January 18, 2018 by Stephanie

Daphne-8 Months

Weight: 16 lbs. She is still little, but she is growing! We love our little Daffodil!

Health: This month has been rough in Daphne’s world. She had her first ear infection. She got a bad cough right before Christmas. I am fairly certain she is cutting a tooth right now, because she has been really fussy and not sleeping so great on and off.

Diet: We are still going strong with the breastfeeding. I nurse her in the morning and before bed. Then she has two breastmilk bottles and one formula bottle during the day while I am at work. On the weekends, for the most part we avoid the formula and nurse the whole time. Usually, she has a fruit/veggie packet for breakfast, oatmeal for lunch, and then a sample of whatever we are having at dinner. She has tried all kinds of new things: turkey, pasta, oranges, quinoa, black beans, crackers, and she can eat a whole fruit/veggie packet on her own so she has tried a lot of new flavors that way. Her favorite is still mashed potatoes. We are doing mostly a baby led weaning approach, but we have done some purees mostly by way of the packets. She gets really impatient when food isn’t getting to her fast enough, and she still isn’t super great with her pincer grasp, so again she can get frustrated easily. We just have to remind ourselves that she isn’t eating to get nutrition right now, and we are fully in the exploratory stages.

Clothes: She is mostly in 3-6 month clothes. She can fit into some 6 month sleepers, and most of her pants are 6 months. She is in a size 3 diaper, and size 1 shoe.

Sleeping: We started using the Zipadee-Zip because she was rolling over in everything else and not happy about the freedom. It has been great. We have had a couple nights where her sleep has been bad but that was because she had the ear infection and is teething. The nights she doesn’t sleep though are so rough for us since we are so used to her good sleep habits. She also hates to snuggle and when she is around anyone else it means it is time to be awake and alert so co-sleeping is not an option when she has a bad night. She still has two naps a day, but the length can vary. When all is right, she goes to bed around 8pm and stays asleep until 6ish am. She hardly ever sleeps past 7am. We have been so lucky that she has been a great sleeper!

Likes: Eating. I’m still the ultimate pacifier for her. She loves her Dory pez dispenser and her Oogaa teethers. She loves tickles and raspberries on her neck. She is obsessed with George; he can get the biggest smiles out of her. She loves jumping in her saucer. We tried putting her in her walker and jumper, both which we think she would love. However, she is still so little that the seats kind of swallow her up. She loves dancing whether it be when you are holding her or when you do it in front of her.

Dislikes: She isn’t fond of baths or diaper changes. She is starting to roll around when I change her, which is a super fun development. She hates the bumbo; she just tries to turn around in the thing. She is terrified of the vacuum.

Milestones: She can stand when she is holding on to something. She can’t get there on her own yet though. She enjoyed her first Christmas and New Years. She can drink out of straws. She loves drinking out of my cups and is always clamoring to get them, and she has her own little camel back now that she drinks water out of. She sort of waves at you. It is more of a gimme signal, but it is in response to waves.

Nicknames: Chunker Cheeks, Daphie, and Daphie Girl. The two most common are Daph and Sister. George actually says her name, but he pronounces it as Naphne.

Quirks: She is very hard to impress and she makes you work for her smiles. Oh but when she does smile, it can light up a room.

We parents are: tired. It has been a long taxing month. We both have been putting in extra time at work, which creates for long days. Then we all came down with a bug after Christmas. Thank God my mom is here, otherwise I don’t know how we would have gotten through those couple days. Tom’s grandma passed away this past weekend, so that has been emotionally taxing on everyone. Grammy was such a sweet sassy lady. She always treated me like I had always been one of her grandchildren, and she is one of the few people Daph would smile for without much work. She is going to be greatly missed, and it has been hard to see this loss for Tom and my in-laws.

George is: doing great. I just can’t get over how great of a big brother he is. He is very helpful and kind to her for the most part. We have been dealing with him stealing her pacy and hiding in corners sucking on it himself. He also struggles a little bit now that she can crawl and get toys that he is playing with. He doesn’t quite understand that some toys are hers, and the idea of sharing is sometimes lost on him. He does insist on putting her to bed every night. If for some reason I put her to bed without him, he will walk in her room anyway after lights are out to tell her goodnight.

The dogs are:

I cannot believe that 8 months have passed with this sweet little nugget.

Here is George at this age.

December 18, 2017 by Stephanie

Daphne-7 Months

Weight: She is 15 lbs. At her check up, she was in the 7% for weight, 25 inches tall (10%), 42.5 inches head circumference (50%). Our peds said that she is doing well enough with growing that we don’t have to keep coming back in with extra checkups. I feel that she is gaining weight when I hold her, but I don’t feel like the scale reflects it!

Health: Besides a diaper rash (which I think comes with the territory with solid food poop), she has been healthy this month.

