9 months

Owen was 9 months old on December 26th...so we are still a little behind on the updates. He's growing up so fast that I just can't keep up. It's also becoming a lot more difficult to keep him entertained for the photos.

Owen has become such a big boy over the past month, both in size and in his new found independence. At his 9 month check-up he weighed in at 18 lbs 9 oz and was 28 inches long. This put him in the 25th percentile for height and weight and in the 75th percentile for head circumference. Yeah! He's moving on up! Now that he's eating "real" food he's really started packing on the pounds. The "real" food is so good that he's always wanting to eat! Now Josh and I have the challenge cooking fat free. Our way of shopping has definitely changed...now we just go down the isles at the grocery store looking at the nutrition guide on the back of EVERYTHING! It's crazy how much fat there is in most food.

We had an appointment with the geneticist and metabolic nutritionist back in November. They thought Owen looked GREAT. They ran Owen's blood work and everything came back normal (well, normal for Owen). This was good news, because we had added 1 oz of breast milk to each of Owen's bottles (which means that we increased his fat intake) and there was no change in his blood work. Yeah! They also did mine and Josh's DNA at this appointment. The results came back showing that Owen officially has VLCAD. This was not a surprise, just confirmation. We also learned, through our DNA, that one of Owen's defective genes has a protein attached which will help with the breakdown of fat. This means that we may be able to add a little more fat into his diet when he stops drinking his special formula and starts drinking skim milk. According to the doctors, this will all be trial and error. I'm not sure how we feel about this, but for now we are sticking to a no fat diet.

Things you are doing now.....

• You weigh 18lbs 9oz


• You just started wearing 6-9 month clothes and are still wearing size three diapers

• You've mastered crawling and are constantly on the move

• You are pulling up on everything and cruising everywhere

• You've started eating "real" food and seem to like it a lot better than your baby food

• You've started drinking your milk out of sippy cups during the day and only drinking out of your bottle at night


• Your feeding schedule for now: 8:30 - 2.5 tbs cereal and 4oz milk, 11:30 - lunch (fruit and veggies) you're in the process of transitioning to real food, 1:00 - 4.5 oz milk, 2:30 - snack (cheerios, puffs, veggie dips, yogurt melts, bitter biscuit) 4:00 - 4.5 oz milk, 7:00 - dinner ("real" veggies) and 4.5 oz milk, 10:00 - 6 oz. milk, 6:00am - 4 oz milk


• You love playing with all your big boy toys

• Your favorite toy changes frequently, but at the moment...you really like your Dunk and Cheer basketball toy and blue car that mommy and daddy push you in


• You still like you walker...you are now running around the house in it!


• You and Honey have become big buds...you like to crawl over to her bed and pull her hair while she cleans up the food that didn't make it into your mouth.
  

• Bath time is still a favorite....You've learned to splash really big and love playing with all of your bath toys. You cry every time your bath is over


• You have developed you're own way of waving. You just stick your arm up in the air like you have a question...it makes us laugh everytime