pink, brown, yellow, orange and blue, i love you: The Dude Abides

First, I want to mention that I don't think I've ever actually called The Dude by his name on here. There's not really a sense of protecting him. I throw his pictures around all over this thing, and I'm an active Facebook mom. His name's Jude. I just like calling him The Dude. That's what mommy and daddy call him at home, so that's what he's named in the blog.

The Dude now has a tooth actually coming through his gums. It's barely poking through, but it's there. The poor thing has turned from quite the happy baby to a teething, screaming, lip-sucking mess. And this usually hits around 7 PM, right when I'm usually getting the best Dude time. It sucks to say the least. I don't get a lot of time to spend with him during the week, and it makes me a sad panda when the short amount of time I do have with him is consumed by crying and sleeping. It's just not like him!

One reason for him being so tired is that he's finally getting off his lazy butt (I jest) and learning how to crawl! He's not super competent in that arena yet, but he's getting there. He can scoot and move and is so happy when he finally reaches that toy he was going for. Or when he catches my big toe. He's done it a couple of times. He's a sneaky little one. He starts crawling one way, I turn my head and all of a sudden he already went back the other way and has placed my big toe in his mouth. If it wasn't disgusting it'd be hilarious. (Okay, it's hilarious either way, but I can't encourage it, cause it is gross.)

I have also discovered that he loves it when I sing to him. But only silly songs. Like the Itsy Bitsy Spider, and You Are My Sunshine. And I have to make him do the movements. It's not funny when mommy looks like a fool, but it's funny when Jude's doing the motions. He hasn't taken a liking to Benny the Magic Bunny yet, but I will change that. Actually, if I could get him through his childhood years without listening to horrendous children's music, I would consider that a giant success. He likes a lot of music in general, but if he could be singing The Beatles by age 2, he would be the best baby ever. He already is, but that would be the icing on the cake.

It continually amazes me how many compliments we get on him. I know he's beautiful, but I always think I'm biased (I am his mom.) But it never fails. And it's never "oohhhh, he's so cute!". It's always "oohhhh, he's so PRETTY! I mean, handsome." But it's okay. He's pretty. For sure. I've been buying some clothes out of the girls section (for the colors! No ruffles or anything.) but if I did go for the ruffles, nobody would believe he was a boy.

Which leads to the next development in his life. He LOVES his little Dude. Every time his diaper comes off- whoosh! His hands go south immediately. I think it's just a fascination with "what the heck is down there?" He has nails (because they grow an inch a day) and he digs in, so I'm fairly certain there's no pleasure element to it. It's just a fun toy that he uses to spray mommy with. All the time. Which, I have observed now that any time he pees, he shudders before and after. It's a.dor.able. It just is. There's nothing cuter than a baby with a cold chill. He does a full body shake. But back to the pretty factor. We had our friend Clay (Dirty Cheese Photography) do his 7 month old photo shoot, and it convinced me that if I don't get my kid some modeling gigs to put money away for college, then I am doing him a disservice. But, I'll never follow through. I wouldn't be able to take it if some photographer or set designer or whatever said bad things about him or thought he wasn't doing well. I'd be super pissed. Anyway, courtesy of Dirty Cheese Photography's Facebook page (since I haven't had the money yet to pay for the prints/downloads) here's Jude the model!