Life of Wilder: Week Nine

It's been a fairly eventful week in the Taylor house. Last Sunday was a beautiful day so we took Wilder to Balboa Park. It's such a great place to stroll around and get some sun. We walked him up and down the Prada, took some pictures on the lawn in front of the Botanical Building, and made a quick trip to the Timken Museum of Art where Wilder shared some interesting insight on Rembrandt's portrait of St. Bartholomew. ;) 

Balboa Park is definitely one of our favorite places to visit in San Diego. It is absolutely beautiful and there is so much to see and do. There are always musicians and street performers lining the Prada and there is always at least one weird/random/interesting thing to take a picture of. This time we saw two of these "Omg, take a picture of that!" sights...

Look very closely at what's in the stroller...

Yes, that would be a live bunny, haha

Armless man playing the guitar with his feet...

He was actually pretty good at it. I posted a video

of it on YouTube that you can watch by clicking here.

So, after Wilder rolled over last Wednesday, he rolled over again on Thursday to both sides, but he must have worn himself out because he has refused to roll over ever since, haha! I'll put him on his tummy but it's almost like he forgot how he did it. He'll get his legs going one way and his head going the other way or he'll stick his arm out to the side so that it stops him from going all the way over. He gets so frustrated, poor thing! But he did reach another small milestone this week -- he intentionally grabbed one of the rings hanging from his play mat, swung it around for a few minutes, and tried to put it in his mouth. He was so proud of himself, he didn't want to let go.

This week he's been escaping his swaddling blanket every night. Hopefully he'll get used to sleeping this way and soon we won't have to swaddle him at all. His main reason for working his arms up out of the swaddle is because he desperately wants to to suck his thumb.

He wants SO badly to get his thumb in his mouth and he has scratched his face all up trying to accomplish this in the dark. Last night I caught him blindly jabbing both thumbs at his face hoping to at least get one of them in, haha, and the other night this is what I found when I looked at the video monitor: 

Tuesday night Paul gave Wilder his first bottle. I've been putting off doing this because it's such a hassle to pump and try to save up the milk and since I'm always with him there was never really a necessity for it. But I knew I needed to at least get him used to a bottle now so he won't reject it in the future if I need to be away from him for more than a few hours at a time. I wasn't sure how he would react to it, but he took it no questions asked. He's such a little piglet I guess he'll take his milk however he can get it. 

On Wednesday I took Wilder and the dogs to the dog park by myself. If you've ever witnessed how jacked up our dogs get when they think there's even a remote possibility that they are going somewhere (Posey literally attacks Rider out of excitement) then you know how big of an accomplishment this is. I was pretty proud of myself and it's nice to know that it can be done with a little planning and strategy (i.e. put the dogs in their room so they don't suspect they're being taken along, put Wilder in his car seat, go out to the car and open up the back end, come back in leaving the gate and the front door open, let the dogs out of their room, at which point they make a mad, scrambling dash out the front door, through the gate, and into the back of the car, then come back and get Wilder and go). It felt good to get outside so I'll probably do that more often now that I have the correct sequence of events down to minimize the insanity. 

On Thursday I took Wilder to my old work to meet everybody. He did so great and let everyone hold him while he just stared at all the people around him. They witnessed the pregnancy from start to finish (that sounds weird... not the literal start or finish, haha, but you know what I mean) and have been like a family to me out here so I was so excited for them to finally meet him. Of course, he wouldn't "Ooh ooh" for them (why won't kids perform when you want them to?) but they all thought he was just too cute :)

Today Wilder and I went to our first baby yoga class on the lawn of the Kensington-Normal Heights Public Library. He was the youngest baby there so most of the poses were for little ones who could at least stand with the help of their mom, but it was pretty easy for me to modify them for him. He did so good and let me hold him up in the air, move his arms and legs around, roll him around on the mat, etc. He was actually a little fussy before we went, but once we got there he loved the fresh air and getting to watch all the other babies and people. It wasn't as much exercise for me as I had hoped but it was fun to get out of the house and go do something interactive together and he was absolutely worn out when we left. We'll definitely be going back. 

Also this week I did another little photo shoot with him with our good camera and got some (I think) really amazing photos. He is so funny, he loves having his picture taken and will lay there for an hour or more watching me snap the camera at him (probably because I'm making a total fool of myself trying to get him to smile for me, haha). Here are some of my favorite shots:

OK, that's all for this week. Hope all of you have a fantastic weekend!