Life as the Neal's Know It...

Max is SIX months old!

December, 2010

My little Maxers is now SIX. MONTHS. OLD! How did this happen? He is so animated and so much fun these days!

Max's stats:

Max is 16.2 lbs and 26.5 inches long
He is rolling from back to belly now in addition to rolling from belly to back
He cut his first tooth, and we felt his second one coming in
Had his first CHRISTMAS! We went to Nana and Poppy's in Asheville and got to see Uncle Barry too!
Max got to sit on Santa's lap
Max got to see snow for the first time!
Max got his first virus....and got sent home from school. Poor little guy was throwing up and had diarreah. So sad....

November, 2010

5 months old....wow, Max is getting so big! He weighs about 15.1 lbs and is 25.25 inches long. Soooo big....or so the book says. Max loves his Elmo book that says "how big is baby elmo...baby elmo is sooooooo big!"

Max's stats:

Max starts eating two meals on November 4th (breakfast and dinner)
Max starting eating green beans in addition to just rice cereal
First Thanksgiving (we went to Gammy and Paw Paw's in Alabama)
Max started eating breakfast, lunch AND dinner on November 22nd.
Nana came to visit and watched Max so mommy and daddy could have a date night!
Max got to meet Danny and Melinda

Max is FOUR months old!

October, 2010

Kissing Monster!!!!!!

I could always get Max to giggle when I kissed him all over and yelled "kissing monster". He loved this! He is getting so big....so big, in fact, that it is time for rice cereal!!!!

Max's stats:

Weight 14.3 lbs and was 24.5 inches long (50th percentile)
Mom's first overnight trip away (for business)
Max did his first raspberry
Ate rice cereal for the first time!
Max went to Asheville to visit Nana and Poppy
Discovered his lips and made a new face (sucking in his lips....which made him look like an old man) LOL.
Max. Found. His. Feet.
First time in a high chair
First Halloween....he dressed up as a tiger
Max went to visit Aunt Shell, Uncle Jeff, Jack, KK, and Lukey in San Antonio....and Max got to sit in first class on his way home!

Max is THREE months old!

September, 2010

Max is three months old and loving life! He is 13 lbs. and 23.75 inches long.

Max's stats:

He rolled over from belly to back
Took his second plane ride to Michigan where he got to meet his great-grandpa Barry!
Slept till 10:15 a.m.
Moved up to size 2 diapers
Starting to "pre-teeth"....lots "O" drool
Really giggles when mommy sang "I love you" to him in the bath

....and most importantly, Max watched his first ALABAMA football game :-).

Worst part of this month....September 28th....when Max fell off the changing table. It was about 6 in the morning and I was changing him on the table. I opened the closet door which is adjacent to the table. I had my hand on the pad and reached into the closet to grab his clothes and before I knew it, I heard a loud cry and he was on the floor right by my foot. He had propped his leg up and pushed himself off the side of the table. Scared to death, I scooped him up and ran to Jake crying....what had I done? We were so scared that Max were hurt, we called 911. Paramedics came and checked him out and he was fine. I took him to the doctor just to have him looked over one last time.....Max and Mommy cuddled the rest of the day....

August 16th....a day I'll never forget.

August 16th was a sad day for mommy. This day was so monumental, that it needed it's own post. This was the day that I was forced....that's right, forced to drop you off at daycare, Max. I cried harder than I think I've ever cried.....and it happened all day.
It was heartbreaking to drop you off at school for the first time. We love the school...it is just hard to share you all day. Jake and I both went and dropped Max off in the morning. His teachers were very kind to say that I could come by anytime I wanted to hold him....so I fully took advantage of that....and came by at 11 a.m. AND 2 p.m. to hold my munchkin :-).

What is wrong with this picture....I left sobbing. Crying so hard that the teachers were consoling me and Jake had to walk me to my car. And, Max....well he was just fine :-). His first day of school picture is below...my witness:

Thanks Mrs. P and Miss Lewis for making this traumatic day a little easier....

Max is TWO months old!

August, 2010

Wooohoooo, Max is now two months old....however, with him getting older that means that mommy had to go back to work. I had inititally taken off 6 weeks, but took an extra two because I could not bare to go back to work yet. So August 2nd was my official first day back to work. The first week, Jake stayed home with Max (an experience in and of itself, ha!). Needless to say, I think daddy was ready to go back to work after 5 days at home taking care of baby while mom worked :-).

Nana came the second week of August to watch Maxers! What a help! This allowed us to keep Max out of daycare until he was 10 weeks old....still entirely too young, but better than 6 weeks.

Max is really getting better. He weighted 12 lbs exactly at his two month well visit. He is discovering more and more as well as reacting to things more so.

Max's stats:

Max slept 10 hours straight at eight weeks old......allelujia!
August was when Max starting bottle feeding solely
Started cooing (the best noise ever)
Discovered his hands
Visit from Aunt Shell and Lukey
Starting pulling himself to a sitting position when holding onto my hands around 10 weeks
Sat in his bumbo chair
First cold
First trip to Alabama to see Gammy and Paw Paw
Sucking on your hands
Sat in the exersaucer at school (at 2 months and 3.5 weeks old)
Started making small giggle noises
Max had the cutest pouty face....I mean, so cute, we would almost want to do things that would make him want to cry just to see this adorable face...

....don't you agree?

Max is ONE month old!

July, 2010

At one month old, Max became a frequent flier like his mama. At 1 month and 3 days old, he traveled with us to Florida. My company (Spirit Health Group) offered to bring us down to Boca Raton for our National Executive Meeting....so off to the beach we went! It was a great trip and it was right around this time that Max started sleep through the night - around 6 hours straight....glorious!