WOW, 6 months sure flew by quickly!
Nixon has become such an integral part of our family that none of us can remember much about life without him. In the past 6 months he has grown immensely, in fact, he is the same size I was at about 14months old! At his 6 month check up Nixon weighed 20lbs and was almost 30inches tall.
Not only has he grown physically, his skills have grown as well! He can roll over from front to back and back to front on both sides, and does so to get wherever he needs to go. Mom can no longer leave him alone on the floor. It is amazing how fast he can maneuver across the room. Nixon can also sit up unassisted for short periods of time (if left too long he looks like a weeble wooble and you know what they say about those), but loves spending most of his time in the pond or the johnny jumper.
He eats lots of different baby foods, though he does not care for any made by Mom. No matter what she prepares, he spits it out and ops for the jarred kind. Mom is beyond confused- what baby turns down home made meals from scratch for jarred Gerber junk? His main problem with eating is that he can't seem to take his fingers out of his mouth long enough to get his food in there. It is the most comical/frustrating thing ever.
Here is a picture of our happy, healthy, 6 month brother Nixon:
Right before his 6 month birthday his 2 front teeth came in. He was sure relieved when his teething pain was gone and couldn't stop smiling:
Since Presley's birthday our family has been busy with school activities and have kept a low profile. Everyone was sick for period of time, and that kept us at home. Mom tried her best to work on teaching Nixon to eat correctly. She was incredibly unsuccessful...
He refuses to take his fingers out of his mouth...
When he does, she has to shove the food in quickly and hold the spoon until he swallows.
The worst part is that he thinks its hilarious when Mom gets frustrated!
After a feeding Nixon looks like he went to battle:
Too bad for her it was the one night Dad came home early from work to see Macie, Presley and I before bed. He walked in the door and the first words out of his mouth were ones that I cannot type without being censored. It went a little something like "why the * is Nixon wearing that *"?!?! He did however laugh at the fact that Nixon puked all over it...
Nixon gets SO messy that Mom has resorted to placing him in the kitchen sink after he is done with his food. She carries him over, bumbo and all, rinses him off (while he is still wearing his food soaked clothing), and once all the chunks are washed away, takes his clothes off and gives him a bath. Nixon doesn't seem to mind- he loves the water!
Lots of nights Mom cleans the kitchen while he entertains himself in the water:
Once he is cleaned off, Mom dries him in a comfy towel and puts him in his pond while she gets his bottle ready.
Nixon still loves his bottle. When he sees it across the room he breaks into a shrieking cry until its placed in his mouth.
After his night time bottle he sits with Mom and Dad before bed, and apparently they have all sorts of silly conversations.
The weather in Las Vegas has been amazing, and the family is taking advantage of every day we are able to spend outside. We know all too well that soon the summer heat will be here and our days of extended outdoor fun will disappear. In an effort to be outside, as well as get exercise, we have been riding our bikes home from school once a week. Because we don't have the time to eat, dress, and ride to school in the morning, Mom has to bring our bikes on the trailer. It is quite the production. She has to bungee my bike and Macie's together behind Nixon, and combined with the weight of Nixon in his infant seat and Presley on the bike seat, Mom has a fairly heavy load to carry on the 2 mile ride to school.
Nixon has the best seat in the house,
and he enjoys the sights and smells of the outdoors.
On the morning of Nixon's 6 month birthday the family sat together and enjoyed a birthday breakfast and song before school. We all posed for some pictures to commemorate the big day!
Mom couldn't stop laughing at how much Macie reminds her of me when I was 5- same poses and all!
After school that afternoon Mom took us to the park.
Nixon enjoyed watching us run around and play!
Back at home the family had dinner together and then Mom brought him out a small cake. We sang Nixon Happy Birthday, but he wasn't too interested.
Mom fed Nixon some of his birthday cake and he really enjoyed it! Now he really isn't going to want to eat the healthy stuff!
After his birthday Mom took him to a specialist to get some advise about the flat spot he has on the back of his head. The doctors all agreed that Nixon's flat spot was pretty severe, and didn't seem to be getting any better with age. Despite all of the families best efforts to reposition him, he always ends up directly on it. The only thing to do was get a helmet. Mom and Dad decided that this needed to be addressed quickly, so the following week Nixon came home with his new armor:
Dad fell over laughing when he saw the Mohawk sticking out of the top. Mom smirked and said "you can't keep a good hawk down"- we all got a good laugh out of that one!
It doesn't seem to bother him much, but it takes a lot to get used to- he has to wear it 23 hours a day! Mom and Dad have been calling him Magnito!
I think that they really got him a helmet to protect his little head from Macie and Presley- they are really rough! Good thing Nixon knows that I will always take care of him.
The helmet has only become a burden to Mom when she is feeding Nixon. Because his fingers are always in his mouth they get covered in food. This is not good when Nixon flails his arms around and gets food everywhere.
On the whole we are incredibly fortunate and don't have much at all to complain about. Nixon is a happy baby, and even his helmet (which I'm sure is uncomfortable) doesn't stop this kid from putting smiles on our faces.
He even makes a helmet look like a cool accessory. Who knows, maybe he starts a new trend...
The rest of April is going to be pretty mellow which is good because May is going to be absolutely crazy! We have all sorts of great house guests coming and have tons of fun things planned. We look forward to resting up before the party starts- good thing Nixon is a big fan of sleep!
I don't think any of us knew just how much our family needed this little man to be complete. He has brought such a new and wonderful dynamic to our home and we couldn't be happier. Now that Mom and Dad are done having babies, they are working on raising the 4 of us. It's going to be a crazy, insane, busy, frustrating road ahead, but it will be full of love and laughter, and nothing will be more rewarding!
