Dear Nora-Five months old and you're ready to get moving! The last two weeks you have gotten tired of lying around and want to constantly be sitting up (assisted), rolling, and reaching for whatever is closest, whether it's the cat (Bixby is surprisingly tolerant of your petting) or Mommy's hair (ouch!). Everything is interesting, and this has made it easier to entertain you. You finally can keep yourself occupied for ~10 minutes at a time on your playmat or the jumperoo (still not a huge amount of time, but at least we don't have to carry you around or face screaming like we did a couple months ago!). You find all kinds of things funny, like peek-a-boo, silly songs we sing to you, or when your grandparents' dog Dante barks. Your smiles light up our days, and those around us- you love to smile at people and see them fawn :).
Sleeping: We had some sleep regression this month. It wasn't too bad though- just more frequent random wakings where you would start screaming but
usually could be calmed down and back to sleep in less than 5 minutes with some pacifier help (you otherwise don't really like the pacifier much anymore). This typically happens about once a night, sometimes twice- fortunately it's often before we go to bed ourselves. Otherwise, you still sleep from about 8:30pm to 5:30am, sometimes 6am. Naps were really rough this month (one day at daycare, you slept a total of 35 minutes all day!) but even in the last couple of days naps seemed to be improving.... we'll see if that continues.
And.... we still swaddle. :( We have gotten you to sleep naps with either one arm out or both out, so I feel like we're working towards getting rid of the pesky swaddle, but I tried it for a weekend at night and realized I like my sleep too much- you woke up like 3 times and had such a hard time calming your arms down to fall asleep. It's just so much easier when you pass out right away swaddled! But, I'm hoping maybe this next month is the month and we'll slowly be able to wean you out of it. Time will tell!
Eating: As I mentioned
last month, I started supplementing formula and began a slow weaning process as you still preferred the bottle and my supply was not responding to various boosting methods. For the first half of the month, I was able to provide all your daycare bottles, which was great, but then due to a work conference and the associated stress, my supply dropped further, so I decided to not fight it and dropped a work pumping session, which happily provided me with more time during the work day, though I was sad about ending everything. So then we went down to 3 bottles of breastmilk per day, then 2 bottles, and now we're just down to frozen milk and 1 bottle per day, which should continue for maybe the next 2 weeks or so.
I nursed you for the last real time on Halloween morning, and I tried to memorize the moment- your long eyelashes against your round cheeks, your legs curled up against me, your little hand reaching up to stroke my face, your happy sounds of contentment, the early morning light just creeping in through the curtain, and the feeling of no one but you and me in the world. I know you will not remember it, but I will cherish these five months of nursing you for forever.
Weight: Not actually sure since we don't have a doctor's appointment this month, but I'm estimating about 14 lbs right now.
Diaper Size: Size 2. I really pushed the size 1 for as long as possible because of that giant box that I had, but size 2 seems to fit much better.
Clothes Size: Comfortably in 3-6 months. I had to put away all your 0-3 month things.
Milestones/Firsts: First time
apple-picking and
visiting a pumpkin patch. First time meeting more extended family on Kevin's side. First plane ride alone with Mommy (overall, a success! More about our trip home to Colorado later). First meeting of a dog (Dante). First Halloween and first costume.
You really worked toward sitting up this month. Though you still can't do it completely unassisted, if you're sitting still and not trying to grab something you can do it by yourself. You just are constantly grabbing for whatever is in front of you which makes you fall over :). You babble a lot and sometimes I'm just dying to know what you're talking about because it sounds so interesting! You're very good at raking your hands along the floor and grabbing objects. If only you could use that hand control for better use at night when you're trying to sleep! You also got better at rolling and now you roll right to your stomach as soon as I set you down.
Likes/Dislikes: I saw some marginal improvement during car rides. It sort of depends on your mood on whether you'll scream or not. You like rolling around on the floor. You love your jumperoo! Still haven't really started jumping yet though. You can now twist your way out of the bumbo so that doesn't really work so well anymore. You love bath time, and you love our cats, especially Bixby (Karma seems more keen on avoiding baby hands, though she doesn't mind you if you're not grabbing for her). You could spend long periods of time just grabbing at objects and then tossing them aside (spoons, keys, cups, toys, etc). You finally started to get and enjoy peekaboo, and you like looking in mirrors as well. You have some stranger anxiety popping up- it's not terrible yet, but if you're already a bit tired or grumpy you do not like being handed to someone new. You like being carried in the baby bjorn and looking outward- much preferred to the Ergo carrier, though I'm hoping we'll still get some use out of the Ergo as a back carrier when you're a little bigger.
We just love seeing you take interest in the world and developing your own personality. My baby book says that months 4-7 are some of the best in the first year because babies are more interactive but can't quite cause so much trouble yet :). So far, I'm loving every minute. I still look at you in amazement every day and wonder at the awesome blessing you are in our lives. How lucky are we?
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