Happy half birthday baby boy! I just cannot believe you are already 6 months old, it seems like you were born just last month. There are times when I look at you or think about you when you are asleep and feel like my heart is going to explode, I have so much love for you.

You are at such a fun stage where you are discovering the world and everything around you. Your newest favorite thing to do is grab our cups out of our hands and put your mouth on it like you are taking a drink, it is hilarious and gets me every time. Everything now goes directly to your mouth. You are really noisy now and are figuring out all the sounds you can make, which lately has been lots of different types of whines as well as a horrible noise where you suck in the air, it drives me crazy. We love to listen to you jabber, sometimes you will just lay in your crib holding your toes and chat to yourself in the morning or after naps, its adorable. You have become really wiggly and active over the past couple of weeks and your reaction is getting much faster. You are getting really good at sitting and like it, unless you feel like standing, which you usually do haha. You know your name and respond to it. You get so excited when dad or I walk into a room and kick your feet like crazy.

You went on your first road trip a couple weeks ago, all the way to Arizona! You did so good! I was a little really worried about how you would do on the drive but you exceeded all my hopes. We planned the drive times around your naps which was perfect. We stopped in LA to spend the night at Grandpa Bob & Grandma Daisy’s house. It was so nice to see them and I wish we could have spent another day or two with them. I think it was the ideal time to go on a road trip because you aren’t mobile yet but you can be entertained. And speaking of entertainment, thank heavens for Baby Einstein! If you weren’t sleeping or were tired of looking at books and playing with toys I would turn on Baby Eintsteins and you were content for another hour!

You went swimming in the pool for the first time while in Arizona with Janie and you loved it! You kicked your feet the whole time.

You also got to meet Ruby and Jude & Stephanie and Brad, our friends who used to live here who we love so much. Thank you for being such gracious hosts Hunter family, we miss you already. And a special thank you to Ruby for all the pictures you drew for “baby Mason” and thank you Jude for giving us your room.

We got to see lots of family while we were there, which was nice. We went to Arizona for Mark’s grandfather’s (Grandpa Marlow Taylor) funeral. It was a lovely service and we will miss Grandpa Taylor.

We also went to the Grand Canyon with Logan, Jana & Janie while in Arizona. The Grand Canyon itself was a lot of work with two babies but we had the best day since we got to spend it with the Hancocks! Thanks for being so patient with us and up for any adventure Jana & Logan. We love you guys and your adorable, happy, beautiful Janie.

Thanks to our road trip, you now are a great napper! You take 2, 2 hour naps daily and it has changed my life! I now have time to eat breakfast, shower, clean the house, read a book, prep for dinner and watch tv! You are becoming more social and smile at family and friends and even strangers!  You are tickle-ish, especially on the sides of your belly and your thighs, I can get a pretty good laugh out of you and I love it! You love watching Leo (our cat) and want to grab him, which he is still terrified of. I think when you finally crawl it will be to chase Leo haha. You love to eat, we started giving you rice cereal but it made you constipated but you had your first “solids” tonight, peas, and you loved it! I think you are going to be a good eater. You are SO patient with me and let me put all sorts of accessories on you like your sunnies, hats and bunny ears (being Easter and all).

You had your 6 month well check today and you are doing great! Reaching all the mile stones you should be and you’re working on getting your bottom front teeth in, although the dr says it still could be another month or two before they come out, which is fine with me! You are going to be tall and thin, like your dad! Your dr asked me again today, “How tall is his dad?”

6 month stats:

17lbs 4oz (45%) and 27.5″ (86%)

Time just seems to be flying by! I really cannot believe you have been in our family for 5 months already, time needs to slow down! You seem to learn something new everyday, it’s unbelievable! You always want to have your toes in your mouth and I think it is the cutest thing ever.

You just realized that you can grab the toys hanging on your play mat with your feet and think that’s pretty cool. You’ve also learned to sit up just in the past week. The first time you sat on your own for longer than a second was when we were skyping with Jana & Janie and you sat up and tried to reach for the ipad to eat Janie. Sometimes you look like a little gorilla when you sit up because you put your arms out in front of your feet or out to the sides on the ground. You also get distracted very easily and fall over when you try to reach for something.

This month has been both the hardest and the most fun month. You got a really bad cold that completely messed up your good sleeping at night and you were up every 2 hours, that was hard on me. I knew the dr. wouldn’t/couldn’t do anything for you but I thought it was best to take you in just in case. I was right though, you just had to wait for it to pass. It was a hard week and I felt so bad for you, especially when you would get coughing attacks and choke. Not fun!

