am hopeful that more will follow.

And today, drumroll please, he rolled over for the first time! I clapped and cheered like he'd just climbed Mt. Everest or won the Nobel prize in Literature (which, lets face it, he probably will someday). I was so worried that he would roll over for the first time while I was at work, so I was absolutely delighted that he chose to do it this afternoon.

His other new trick is to gradually work a sock off his foot and then put it in his mouth.

I love this last picture. It looks like he's saying "Yes, I know it's wrong to chew my own sock, but since my Mommy hasn't bought me a teething ring*, it's all I have. Please donate to my teething ring fund."

*Fortunately for Ben's socks, he now has a new teething ring. Though I'm not sure it will replace the socks entirely.