Thurs., Aug. 13 (20 Weeks Even)

Brady is 20 Weeks Old today! That's half a pregnancy! Wow! Earlier this week (at 19 weeks), he mastered holding his own bottle. That's right, he can now hold his own bottle - no problem! He also grabs my glasses off my face and then try to put them back on me! Over the past 2 weeks, he has really become a fan of Peek-A-Boo too (causes serious giggle fits). At the 4 month mark, Brady started grabbing his feet ALL the time and even putting his feet in his mouth. He's getting better with sitting up and can sit up unassisted for about 10-15 seconds each time. He falls over when he reaches down to put his toes in his mouth. Very cute!

He is still on bananas (loves bananas!) but we'll be trying out squash tomorrow. That should be interesting. Up until now, all the foods (rice cereal with breastmilk and bananas - also usually with breastmilk) have been fairly sweet...so I'm interested to see what he'll think of squash! I'm excited to make all this organic, homemade baby food! He's still drinking a lot of milk but definitely enjoys his two "real meals" each day.

In other news, we're still getting Brady used to the idea of sleeping without the swaddle blankets. We're definitely not rushing him out of them...he just loves his swaddle blankets! But we do think he wakes himself up from trying to roll around / escape so we're transitioning to sleep in just PJ's. In an effort to not totally freak him out, we've been having him sleep with one arm out of the swaddles for the past two weeks. We'll eventually switch to two arms out and then take them away. Our little guy has been going through a MASSIVE growth spurt over the past two weeks...eating constantly...sleeping a lot etc. He also seems Much bigger. I've been meaning to measure him lately because it really looks like he grew a few inches overnight.

And we think it's pretty much official. I can pretty much guarantee Brady will keep his BLUE eyes. Thought they might be green for a while there but they are most definitely blue now. Blue eyes seem to be a very strong McDonald trait (Great Grampy, Grampy, Ted, Anna, Nick, Ben & Zach all have blue eyes...so does Grandma LaBerge - Meema's Mom). So I guess we should be too surprised.

Mark has been doing a great job taking care of Brady during the day! I have been so busy at work lately - working very long hours etc. Mark brings Brady by each day around lunch and I get to snuggle and nurse him for ~15-20 minutes. I look forward to it every morning. The nursing over all is going well - no effect to supply from introducing solids. My goal is still a year of nursing. Not only is it really good for Brady - it's also supposed to be good for me - studies have shown that nursing for 1+ year at a stretch greatly reduces your risk of breast cancer. So sign me up!

I can't believe my little guy is 20 weeks old today. He throws his arms around my neck now and hugs/snuggles me. When did he get to be so big?