11 Months Today...10 Month Low Down

Today is LL's 11 Month Birthday --Here's Her 10 Month Low Down 

Bedtime:
She is in the bath tub around 6:30 and asleep by 7:00.

Wake-Up:
Sleeping til 6:00-6:30

Naps:
We're still taking 2 naps a day.  The first one is around 8:00-8:30 and it last about an hour.  Her 2nd is between 1:00-2:00 and is usually around 1 1/2 hours. I also have been putting her down awake and she goes to sleep after about 15-20 minutes. 

Bottles:
She is now getting 4 bottles a day.  She is becoming less interested in her bottles and the amount she is drinking.  I always make 5oz. but she rarely drinks it all.  She is eating more solid food and it may be because of all the solid food she is eating.

Foods:

Her appetite has gotten much bigger.  She eats 3 average size meals a day along with 2 snacks.  She is still getting Stage 3 foods along with cut up fruits.  Texture is no longer an issue for her so she is trying and liking more foods.  We still have not introduced meat or cheese. 

New foods this month:

cut up bananas, and she LOVES the strawberry/banana smoothie from Smoothie King

Night Time:
It is so very nice knowing that when we put her down at night we know she's sleeping till the morning.  Stress level is gone.  Bryan and I are even going out more now.  We feel more comfortable knowing Avery won't wake up when a babysitter is here. 

Developmental Milestones & Firsts:
Nothing new to report this month.  In fact, it's been showing in the lack of blog entries.  Avery is going to look back at this month and ask why nothing was entered during her 10th month.  It really is because nothing new has happened.  No new teeth, still cruising the walls and furniture.  She did take a few steps and balance on her own.  But nothing major.  I will say that she is playing better on her own....throwing objects and going to find them, pushing toys around, dancing more to music.  She is also babbling more non-stop.

As you can see, it's becoming more and more difficult for Avery to stay still for her monthly pictures.  As soon as we put her on the chair, she immediately starts moving, wiggling and she reaches out for me.  *Sigh* this is definitely the beginning of me chasing her around and around.  I can tell her 2nd year is going to be full throttle forward.  

LL is Officially Weaned

Last week was the end of breastfeeding for me.  After my left boobie decided not to produce any more milk and LL completely uninterested in nursing, I decided to hang it up.  I thought I would be more emotional about it but LL and I were both OK with it.  I knew it was the right time for both of us.

This is where I sat for 7 months while I pumped....just me, my pump and the computer.  I have to say I won't miss pumping.

Good bye for now.  Here it is sitting on the shelf in the closet.  See ya next time around!

I thought weaning would also be more painful.  But, since my left boobah dried up it was only my right one to deal with.  When I felt it getting full, I would pump just a little.  I only had to pump one time.  It's still a little larger than the left but it's not producing any milk, it has stayed the same for about 3 days.  I guess I should read up on what happens.

7 Months...6 Month Low Down

Yesterday was LL's 7 Month Birthday --Here's Her 6 Month Low Down

Bedtime: between 7:00-7:30.  We moved her time back to her original bedtime.  We are so confused as parents.  We are forever going back and forth and experimenting with poor LL.  The bottom line...at this point in the day, she is tired and needs to go to bed at 7:00!

Wake-Up: Anytime between 6:00am and 7:30.  She is so all over the place.  There has never been consistency to anything LL does.

Naps: For the most part, LL is still taking 4 naps.  Depends on when she first gets up in the morning.  But I can see how she is trying to transition down to 3 naps.  Her first morning nap has become a long one...around 1 1/2 hours. Her last nap is around 3-3:30.  I won't let her take another one after that.

**On a side note:  We have been putting LL down in her crib while she is still awake for all naps and bedtime.  We stand over her crib and pat her stomach and hum and she goes to sleep on her own.
Sometimes it easier than other days, but she's getting the idea.  The goal is to just put her down and leave her to fall asleep solo.  I'm so jealous of moms who can do this with their babes.  We're hoping this will help with nighttime wakings and longer stretches of sleep.