You love to dance at night before bedtime with us, we look forward to it every evening. Your favorite songs are “U Can’t Touch This” and “Uptown Funk”. You also love when we sing to you, especially when I sing “Thinking Out Loud.”

You love to growl and love when I growl back at you.You make an “ahh” sound every time we change your diaper and it kills us! You want to touch and hold everything I’m holding, you are very curious. You can have 100 toys but always want the tv remote. You have started dive bombing in the direction of something you want. I have to hold on super tight when I hold you now. You are so busy now, I can’t even imagine how busy you will be once you start crawling.  You still are very serious and observant when we go anywhere. People think I photoshop your pictures because you never smile unless we are at home. We finally got the bathtub fixed and you can now take baths in your bumbo in the bathtub and you seem to like it!

You like going to the grocery store with me because I wear you in the baby bjuorn and you get to help me push the cart and you swipe things off the shelves. People get such a kick out of you kicking your feet and flapping your arms while we shop. You loveeee “Baby Einsteins” and we think its so boring. You are a pretty big baby, all your aunts think you are ginormous! You just recently started wearing 3-6 month clothes but now you are already getting too big for them so I pulled out your 6-9 month clothes for you. You’ve recently noticed Leo (our cat) more and like to watch him, he’s still terrified of you though.

You love to wear your sun glasses and will leave them on for hours.

Dad had to go to Hawaii for work for a whole week and he missed you so much. I got to spend my birthday with you and you are the best little pal I could ask for. You are so patient with me. I like to think you try to give me kisses but you are probably just trying to eat me. Sometimes after you are done eating you like to sit on my lap and snuggle your face into my neck and suck your thumb and we just sit and rock for a few minutes. You bring so much joy and love to our lives. I feel so blessed that I get to stay home with you every day and watch you progress and gain such a strong bond with you.

Mason, you have grown and developed so much over past two weeks, it’s truly amazing! Your dad often asks me how I entertain you all day, but really you entertain me! You give me the best smiles and giggles, I can’t wait for that first big belly laugh.

You are such a momma’s boy right now and secretly I love it! Although sometimes I feel a little bad for your dad, but his time will come when you just want to hang out with him.  You’ve reached some really big milestones the past couple of weeks. You can now grab and hold things. You love to hold the toy on your car seat and look for it when we put you in the stroller, it’s the cutest thing, so we put it on your stroller when we go for walks. You hold your feet now when I change your diaper and it’s so cute! You’re really strong and try to sit up constantly. Whenever you are laying on your back, you pull your head up and prop yourself up on your elbows. I haven’t been very good at doing tummy time, partly because you don’t like it and also because you have really good control of your head, your neck is really strong. But last week we decided to do tummy time one evening to see if you were close to thinking about rolling over, and then you went and rolled over! We were shocked! You did it a few more times (tummy to back). You aren’t the most graceful, you kind of flop over to your back but it’s still really impressive! You looked at us like it was no big deal. Then the next day you rolled onto your tummy from your back and we haven’t been able to stop you since! It’s actually become a problem, you roll over in your sleep at night and wake yourself up! You’ve also decided that you no longer want to be swaddled and it about broke my heart. We still use the “swaddle me” to swaddle your legs but we keep your arms out.  You are no longer a newborn anymore, you are an infant! Stop growing up! We stayed with aunt Courtney at grandma & grandpas house while they were picking up aunt Rachel from her mission and you had a sleep regression. I don’t know if it was because you weren’t in your own bed or because you didn’t want to be swaddled anymore or if it was just bound to happen because of your age, but we’ve been trying to get you back into your routine. You’ve done a lot better since we stopped swaddling your arms and last night you finally slept through the night again!

Something clicked for us the past week or so and you finally will take naps in your crib! You usually take three naps a day for about 45 minutes each. They aren’t as long as they should be but hey, it’s progress!

You’ve gotten much better in the car and running errands with me. I don’t dread it like I used to. You usually either sleep in your car seat on the stroller or I carry you on the baby bjourn, you like to face forward so you can see what’s going on. But I think you are a home body like your mom. Our best days are the days we don’t have to go anywhere and can just relax at home together.

You love to suck your thumb and chew on your fingers. You haven’t quite figured out to close your fist while you suck your thumb so your fingers often poke your eyes or get stuck in your nose.

You love to make noise and blow bubbles. We love “chatting” with you, you have a lot to say. You don’t like to perform. You never want to smile when we are at someone else’s home, you like to save the smiles for me and dad. Sometimes it bugs me because I want to show you off but I also love that you love us so much.

