8 Months! (Baby Eli)

Eli is 8 months old today!  I can hardly believe it.  He is the best thing in our lives so far and we love him so stinkin' much!  Every day with him is a joy.

Some of the things he's been doing lately:

• Scratches at things with different material (like the couch or carpet or his play mat, etc) by opening and closing his hands on them
• Puts his top lip over his bottom lip and talks, "ba ba ba ba" or makes a popping sound
• Rolls everywhere!  Anywhere he wants to go, he rolls.  Sometimes he tries to crawl but ends up rolling over.  Or he'll move forward by rolling back and forth from one side to the other on his tummy.
• Getting really good at holding himself up on his hands.  He moves his upper body around, but just kicks his feet.
• Loves balloons!  He goes crazy for them.
• Loves tags.  He goes for the tag on every toy.
• Loves the Bumbo chair table.  If he can see it he will try to get it!  He loves to play with it, so silly.
• Some of his favorite foods: bananas, apples, sweet potatoes, popsicles, oatmeal (with fruit in it!)
• Puts his feet up on anything in range
• Still uses his feet like hands!  He holds onto things with all fours.
• Loves music
• Always wants whatever Daddy is drinking, no matter if it's from a bottle or cup or anything.  Eli loves cups and bottles, and goes crazy for them!
• We had a framed picture of our little family out from the hospital when Eli was born and he loves it!  He will roll over to it and touch our faces and give kisses to us in the picture.  It's so cute!
• We give him a diaper to play with when we change his diaper so he doesn't roll over and grab other things he shouldn't, like the cords on the blinds!
• We've been trying to teach him "kisses" for a while now, and he does them really well now!  He gives us kiss attacks!  He'll lunge at us and grab the sides of our face (or hair!) and hold on really tight and pull us close to him and stick his wide open, slobbery mouth on our face.  Sometimes multiple times in a row.  He loves us!
• Adam has been trying to teach Eli how to do high-fives, and he started doing them when prompted by Adam by himself just the other day 
• Sits up unsupported really well, but we still have to keep a close eye on him to catch him when he falls backwards
• Hates when we clean out his nose!
• Likes watching sports
• Super smiley!
• Just in the last couple weeks we graduated him from the infant bath seat to a laundry basket for bath time.  He sits up in the bath and plays and splashes -- so cute!  And he loves his rubber ducky.
• Still tries to eat anything he can get his little hands on!
• When he's sitting on anyone's lap, at some point he will try to eat their knees
• We've noticed just in the last few days that he's trying to lift himself up!  In the bath the other day he grabbed on to two sides of the basket at one of the corners and lifted himself up passed halfway!  And just this morning Adam was asking him for a high-five and Eli grabbed on to his hand with both of his and tried with all his might to lift up!
• Easily distracted by feet - Mine, Adam's or even his own!  He still sucks on his big toe occasionally
• Sleeps mostly on his tummy, or on his side.  Sometimes when we put him down for a nap, right away he rolls to his side and falls asleep!
• He had his first ride in a shopping cart in the kid seat yesterday!
• Likes to play the piano, and likes when Mommy plays
• This last month he visited his first new states (in this order): Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, South Dakota & New Mexico.  Now he's been to 7 states!  (Not counting Idaho when I was pregnant... ;) )