Wish Granted???

When I was pregnant and found out that Luke was going to be a boy, I sent an email to my family saying I hoped that our baby boy was going to look like Phil and attached some pictures of my hubby as a little chub. So....you tell me. Did I get my wish??

(I added this one just b/c I think it's HILARIOUS.)

Cold. Cold. Cold.

You've probably noticed that I haven't blogged in a while. Why? Because we've been busy. Busy doing NOTHING. It's been so cold around here that Luke and I have been staying inside as much as possible, so there hasn't been much to blog about. We've had to make our own fun doing things like....


Playing peek-a-boo behind the couch with Mommy...

Practicing our clapping...

...And playing with our dog.
No, we don't have a real dog. You didn't miss that blog post. We do, however, have an awesome stuffed dog that my grandma gave Luke for Christmas. He absolutely loves it. Every time he sees it he goes nuts until he can get to it. The other day he ran circles around the house in his walker with the dog on the tray. All I can say is that dog is so lucky he's not real!


Here comes LUKE!!!


So excited to see the doggy!!


Giving the doggy a big fat kiss...er, chomp, I guess.


Starting to play...


Our little wrestler, practicing his pinning moves.

Here's hoping the sun comes out to stay for a while...
We can't wait for spring!

Punk or Punkin?

If you follow this blog at all, you know that Luke is a big time thumb sucker. It's really cute (for now), but it can be a problem when it's time for him to eat. Ever since he started eating solid foods, we have tried really hard to teach him that we don't suck our thumb while we are eating. He usually responds pretty well, but lately he has been thinking that it's hilarious when we tell him no. The other night Phil was feeding him dinner, and Luke just got so tickled that neither Phil nor I could keep a straight face as we fought to keep Luke's thumb out of his mouth. The first video is really short, but hilarious because of Phil's reaction more than anything. You can't tell in the video, but Luke laughs and spits a mouthful of food all over Phil's jeans. Phil was not happy.

This is where Phil and I just caved, realizing all the while that Luke was manipulating us right before our very eyes.

You may also know that we have been working for a while on teaching our punkin to feed himself his puffs (similar to Cheerios). I mentioned that he can do it now in my last post, but last night we discovered something else that he has learned...While we were teaching him, we would clap and cheer every time he'd actually get a puff in his mouth. It turns out that he not only learned to put them in his mouth, but he also learned that you are supposed to clap for yourself while you chew on your puffs. Here he is showing us that he can not only feed himself, but also celebrate his accomplishment!

A Fishy Lunch with Daddy....

Thursday Luke and I met Phil for lunch. Guess where we went?
CHICK-FIL-A, OF COURSE!
Does Phil ever go anywhere else? We went to the one in the mall, because it's the closest, and because Phil can get away with using multiple coupons at that one. There's a play area there for the kiddos, and while Luke isn't big enough to play on it yet, he loved watching all the big kids running around and playing together.


Showing off a little chest...
Yellow Man now goes everywhere with us thanks to an unused pacifier leash we had lying around. Unfortunately it made for a peep show when attached to this outfit.


Big laughs for Mommy.


Showing off those chapped cheeks...


...and those bottom teeth.

It wasn't Luke's first trip to have lunch with Daddy at the mall (Chick-Fil-A), but it was the first time that he's been big enough to sit in his own seat and eat his own solid food...a big yellow fish.


Mmmmmm...fish!

Well, actually, the big yellow fish housed Luke's puffs, which he can now feed himself! He also got to eat his very own carrots, green beans, and pears with blueberries. Little did he know, he was getting the short end of the stick while Phil and I were chowing down on our chicken sandwiches and waffle fries.


Tastes like chicken to me.


Yum-o.


Daddy tries to get a bite.


Man, this lunch thing is awesome.

After lunch, we stopped by Phil's office so all the office ladies could see Luke. We found a box full of paper waiting to be recycled, and it was just Luke's size! We put him in it and were able to entertain him for a whole 5 minutes...


What the heck....???


Ummm. What is this stuff?


Mmmmmm....tastes like chicken, too.


I just realized Yellow Man was here, too!


Walking to say hi to Sue.


Looking sleepy.

We had a good time with Daddy and managed to rob him off lots of work time!

8 (and a half) months!

Because of the holidays, I totally slacked on Luke's 8 month update. So now, weeks later, I am finally getting around to it!

Poor little punkin has a chapped face again.

