"Whaat? Whooo? Hooow?"

These are the questions I could see running through my little tot's head when he first met Santa Clause. I should caviat this post with the fact that Cavin was tired, hungry, and had just sat through an hour long Catholic mass in an uncomfortable 'I'm wearing this outfit b/c it appeases my mom and is festive' outfit.

When I sat him down on Santa's lap he immediately became infatuated with the beard. Seriously, he would not stop staring. I was beginning to think Santa would take offense and become uncomfortable. And with Cavin's obsession in pulling my hair and sticking it in my mouth I had serious concern that Santa's gross beard would find it in my child's clean mouth. Alas, no...just...a lot of....staring.

Meanwhile, 50,000 people (okay, maybe there were really just 5 adults but daddy and mommy count as 49,997) were screaming Cavin's name, jumping up and down, waving toys, acting like complete fools to get just one precious photo of Cavin, Santa, and Mrs. Clause looking at the camera. But nope. We have one excellent photo of Santa looking at Cavin and Cavin....looking at the beard. All 50,000 adults tried for what felt like 5 minutes until Cavin got completely overwhelmed and burst into tears!

And with a "maybe you should take him" from Santa, mommy swooped him up in hopes that despite Cavin's "naughty" behavior he will still be considered on Santa's "nice" list.

Sweet Relief

A night time ritual: a tantalizing menu of rice cereal mixed with fruits and / or veggies followed by a chilled dessert - a teething ring.




Showing off his festive "My first tooth" onesie...

Happy Seven Month Birthday Cavin!

He is getting up there! I apologize for the late birthday post this month...things have been pretty hectic in the Spruiell household between my NY trip, our Houston trip, and Thanksgiving. Okay, enough with the excuses....onto the birthday boy!

When it came to the monthly Elmo shot, this month proved a LITTLE easier. Since he's very comfortable sitting up these days, he would stay on Elmo for a little more time. The tough part was getting him to pose and smile at the same time. He'd sit there for a few seconds with this look like 'can I go now??? can I?? please! I want to go!!!!'

Cavin: "Okay, it's time to go. That's okay right?"

Cavin: "Screw this. I'm out."

Cavin: "Get out of my way mom!!!"

This month Cavin perfected his crawling technique. This little guy is pretty fast. He kicks it into high gear when he sees one of his furry friends. Once one of the dogs see he is headed their way, they meet him half way with lots of licks...it is such a cute relationship he has with those two. As for Toby, it took Toby 8 months to warm up to each of these dogs so I'm hoping to have some good news right around Cavin's 9 month Elmo picture.

In other news, at around 6.5 months Cavin started pulling himself up to stand! And about a week and a half after that he was already cruising around...in other words, taking steps while holding onto something. He still doesn't cruise that fast or go that far....for long! He even takes one hand off and uses it to pull down toys.

As you can probably imagine, the second Cavin wakes up, the productivity levels in our household decrease by 50%. Meaning, one parent is constantly following after Cavin picking up after him or ensuring he doesn't injure himself too bad. Mike has been baby proofing as much as possible but we feel like we barely keep up.



We also started solid foods this month. We began with rice cereal which went over pretty well. Then we figured we'd begin his fruit / veggie experience with avocado since, other than Jerry, he's the only native Californian in our family. Well, apparently the CO and TX in his blood was stronger than CA b/c he didn't take to the avocados very well. We'll try those again soon. He warmed up to sweet potatoes, likes bananas, and loves pears! Cavin has never been a big eater so we are finding that solid feeding time is a bit of a challenge to keep him interested but he's getting better as the days go on.


He also has TWO bottom teeth! Okay, so one showed up before his 7 month bday and one showed up after...but I'm included the second tooth in this post anyways. We endured quite a few sleepless nights for those bad boys. Mr. Molar, you can wait for now. And as with all big occasions he dressed appropriately and sported a "My First Tooth" onesie to daycare the day is first tooth popped in. I'll post the pic of that later.


So as you can see it has been a BIG month!


Now on to the stats! Since Cavin didn't have a doctor's appointment this month, the stats are VERY approximate.


Weight: 19 pounds, 6 ounces
Height: 29.5 inches
Head: enormous - he's grown out of all but two of his hats


Happy Birthday honey-bunny!