Hunter's going to be 7 months old this Friday.

I keep expecting to get used to him, but every day, he's a little more amazing than the last. Oh, and I admit that I was wrong -- Hunter really is an extraordinarily adorable child. (And yes, Aunt Betty, I'll be posting some new pictures soon.)

So many milestones. Last Saturday, he sat up unsupported for the first time. Monday, his first tooth broke through (which may help account for the intensity of The Squash Incident.) I'm finding that although biting isn't really a problem so far, there is a bit of extra scraping that's making nursing a bit uncomfortable.

His primary mode of locomotion is rolling over and over with the occasional scootching on his back. The first time he did this -- October 27th -- he taught me the dangers of complacency. I'd set him up on the floor of our room with the baby monitor and some toys and was outside shoveling snow. Suddenly, he started shrieking, and I rushed inside to find that my heretofore immobile child had managed to scoot himself backwards two feet and pull the clean laundry on top of himself.

He can prop up his torso when on his belly or he can push himself with his legs, but he hasn't figured out how to do both at the same time, so he ends up wheelbarrowing his head into the ground. I'd been saying that he'll be crawling by Christmas, but he may need a bit longer to work things out.

We've been introducing food, but I admit that it's been done in a pretty lackadaisical manner. We've done single grain cereals (rice, barley and oatmeal) carrots and, as previously noted, squash, but only an ounce or so of diluted cereal and less than a tablespoon of the veggies at a time, and only three or four times a week. He seems to be doing okay with mainly breastfeeding and a six ounce bottle of formula when Bethany watches him (I'm still having problems pumping on a regular basis, but I'm still trying), so I'm not too worried.

I'm also trying to get him into something of a routine at night: feed, bath (not every night, since it's so dry up here), read a book (his favorite to read is The Moon; his favorite to eat is Look At Me, both from Baby's First Book Club), nurse with lullabies and to sleep by 8:30pm. That's the idea, anyway. We're still working on it.

His manual dexterity is progressing in leaps and bounds. It seems only last week that he'd merely thwap stuff at random, and yesterday that his hands' sole purpose was to shove things into his mouth. Now he reaches out for and takes hold of things, turns them and looks at them from all sides, and passes them between his hands before shoving them in his mouth.

The thwapping itself has taken on new, whole arm dimensions. I'd say we're a few short weeks from the wooden spoon and Tupperware stage.

Oh, and I love listening to him talk, from the repetition of sounds to the melodic inflection of babbled conversation.

Every day, he figures out something new. Every day, he's more able to communicate his needs and feelings. Every day, I feel closer to him and love him even more than I could have imagined.

Right now, this sacred mother/child bond is letting me know that he needs a new diaper.