Our little man is getting to be quite the big man. He seems to do new things every day, and Phil and I just look at each other like, "Did you just see that, too?" We can hardly believe it. Most days when Phil gets home from work, I give him the run down of the surprising things that Luke has done that day or the several ways in which he's tried to tear down the house. He is ALL boy and is definitely going to give us a run for our money. Here are some of his latest accomplishments:

~ Perhaps his greatest accomplishment as of late is that he can now pick up Cheerios AND put them in his mouth. For a good while Luke would pick one up, only to throw it on the floor or scrape it back and forth on the tray/counter. This was maybe the greatest mystery ever to exist in the Tatum house. Luke puts EVERYTHING in his mouth. Why in the world would he not even try to put Cheerios in his mouth?? Who knows. Anyway, he is now past that and is a Cheerio champ. Well, kind of. We still have to give him one at a time, or he'll just pick one up and push all the others onto the floor, never putting the one in his hand in his mouth. Strange. But true.

~ We are still working on the sippy cup, but he's getting better at it! Chewing on the bottom of it is still his preference, but he seems to enjoy drinking from it from time to time, too.

~ Luke moved himself to a 4 hour feeding schedule, and I am thrilled. I had been trying to transition him to a 4 hour schedule for a while, but it wasn't really working, so I'd given up. I didn't really mind, but I was wondering when he was going to be ready. He made it known that he was ready by suddenly and repeatedly refusing to nurse before the 4 hour mark. It was so weird, because it was the first time he'd ever not wanted to eat. My first thought was that he was sick, but then I figured it out!



~ Luke finally decided to give up the army crawl for good. He is a real pro now and moves at warp speeds. Interestingly enough, Luke started his wanna-be crawl at 5 months and moved on to his big boy crawling at 7 1/2 months, which is the exactly what/when Phil did!

~ Speaking of Phil, Luke is proving to be more and more like him all the time. It's crazy. Every couple of days Phil and I can be found talking about yet another way in which Luke is so much like his daddy.

~ Luke's favorite thing to do is stand up now. It's hilarious to watch him play because he plays for a while on his tummy, then realizes that he's not standing, so he crawls to the nearest sizable object and pulls himself up. Then he realizes that his toys are back where he was, so he squats down and crawls back...for a few minutes, until he does it all again. Although we've witnessed that he's able to sit himself up from his tummy, he doesn't do it very often and seems to prefer to pull himself up to a standing position in order to then squat down into a sitting position.

~ Luke is finally ticklish. He hasn't been until recently, and it's been no fun. Now he is suddenly ticklish, and it's the cutest thing!



~ We were having a problem with Luke flooding his diapers and waking up during the night. As it was, he was already wearing size 5 overnight diapers (Pampers Extra Protection we love you), and we couldn't (and still can't) find them in size 6. We were getting DESPERATE, and then I remembered a woman in my breast feeding support group who told me about these diaper inserts that she once used for her daughter. I called Babies R' Us and asked, and sure enough, they had them! If you have the same problem, you HAVE to get these!! They act as extra padding to help sop up it all up. They're great. For some reason they call them "diaper doublers" at the store, even though they are not called that anywhere on the package. They are called Diaper Booster Pads by Select Kids on the package. Online they only offer a case of them (180 count), but in the store they seem to only sell smaller packs of them (can't remember the exact count, 30-ish?). They have the same logo on the front, though, but are in a white bag, instead of a green box. Oh, and they're only $3.49!

~ Luke's officially entered the separation anxiety stage. He's always been so good with other people and would let absolutely anyone hold him. Lately, though, he's been much more hesitant to go to just anyone, at least at first. Once he gets warmed up, he'll let pretty much anybody hold him, though, (at least until he wants to get down and play) so that is good. I really don't want him to be clingy! Also, for several days after we got back from vacation, he'd scream and cry for a little bit whenever we'd put him in his bed and leave the room. He had been able to be put in his bed and fall asleep on his own for a long time, so I couldn't believe he was suddenly freaking out EVERY time we put him down. Thankfully, after just letting him cry it out for a few days, he went back to his old self. I do think, though, that it all went back to this new bout of separation anxiety, and he had to just get over it!



~ Like I mentioned before, Luke is ALL boy and is already keeping me busy. Just in the last 2 weeks he has done the following: 1.) He's learned to flush the toilet when he's in his walker. He comes into the bathroom downstairs while I'm straightening my hair and immediately reaches up to the shiny handle on the toilet and pulls it down, flushing it. He'd do it over and over if I let him. 2.) He has learned to force himself over the step that goes down into our living room while he's in his walker. It has a little rim on the edge of it that usually stops the walker. Even if he gets going really fast, it will still stop him. He's figured out, though, that if he walks up to the rim and pushes really, really hard, he can push himself over the edge...of course, then he flips himself over and into the wall! 3.) He watched me open a drawer today and now that's all he wants to do. Open drawers. Any drawer, every drawer. We need to get some drawer locks, ASAP! 4.) He started pulling the dining room chairs down on top of himself and even pulled a rattan arm chair down on top of himself in the living room. 5.) Any time we let him crawl outside of the corral, he activates his Go-Go Gadget Outlet Radar and sprints to touch the nearest electrical outlet. He even did this at Phil's office today. Luckily, at home we have outlet covers everywhere. 6.) Yesterday when I was putting his clothes away in his room, in a matter of seconds he pulled the wire out of his sound machine and started happily chewing on one end while the other was still plugged in! When I saw this, I freaked out and did what any other mother would do. I put it in my mouth to see what it would do/had done to him. Sure enough, it shocked me. It had been shocking him, but he was enjoying it and just happily jabbering away.

