I'm Still Alive, I Promise!

I know. Bad, bad blogger. I apologize. At some point, Jack outgrew his bassinet and decided that the crib is, in fact, a torture device. So instead of being able to sneak him into his own bed at night, I instead tuck him into bed with us, which means I have basically no baby-free time. And he's super-mobile now, which really limits my writing time.

So, a quick update? He's still got food allergies (at this point, we've figured out dairy, soy, wheat, corn, peanuts, tree nuts, sunflower seeds, and beef, but something else is still lurking and I can't figure out what it is). The allergies trigger his eczema, which isn't really all that bad except that he got so used to it itching that even when he's not broken out, he still tries to claw all the skin off his ankles (and once, he succeeded, which was maybe the worst thing I've ever had to deal with in regards to the care of babies). So it's the middle of summer, and my poor baby has to wear socks at all times, to protect him from himself. And I have to coat him in moisturizer and wrap him in bandages every night to keep everything from flaring up.

You know what's fun? Trying to get rolled gauze secured on a baby leg that's heavily coated in moisturizer and trying desperately to run away from you. Every single night.

Other than that, though, everything is awesome. He's a happy guy. The more he can do, the happier he becomes. Now, he can pull himself up to standing, and sometimes he can even stand on his own for a few seconds at a time. He's also learned that drawers and cabinets can be opened, which has once again completely undone all my previous efforts at babyproofing. (As I type this, he's pulling all the socks out of a dresser drawer in his room. Why? Because he can. And he's happy. And safe. And it just isn't worth the fight of keeping him out of there.)

He's also starting to eat solids, which has been a really great adventure. He doesn't ever eat more than a few bites of anything, but he'll taste just about anything, and it's prompted me to start working on finding more allergy-friendly recipes so he can eat a little more diversely at some point. So far, I've had good luck with banana muffins (coconut flour, of course), and I think I've perfected coconut milk ice cream, although I'm wanting to play around with a couple different flavors now that I've got the texture where I want it. (And yes, I'm going to post the recipe. I just wanted to nail the texture before I went to the trouble of taking pictures of everything.)

For now, though, the sock drawer is nearly empty and he's starting to move toward his other favorite thing... Kitty. I should save her, probably.