Where Did July Go?

Somewhere between trying to survive the heat and participating in day to day life, July has flown by!  So what has Mateus been up to....He is now loving trips to North Park to swing on the swing-

But was not all that excited about going down the slide (although we still managed to capture a smile at the end)

If I haven't commented before, Mateus does NOT like the heat so our outside time has been few and far between when that major heat wave set in.  We still managed to stay entertained indoors as Mateus's toy collection seems to keep growing!  We've been working on "moving" as Mateus still has not made any attempts to crawl.  I'm trying so hard to be patient but the overachiever in me is very aware of the timeline for this next milestone.  He just taught himself to roll onto his stomach (yay!) mostly to retrieve books or cell phones- his 2 preferred motivators at this point.  Here are a few snapshots from the past few weeks:

                                     Yay for yogurt!  (Did I mention this kids loves his food?)

                                                                   Laundry helper

                                                            Standing with Daddy
Just today Mateus had his first trip to the zoo.  He was more interested in people watching than looking at the animals.  We were fortunate to have a nice visit from one of my dearest friends Sue and her family.  Mateus enjoyed meeting more new friends.

The excitement finally got to be too much for him and he gave into sleep (3 hours past his nap time! :-)

Mateus at 8 months........

                                                              Has perfected the pout

                                                     Is showing signs that he likes water

 Tried chicken for the first time (this picture is deceiving as he has yet to   decide whether or not he actually likes it

                                                        Is discovering an interest in tools

                                                                Loves to laugh at Daddy

                                                       Gets more handsome by the day :-)

                                                  Is already working on being a "ladies man"

                                                       Gets so excited for his toy train

                                                    Tried a puff for the first time (and was very unsure of it!)

Family time

There truly is nothing like family.  The familiarity and comfort is such a nice thing to look forward to during our visits home.  Mateus is so fortunate to be part of a such large extended family.  I wish we could make the trip more often but when we do, it's always filled with lots of visits which is wonderful!  It truly is so nice to have so many people excited to see our little man and we are lucky that he is pretty easy going with all the attention...actually let's face it- Mateus loves the attention!  :-)  Here are some pictures from the weekend:

                                                              Hangin out with "GG"

                                                                First visit to the lake!

                                                             Snuggling with Daddy

                                                                 Using his voice

 This was a position we found the cousins multiple times throughout the weekend.  Nathan wanted to give hugs, Mateus was more interested in pulling hair, and neither one of them was sure how to respond to the other.

 We thought we had this great idea to do this photo op outside not realizing how interesting the grass would be to the boys.  Needless to say they were "busy at work" pulling grass and could have cared less about looking at the cameras.

                                  We were able to capture this moment between the two of them. 

                                                      

                                                 Already taking a turn in the driver's seat