Diet: We started supplementing soon after she turned 6 months. One thing I told myself this time around was that I was not going to work myself to death to exclusively breastfeed. I don’t want to get to a point where I am a slave to pumping to make enough. So during the week, she gets one formula bottle. For the most part on the weekends, we get by with just breastmilk. Sometimes when we are out and about, I will take a small formula bottle to get through our outing. I am feeling pretty good about this whole thing because at this time with George we were almost completely weaned off and only down to one nursing feeding a day and no pumps. The no-stress/no-pressure approach has been working for us! She has also really gotten into solid food this month. She eats oatmeal at lunch, and then dinner is where we explore with whatever we happen to be eating that day. She has tried all kinds of new things: broccoli, mashed potatoes, fries, apples, eggs, cous cous, peaches, peas, meatloaf, and salmon. Her favorites are broccoli, meatloaf, and mashed potatoes. We are doing mostly a baby led weaning approach, but we have done some purees.

Clothes: She just went up to 3-6 month clothes. She is in a size 2 diaper, and size 1 shoe.

Sleeping: We have hit a hiccup with her sleeping. Our peds wants us to transition her out of the magic sleep suit because she has been full mobile now with rolling over for awhile. She is afraid Daphne doesn’t have the mobility and range she needs while sleeping. Plus, her flat spot is coming back again. So we are trying to transition her to the Halo Sleepsack at nap times right now. Her nap times have been cut in half, and she fights going to sleep really hard in that thing. She rolls over in that thing a lot more, and I am panicked that she is going to die with her face in the sheet so it is hard to do anything while she is attempting sleep. I have been looking at the Zipadee-Zip to help, but the sizing is throwing me off. We are still using the magic suit at night, and she is still sleeping through the night (8pm-6:30am). She won’t sleep in past 6:30.

Likes: Eating. Me. Chewing on her sleeve to go to sleep or chewing on her burp cloths. Any teething toy and George’s mega blocks. Tom’s voice. Puppy Dog Pals theme song. George. Her own feet.

Dislikes: She still hates a dirty diaper, but even more so now that her poops have changed with the food intake.

Milestones: She started CRAWLING! She is getting faster and faster. She will finally let Tom pick her up without crying for me. While she was sitting up on her own last month, I wanted to note that the pediatrician was surprised at how well she was doing with that.

Nicknames: Sister Friend, Girlfriend, Chunker Cheeks, Daphie, and Daph. Most of the time it is still Sister.

Quirks: She does this thing with her hand where her palm is stretched out all the time. See below. It takes a lot to get her to belly laugh, but when she does it is such a good deep laugh. She has started using a pacy more, which is beneficial. However she only likes the one they sent her home with from the hospital. She wont even use the same brand in a different color.

We parents are: doing pretty good and getting into the holiday spirit! I cannot believe Christmas is a week away! Tom has been on day shift which I always love because it is just more time at home all together. I also got a promotion at work. My boss got a huge promotion to another part of the institution, so I was named Interim Director of my department until we do a search. It has been kind of a whirlwind of a month with the added duties and the new learning curve. It’s definitely a great opportunity to advocate more for students.

George is: the perfect big brother. He thinks Sister is his best friend, and is always telling her how much he loves her. He likes to get her toys for her, and if she is crying he tries consoling her with her pacy. He also helps me sing to her at night and “tuck” her into bed. It is seriously the sweetest little thing.

The dogs are: going to be 7 this week! That is even more crazy than Daph being 7 months old! Grace has been a little off this month. I don’t know what her deal is, but she has been going potty at the front door a few nights while we are sleeping. Tom is a light sleeper, and she doesn’t even let him know she needs to go until after she has already done the deed. They are loving Daph eating in her high chair though. Crosby is pretty much always at her side.

Sweet Daph. You are such a joy to watch.

Here is George at this age.

February 26, 2015 by Stephanie

George-6 Months

Weight: Right under 14 lbs. He is still pretty lanky but he is definitely getting longer. We will get updated measurements next week at his 6 month check up.

Health: He is doing pretty well; no health concerns as of late. He is full on teething now. Still no teeth, but I feel one on the top trying to make an appearance.

