The Bernardo Family: Frankie

e have officially decided to call the baby Frankie. Calling him Frank is just too confusing, and this is the nickname that seems to have stuck. I still call him Mr. Magoo a lot, but I don't want him to think that is his name! My Mom started calling him Frankie immediately, and my entire family slowly caught on, and now, even Frank and I are calling him that. So I thought I would give you some updates on little Frankie!

*he is wearing size 3 diapers and size 9 month or 6-12 month clothes. I recently washed and pulled out all of his 9-month clothes, and I was shocked to see that some of them are already almost too small for him! He seems to be growing so quickly, it is nuts! He is almost as long as the width of his crib, and I keep praying he does not smack himself in the head while sleeping.

*he is sleeping almost exclusively on his stomach now. He has been sleeping much better at night, usually sleeping through the night until I wake him up at 6:45. Every now and then he wakes up at some point during the night and cries for a few minutes, but he is able to put himself back to sleep, which is nice.

*he has outgrown the swing, so we have just started putting him in his crib for naps. Today he took a 1.5 hour nap in there, which is better than he has ever done! I was so proud of him. He naps fine in the crib at day care, so hopefully the transition won't be too hard.

*he has no interest in eating cereal. We have been giving it to him for almost two weeks now, and even tried mixing it with bananas, but he just does not seem interested. So we are going to hold off for a few days and then try again.

*he miraculously appears not to have caught my strep throat or flu, although I suspect he had one of them a couple of weeks ago when the doctor told me he had "allergies."

*he spends a LOT of time on his tummy these days and he seems to love it. I think he will be an early crawler because of it.

*he does not care much for sitting, but he can sit unassisted for about 10 seconds before toppling over. He much prefers being on his tummy to sitting up.

*he is mesmerized by Frank's voice. When he is talking, he stares at him, it is so cute.

*he gets upset around new people, but especially new men, and it takes him a few minutes to remember people who he has not seen in awhile, like my parents.

*he plays with a purpose and he gets very intense when trying to figure something out. It is so neat and amazing to watch him master new skills and it is so funny to watch him get frustrated when he just can't do something.

*he is still a very happy baby, and he always wakes up in the mornings with a big smile!

*his favorite place to be is outside. He loves the sounds, the smells, and looking around at everything.

*His second favorite place to be is in the bathtub. He loves being naked, and he loves splashing in the water. However, he hates bubbles--we tried to play with them in the bathtub last week and he got really scared!

*He likes to touch EVERYTHING.

*He is the absolute love of our lives and we treasure spending time with him. Even though we are so busy, Frankie is such a blessing and we are thankful every day that he is here!

Here are some pictures of Frankie from this week:

loving the great outdoors