Length: 24" (61cm) - 98th percentile. (Uh-huh, you guessed it, 2/100 babies are taller than Duvan at this age!)
Milestones:
- The smiles, and the giggles!! The smiles abounded this week, and he now definitely expresses excitement with smiling. Marésa also had him laughing today while "pedaling the bicycle" with him. He loves it when he's on his back and you move his legs as if he's riding a bicycle.
- Interaction. Although still only with eyes and facial expressions, we feel like Duvan is starting to communicate with us - really responding to a lot of our conversations and interaction with him.
- Duvan's vision has now really developed. He follows you around the room with his eyes, and will not miss a thing if he's interested in it. The other day we had him on his back in the crib, and he stared at the mobile. At one point we tried to turn him on his tummy to get his clothes right, but he would not look away from the mobile, which was now right behind him - so he stretched he neck around and did everything he could not to lose eyesight of those toys! It is such a simple act, yet it fills your heart with such joy to see him do it.
- Open hands! Duvan is starting to let go of the newborn fist.
Praise God for:
- A great report from the doctor today - all is well, he's developing really well - in fact, we might have to get a bigger carseat sooner than we thought! He's also starting to fit into 3-6 month old clothes.
- Duvan had a pretty nasty rash last week, but he is much better now. Our dear friend Dr. Dan diagnosed him properly and gave great advice on treating it - it's almost gone.
We had an amazing time visiting with Schalk & Jana. We really felt a freedom to do a lot of things with Duvan. On Thursday we went to Washington D.C. for the day, and he was so good! We'll post pictures soon in the journal section of our family webpage (that is - as soon as we've posted the 4 other events in line before it....). He slept through most of the day and missed all the monuments and the white house and everything. At least we'll have pictures to show him later on!
This is the look that steals the heart that's already been stolen a thousand times over. Two days ago Duvan was all bubbles early one morning, and was so amused by his Dad's antics. It was one of the highlights of the most amazing month in our lives. To think that God gave his own Son to be tortured and killed on earth, so that we all might be reconciled with Him. It's unthinkable, and looking into Duvan's eyes and experiencing the sea of emotions that accompany this kind of response from him, slowly gets us to understand the kind of love God has for us.
Marésa had Duvan propped up in the corner of the couch, and he looked too cute to let it pass by. You can tell though from the expression on his face that he's starting to let us know that he's had enough of these two cushions blocking his view of the world!
Duvan now officially falls asleep on his own. We are so thankful to the Lord. It is above and beyond all that we asked for. Last night after putting him down, we were a little surprised when 20 minutes had gone by without a sound from him. So we peeped into the room, and there he was, lying wide awake, looking at everything around him, quietly processing the day's events. It brought tears to Marésa's eyes. When we checked in 10 minutes later, he was fast asleep. We're changing the nightly routine a little, we've started to give him a late night feeding after he's slept for about 2 hours or so, before we go to bed. Duvan sleeps from 8/9pm to 10/11pm, when he get's the late feeding, then through to ~4am, and finally he'll sleep to about 7am or so. We're hoping that soon the late night snack will hold him past the 4am hunger :).
Duvan had his first taste of hiking this week as well! We neglected to take pictures in the woods, but we'll rectify that soon. In the meanwhile, here's Dad with Duvan in the Snugli, ready for the hike! It's a real struggle for him when we're out there, the Snugli is the perfect spot to take a nap in, and must be second only to driving for putting him to sleep, but at the same time the woods are so interesting to look at. So he'll bravely fight the drowsiness that sets in from the rythm of the walking, looking around at the sky through the leaves, the trees and all the news shapes and sounds and smells. He holds out a solid 4 minutes though before losing out badly. :)