Diet: This has been a big month diet wise! It is the last month he will be primarily fed by breastmilk. We are going to start the weaning process next week. He still is mostly fed with breastmilk with one formula bottle right before bed. We do have formula on hand for when we are out an about on the weekends though. He is really difficult to nurse right now, so when we are going to be away from the house it is just better to feed him with formula. When I do nurse him, he will only latch for a minute, then yank himself off and scream. Then latch for another minute before he pulls himself off in a fit again. It is a cycle that goes on for awhile. He will only get about 5 minutes of actual latched on feeding (even though the whole experience may be about 20-30 minutes) done before he is screaming so hard that we are both in tears. The real kicker is that he will then be hungry again in an hour or so. This has been going on for the last two months. So doing this out in public is not ideal. This behavior paired with the fact that I am barely scrapping by with making enough milk for him throughout the day (with extra pumping on the weekend and nights) is why we will be stopping our relationship with breastfeeding this month. Some days I feel really good about this decision, and others I feel really guilty. But the reality is, it is just not working for us, and we are both pretty miserable about the experience. On the plus side, we started REAL SOLID food this month. George could not be a bigger fan of real food. He attacks it with such ferocity. We have done a combination of purees and the Baby Led Weaning approach. Right now he is much more favorable of the purees. His pincer grasp is not the greatest, so feeding himself usually ends up with more of it on the floor. He does grab it (after sufficiently smashing it into the tray) and attempt to bring it to his face. He usually drops it before he can knosh on it. When he does get the food pieces to his mouth, he usually spits those big pieces out more than he does with the puree. So we are experimenting with both the puree and whole foods. He is getting a better grasp on holding a spoon for himself though, but he doesn’t understand dipping it in the bowl to get more. So I dip it and then he takes it from me to put in his own mouth. He honestly just tries grabbing the bowl itself and tipping it into his mouth. My mom got a great video of this and shared it on Facebook, but I can’t figure out how to save it for myself. He growls at you if you don’t get him food fast enough, which then turns into crying if you are really slow. He just wants the food now! He is also known to lick it off his bib once we are done with what is in the bowl. This kid LOVES eating real food. So far we have tried sweet potatoes (his first real food), peas, pears, squash, bananas, carrots, mashed potatoes, french fries, and pizza sauce.

Clothes: We are still in 3 month clothes and size 2 diapers. He is definitely growing so we may be into 3-6 month range here soon.

Sleeping: Sleep is a funny thing right now. George refuses to take naps at home. At the babysitter’s, naps no problem. Actually, he will take naps with us, but only if you are holding him for the entirety of the nap. We aren’t good at the transfer to the crib part so we always wake him up. And once he is up, he is up. So I guess it should be a testament that he doesn’t want to miss anything while at home and loves snuggling in our arms. But it poses a real problem on the weekends when the no napping means he is cranky or that we have to hold him all day. We have tried a lot of different things to get him to nap, obviously none of them seem to work. So suggestions are welcome at this point. As far as bedtime, it has been interesting this month. I had several suggestions over the course of last month with the nap/sleeping through the night situations that he needed to go to bed earlier. He was going to bed around 9pm and getting up at 4am, with very little napping throughout the day. So we tried the earlier bed time, and are still trying it. We feed him around 6:30, give him a bath, then put him to bed around 7:30. Like clockwork, he never sleeps longer than a half hour. Only two times in the past few weeks has he stayed asleep longer. At first we tried consoling him to sleep for the next TWO hours. We would take turns every 15 minutes trying to get him back to bed. We are silly parents, obviously this was not working. So the last week we have been still putting him to “bed” at 7:30. But now after he wakes up from the only nap we ever can get him to take, each of us will take one turn to try to get him to sleep before we let him stay up with us. And he seems pretty content and calm staying up until that last feeding that we do around 9:45. And now he has been staying asleep from 10pm until we wake him up at 5:30 am. It is one of those things that we have to follow his cues instead of worrying about doing what the books say. My only concern for his sleep is on the weekends when we fail to get him to nap. During the week this process seems to work just fine, and he seems happy with the amount that he is getting.

Likes: He is generally a really happy baby. He loves to watch us dance, and he will laugh so hard at us being silly. He likes it when you bicycle his legs. He gets a kick out of it, pun intended. Basically any funny noise you make at him will make him giggle. George loves to be in the baby wrap so we spend a lot of time with it. He has several toys that he loves now, his favorite being this plastic ball thing. FOOD. He loves to stand. He would rather be doing that than sitting. Speaking of sitting, now that he is able to sit up more, baths are a little easier for us all. He is starting to like it more because he has more room to kick his feet around in the water. He loves to munch on his own feet too. I swear his foot is in his mouth a majority of the day.

Dislikes: Naps. Being alone. Not getting food fast enough.

Milestones: He rolls from stomach to back on both sides. He has not rolled from back to stomach yet, but he is flailing around a lot so I think it will happen in the next week. He does roll to his sides, just not completely over. While he is on the floor he will scoot himself around in circles whether he is on his back or stomach. He seems pretty content not being mobile and does not show any signs of wanting to move forward or backwards. No rush. He will move when he is ready. He is ready to sit on his own now though! He sits unassisted for a a few minutes. He also likes to bend all the way forward like he is doing the butterfly stretch and then bend back to a seated position. It is like he is mocking me with his flexibility.

Quirks: He gives neck hugs now. Best moments of the day. The night my grandma died, he held my face with his hands for the first time. I was leaning over him, and he just reached up and put his palms on my cheeks like he knew I needed it. I cried big fat ugly tears all over that sweet face. He likes to hold my face a lot now. He makes all kinds of humming and squealing noises now.

We parents are: ready for the academy to be over. Tom is itching to get on the road with the police department, and I am itching to have my husband back. I am also in shock that this little fella is 6 months now.

The dogs are: have bad cases of cabin fever. So we have been having some behavior issues. They do however love to help clean George at dinner time. They are interacting a lot more. It is really fun to watch them play together. Watch this video for some surefire giggles of George trying to eat Grace’s nose.