You are a fast eater, and I mean fast, like you are done within 5-8 minutes! You like to rub your fuzzy head while you eat, it’s so funny. You also like to hold our faces. You always go for my eyes and dad’s nose.

You like to play in the exersaucer and you really like “Baby Einsteins” that aunt Lauren gave you for Christmas. I especially like Baby Einsteins because it keeps you entertained while I shower! *mom of the year award for me

You love to dance with us at night before bedtime. Some of our favorite songs to dance to are “Sugar” by Maroon 5 and “Uptown Funk” by Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars.

We give you a foot rub before bed each night and you really love it!

One of the funniest things to me and your dad is, almost every day someone says “oh what a  cute baby! He has the most perfectly round head!” I didn’t even know that was a thing but people comment on it ALL. THE. TIME! It cracks us up.

You are such a good baby and at such a fun stage. You learn something new every day and we love watching you.

4 month wellness check:

15lbs 3oz (43%) and 26.5″ (94%)

You are going to be a tall boy 🙂

Every day with our sweet babe seems to be better than the last, if that’s even possible! Just this morning Mark told me that this is his favorite stage so far because Mason can hold his head up and his neck is strong enough to hold him in different positions like airplane, which lets him be more playful. I’m also loving this stage. Mason’s started giving us little giggles and it makes me heart feel like it’s going to burst! Our favorite thing is getting Mason out of his crib in the morning. He gets so excited to see us and gives us the biggest smiles. Then we unwrap him from his swaddle and he stretches and pulls his legs up and we laugh because it’s so cute and funny! Oh the simple joys of parenthood 😉

Loves:

Mason loves having his diaper changed. I’ve never seen a happier baby than when he’s getting a fresh diaper. He smiles the whole time, it’s pretty funny. Sometimes if he’s fussy Mark will go lay him on his changing pad and Mason will stop fussing, Weird, right?

He loves looking at his board books, when he’s in the mood for it.

Mason always loves watching tv, it’s bad! He likes watching basketball games with dad. He’s pretty entertained by Doc McStuffins and Daniel the Tiger. He got a couple Baby Einstein movies from his Aunt Lauren and Uncle Dave for Christmas and I’m excited to turn those on for him so I can shower 🙂

He finally likes going on walks now that he can sit in the stroller and not have to be in his car seat on the stroller.

He loves his sound soother. It can usually calm him down in a matter of minutes.

He loves to sit up and thinks he’s big enough to sit up all the time. When I lay him down he tries to push himself up on his elbows. This darn baby is trying to grow up too fast!

He loves to hold his own hands and ours!

He kills us with his expressions. He really knows how to work the eyebrows!

He has definitely found his voice and always wants to make sure we hear him. He loves to yell and it always sounds like “Ay!” Mark & I joke that he’s yelling at us to come get him out of his crib.

One of my favorite things is when Mason gets tired and is ready for a nap he nestles his face under my chin and snuggles in so tight. It’s the best! Even if he sometimes wipes boogers on my neck 🙂

Mason’s favorite song is “Uptown Funk” by Mark Ronson ft. Bruno Mars. He loves to dance with me to it and loves watching other people dance to it. He giggles every time. It’s so funny!

Hates:

The car seat…and subsequently, the car. He will be all smiles while we put him in the car seat and then as soon as he’s buckled all hell breaks loose.

This past month we had our first really big outing with Mason. I took him to the Disney Family Museum in the Presidio in San Francisco with my family. I was a little nervous about the long car ride and how he would do in a museum but it went great! He slept in my sollybaby wrap almost the whole time! And he slept both ways in the car. He’s still such an easy going baby.

Mark & I went on our first big date since having Mason. My grandma gave Mark tickets to a Warriors basketball game so he took me with him! I was pretty stressed about going just because it was 4-5 hours and at night, which meant he would have to take a bottle and be put to bed… My mom and sister Taylor were so awesome and watched him for us. He didn’t take the bottle very well and he didn’t go to sleep very well…he woke up a little before we got home, which is unusual, he usually doesn’t wake up once he goes to bed. But it was fine, he was fine and my mom still loves him 🙂 We had a great time at the game! It was white out night and we got free t-shirts! And the game was so exciting and the Warriors won! I’m very grateful that we get to live close to our families right now and have so much help and Mason is surrounded by so much love.

This is what a conversation with Mason looks like (except with more eyebrow action, but it’s hard to capture in pictures):