I realize I sound like the most negligent mother in the entire world, but I promise that I really do watch him, I swear....but I can't keep my eyeballs on him every single second, and he seems to know just when I am not looking!

... And everyone just keeps telling me, "This is just the beginning..."
Lord help us all.



Seriously. I adore him.

Snow Much Fun!!

This past Thursday we got four inches of snow, followed by really cold temperatures which kept the snow around through the weekend. It was so pretty that of course we had to get pictures of the punkin in his first snowfall. For all of you blog followers out there, I realize this was not the first snow that he's ever seen, but it was the first snow he's ever physically been in. While we were really excited about this new adventure for Luke, he wasn't as enthusiastic. He loves being out in the cold and looking at the snow, especially when he can hear it crunching under our feet. He wasn't very impressed, though, when we stood him up in it, and was down right mad when he did a face-plant right into it, but I guess I can't really blame him!


Standing with our Eskimo in the middle of our backyard.


Looking a little Randy-esque all bundled up in his snow suit from Flipper and Reid's favorite hat handed down.


I wanted a cute pic of Luke sitting in the snow, but when I sat him down, he immediately went to his tummy and tried to crawl, landing face first in the snow. This was his reaction.
Oops.


After recovering from the face-plant. All better!


I think Luke might have made a couple snow balls while we weren't looking and stuffed them in his cheeks.


Daddy was jumping around making us laugh.
Luke thinks Phil is so funny these days. I have to agree with him.


My sweet boys.


So tickled to be outside in the snow with Daddy!

We got cold quickly, so we went back inside to thaw out. I couldn't quite bring myself to take the hat off yet. I'm glad I didn't because it made for some cute pictures.


Playing on the floor with Mommy.


Climbing up to offer me a few chews on his favorite rattle.


LOVE those cheeks!


And the dimples too!

Then it was time to eat. We Tatums love to eat. Can you tell?


Oh snap!


Sweet punkin.


Our little jack o' lantern.
Seriously. Click on this picture to see it in its own tab. Just look at how far apart those 4 new teeth are!!! I mean, I'm not wishing for snaggle teeth all crowded together, but please. He could store whole peas between each tooth.


Showing off what a good eater he is. Thanks, big man.

Christmas, Numero Dos.

We spent the last part of our Christmas vacation in Tampa, visiting my family. We left Atlanta on Christmas Eve morning and drove down to Tampa. This was Luke's longest car ride ever. We were extremely worried about how this road trip was going to go...Luke has never, ever liked the car seat. He is one of very few babies who almost never falls asleep in the car, and on the off chance that he miraculously does doze off, it only happens after a complete meltdown and then lasts just a few minutes. For this reason I got permission from our pediatrician to give Luke Benedryl to knock him out during our drive. She warned us to test it out first, because some people have the opposite reaction to Benedryl and get really revved up...We did NOT want that, so we tested it out on our one and a half hour drive back from Phil's parents' mountain house. We only gave him a half dosage and while it did put him to sleep, it made him really cranky first and then only made him sleep for 30 minutes! Plus, it made us feel really guilty for drugging our innocent little punkin. So...we weren't all that encouraged when we set out for our long drive to Tampa. We decided to wait on the Benedryl until later in the drive, and lo and behold, we never ended up needing to give it to him. Even though he only took 2 short 30 minute naps (in all of the 8-ish hours that we were driving), he never had any big melt downs and we only stopped 3 times, once being for lunch and gas and the other 2 for quick potty breaks at rest areas. We were very pleased with our little man. I don't want to start taking road trips with him every weekend or anything, but I am proud of him for stepping it up at crunch time. Way to go, Lukie Lu.
Anyway we arrived at my parents' house just in time to feed Luke dinner and put him to bed. The next day was Christmas and we waited until after my brother and his wife arrived at 2 pm to open presents. Luke was super tired and in need of a nap at this point, so we put him down and started opening presents. It wasn't long before we looked in the monitor and saw that not only was Luke standing up in his crib and bouncing up and down like a crazy person, but at this point his jeans were around his ankles. He had stepped on them (he has such short legs that all his pants are way too long) as he pulled himself up and had just pulled them right off. By now we knew that it was highly unlikely that he'd settle down and go to sleep, so we decided to just go and get him up. Somehow between Phil getting him up, changing his diaper, and bringing him downstairs, Luke managed to get his pants back on but lose his shirt. I'll never know how this happened. Anyway, that is why all of our Christmas morning pictures are of Phil and Luke, the hillbilly redneck baby, opening presents together while I snapped the pictures to freeze the moments in time.


