I've Got Hand, First Shots, and Memory

Luke has been growing in leaps and bounds, both physically and intellectually. He's almost 24 inches tall now, so he's about to reach Melissa's height chart (which she placed 12 inches from the ground...) I don't remember his exact weight, I think it's about 14 lbs. We're almost to the point where we can turn his car seat around. I tell you one thing, carrying the car seat with him in it is a laborious task, and I'm not THAT scrawny.

Luke has definitely taken an interest in his hands. We should have named him "Harry", but after Houdini, not Potter. The swaddle blankets we put him in are basically straightjackets, but somehow he still ends up with his hands in his mouth. I've tried to watch this process before, but he refuses to reveal his secret.

Anyway, once he gets his hands out, he will actually hold them up in front of his face and just stare at them in wonder. He also will try to eat them to the point of gagging himself. We've been giving him toys and fingers to stimulate his hands, and he seems to like it. He particularly enjoys a blue monkey that Melissa gave him. Fortunately, it's a nice, quiet toy, unlike a certain alphabet singing frog, who's repetitive song has been permanently burned into my brain and laughter will haunt my dreams for the rest of my life.

Luke's first shots were last week. A lot of people have told me how horrifying this is for a parent. I can definitely understand that, but honestly it wasn't too bad for me. I think it helped that our nurse had all three injections completed within 5 seconds.

Luke's reaction to the shots was as expected. When he is in pain, he definitely gets the pain grimace, but he forgets to breathe, so he's just sitting there with this horrified expression on his face for what seems like an eternity. When he finally takes a breath, the screaming begins.

He definitely wanted to nurse on mommy directly afterwards, and he took a long time to calm down. He was pretty restless that night, but not too terrible. He seemed to recover within 24 hours.

Okay, so as I was playing with Luke the other day, and I think he may have associated a noise with me. I was making "pbbbb" noises while sticking my tongue out. He started making the exact same noise! Granted, his noise wasn't quite the same, but he had the right idea. Then, the next day, he did it again, but this time, he did it without provocation, almost like he had remembered and associated that noise with me. I was dumbfounded, but managed to not fall immediately into the fetal position. Anyway, I'm working on "dada".