Charlie loves his football

See below for a snippet of crawling action!

He's been crawling for around 2 weeks now and can crawl much faster than this when there is a need for urgency e.g. escaping nappy time.

Recently, in the morning, he has been very excited when waking up (usually at 5.15am). We think this is due to his new found skills and wanting to get up and about, to explore.

As per the clip, he really does love his football. He can head the ball more accurately than John Arne Riise.

Bab Crawl (11 months update)

Charlie has finally started to crawl and now he won't stop. The health visitor thought he wouldn't bother crawling but she got it wrong. He can also pull himself up very quickly on to the side of furniture and stands up in his cot when he's had enough sleep or wants to practice in the middle of the night. He also knows how to turn on the dvd player and open the disc tray, so we have had to do some urgent baby-proofing in the house.

Recently, he has picked up a nasty cough/cold but is starting to get better. Hopefully this means he will build up some immunity for later years. His other top tooth (incisor?) is nearly through but is taking ages to cut through the gum.

More words that he understands are:

balloon (he calls it a bweee)
unicorn
penguin
doggy (geee in Charliespeak)
that (accompainied by a pointing gesture)
light
Iggle Piggle
PC (as in personal computer)
& no (the most useful word).

He also can nod and shake his head for "yes" and "no" although he often gets a bit carried away with the actions.

Charlie seems to be fond of music. He loves playing with his musical toys, even if it is just to have some tunes on in the background while he chases his "bweee" around the room. Sometimes he even joins in singing with the car radio and can be quite tuneful. This evening he selected a Bach CD from the bookshelf.

I'll try to post a video of him crawling soon.

Baby menu

Charlie is a very hungry baby. We've known that for nearly 11 months. He loves his mum's recipes. A typical menu for his daily meals is:

Pre-breakfast
Boob

Breakfast
One Oatabix (like Weetabix without the wheat)
Fruit puree of Apple and Raspberry

Mid morning snack
Boob

Lunch
Fillet Steak with mashed potato, button mushrooms and sauteed tomatoes
Apple and mango desert

Mid Afternoon nibbles
Cheese & marmite pin-wheel sandwiches
Milky bar buttons

Dinner
Leek & Potato Soup
Petit Filous Fromage Frais

Supper
Boob

Understanding words & Spot the monkey

Charlie definitely understands a few words now. It seems to have been a development over the last month.
He is familiar with:

Mummy
Daddy
Charlie
Ball
Shaker
Clap
Bang
Splash
Panda
Where is..
Mug
Monkey
In
Phone
& Point at...

Try making a sentence out of those words. He can say Mum, Dad and Nda (for his Panda). The rest of his vocabulary only makes sense in his own head. He also loves a good game of Peepo.

Anyway, these photos should pretty much bring the blog back up to date...

Where's your ball?

We can't stop laughing at this clip of Charlie trying to get his ball out of his basket. There's just one small problem...

Time to take a stand

Finally, in January, after months of showing no interest in putting weight on his legs, he now wants to do nothing else.

Christmas with Charles (a.k.a. Crimbo with Chasbo)

The first Christmas with the baby was great. Even though he's only 7-8 months, I'm sure he was aware that something was going on and was in a really good mood the whole time.

He enjoyed playing/bashing the piano (he definitely has rhythm), bashing his granddad, opening loads of fab presents and he even met Father Christmas.

However, it wasn't the real Father Christmas - it was Daddy in disguise. Charlie wasn't at all happy to see a beardy man in a bright outfit, shouting "Ho, ho, ho," at him. In fact, I've never seen him cry so much. He was terrified, as were most of the family. The only way we managed to take a photo was to pretend that Santa had gone and then I sneaked up behind him for the pic.