Ooooh... a new book from the book club ladies!


Ummmm... a little help here please Dad?


Yay, a new noisy toy!!


Wait. How does this thing work?


This present stuff is pretty fun.


Opening his "Dance, Dance Revolution" for babies. Fabulous.


Bubba got a new drum.


Heehee...this makes noise too!

Thankfully by dinner time, we had managed to get some clothes on that little ragamuffin baby of ours. Sadly I only have ONE picture from that night. Don't know how that happened.


My handsome boys on Christmas night.

In my family, Christmas Eve has always been a big deal. Ever since we were kids we've gone to my grandparents' house to celebrate Christmas with my dad's side of the family. This year we postponed the Christmas Eve festivities until the 26th when we'd all be in town. I bought Luke a special Christmas shirt and tie for the big event, and it was a huge hit. I have to admit that he was pretty darn cute. Unfortunately we didn't any pictures of just him in his get-up. By the time we got to Grandma's, he was not in a good mood. Then as it got closer and closer to bed time, his picture taking tolerance diminished at warp speeds. Oh well.


The frat boy wanna-be with my sister.


Happy in the car on the way to Gma's.


So I hear you're a really good cook. Can you hook me up with some turkey and dressing?


Dude. Don't you be messing up my look, now.


Luke was not down with taking a family picture. He protested by refusing to take his thumb out of his mouth.


The whole fam.
From left to right: Ben (my little brother), Abbi (Ben's wife), Rick (my dad), me with Luke, Phil, Flip (my mom), and Anne (my little sister).


What are you, the paparazzi? Get that thing out of my face.


Looking as chubby as possible, with my pretty cousin, Amy.


My mom took him outside at one point to try to cheer him up.
You can see how well that worked.


Only dinner could make him happy!!


Sweet boy, happily having stored up half his dinner in his cheeks in preparation for the winter.

The next day we had a lazy day...It was great. Luke never got out of his pajamas, and I barely did. We had Gma over for some quality time with Luke. Here we are hanging out with Gma and Annie, who had just woken up from a 4 hour post-late-night-out recovery nap:


Laughing it up... maybe because we realized Gma's the only one in this picture who got dressed for the day.


Four generations in one picture. Gma, Dad, me, and Luke.
Had I known we were going to take such a special picture, I might have actually taken a shower and gotten ready.


Luke LOVES Abbi. Most of the time he just stares at her. Can you blame him? Here he is in a rare moment of realizing that the rest of the world still exists when he's in Abbi's arms.


My little brother, Ben, is not so little. At 6'4" or so, he's a lot to take in, and Luke often just stares at him, too. Here he is in awe of the ultimate big boy, Uncle Ben.


Hey, have you seen how big this guy is??


Gma, Anne, Ben, and Luke, all smiles for the camera.


So my mom had these party popper things that have party hats, prizes, and riddles inside them. Usually she pulls them out for New Year's Eve. This year she didn't have enough for the New Year's party gang, but she did have enough for us that night, so she pulled them out, and we proceeded to eat our entire dinner looking like fools with paper crowns on our heads. We sure know how to have a good time at the Miller house.


Some people could barely get the crowns onto their big ol' noggins, so they were rockin' quasi yarmulkes.


So I managed to change my clothes for dinner, but that was about it. Luckily I had a fancy crown to gussy me up.


The rest of the week was full of hanging out with the fam and playing with Luke. It was nice and relaxing and fun just to be together.



Pops and Luke playing together. Hmmm...who's having more fun?


Once again, Luke is taken with Big Ben.


...and in heaven just staring at Abbi.



Here my parents are pretending to be normal and mature with there grandson....



...But this is what they are really like with him....


Flipper and Luke, made into a USF Bulls fan, and really excited about it.


Pops chasing Luke all around the house, even under the dining room table!


Just chillin' with his toys.


Getting a kiss on the nose from Gma, who ADORES him.


Driving his car, practicing for the day he turns 15.

My best friend Paige came over one evening and brought her daughter (Luke's Tampa girlfriend) to play with Luke. He spent the whole time chasing her around the living room. She spent the whole time playing hard to get and feigning a complete lack of interest in him.


Like, what do you want? Can't you see I'm busy here.


Ummm....I don't go for guys who can't even walk.

Finally forced to get near Luke, Finley quickly gobbled up her snack, afraid the chubby not-so-little guy would steal it from her.

We had a great time in Tampa with my family. Thanks Flipper and Pops for having us!!