Bottles: LL has been getting more bottles per day.  I would say around  4-5. I still pump a lot just to keep my milk supply up.  But for some reason, my left boob decided to become lazy and stop making any milk.  It all happened when LL was sick a couple weeks ago and stopped nursing/eating.  I should of pumped more then, but I didn't.  Now I know!

Nursing:  LL nurses about 2-3 times a day.  One time in the 3am area and the other first time in the am.  

Foods: LL JUST started eating 3 times a day.  I was only giving her solids in the am and pm, but she's been looking at the high chair in the middle of the afternoon and whining. 

New foods this month:  potatoes, cherries, apricots, pineapple, puffs.  I'm considering incorporating soy yogurt.  Anyone else try this?

Night Time: This month of sleeping has been horrible.  Back to square one with her.  I have officially given up on trying to figure her sleeping out.  She is back to waking up 45 min into her nighttime sleep and back up again around 11:30...sometime up at 1:30 or 3:00am or exactly 4:20 am and then up for the day between 6- 7:30.  There is absolutely ZERO consistency to LL's sleep.  Drives me bananas.

Developmental Milestones & Firsts:  Still scooting and army crawling all over the place!  We did buy her "cage" so that I would feel better about letting her crawl around without constantly looking at her.  She likes it for the most part.

LL is almost sitting up...she's been practicing using her kickstand also known as her tripod stance. She's almost gotten all the way to sitting position, then she does a face plant into the ground. ouch.

LL also got her first tooth!  Her lower right one came in about 2 1/2 weeks ago.  We are anxiously waiting for the 2nd one to pop up.  She's drooling and biting down on everything.

Favorite Toys:

Momma's Mental State:  Back to feeling tired and run day all day everyday.  It's getting very old.  Just when I feel like I get caught up on sleep, LL has a horrible night and here I am back to feeling like poo.  I keep telling myself that it won't last forever...but it very hard to be a good mom when you're tired all the time. 

6 Months Today...5 Month Low Down

Today is LL's 6 Month Birthday --Here's Her 5 Month Low Down

Bedtime: between 7:30 and 8:00.  We moved it..for some reason she likes this time better and sleeps longer.

Wake-Up: Usually around 6:30 but lately sleeping to 7:00.  I'll take it!

Naps: LL takes 4 naps a day.  The first 2 in the am are over an hour sometimes an 1 1/2 hours.  The 2 in the afternoon are shorter...about 40 minutes...one because she's usually in the bjorn napping. Her last nap is around 3:30/4:00 and it goes about 40 minutes. 

Bottles: LL gets 2 bottles a day.  The first one at 6:30pm (4oz of Isomil) and the 2nd one around 9:30 (4oz Isomil) for her dreamfeed.  We do not mix the breast and the formula together anymore she likes it by itself now. yay.

Nursing:  LL nurses about 5 times a day.  Right when she wakes up, between 6-7...then again around 9:30am, 12ish, 3ish then again sometime in the 3am area or when she wakes up at night.  I pump around 7:00pm.  It's amazing how your body will adjust to the supply and demand of your baby.

Foods: She eats 2x a day.  The first time is after her first nap around 9:00ish.  She usually eats 1/2 container of a fruit and a 1/2 vegetable. Then she eats dinner around 5:00ish...this time she usually eats 2 full containers.  Our ped said to start incorporating lunch sometime after her 6 month birthday.

New foods this month:  Peaches and Green Beans

Night Time: The night time sleep has been soooo much better.  We put her down around 7:30 and she sleeps all the way to 2-3am!!  So nice.  She no longer wakes up about 45 minutes after putting her to sleep which is also nice. After her 2-3am feeding, she sleeps till 6:30ish.  One thing we did differently is we blacked out her windows so it is completely dark in her room.  It has also helped with longer naps.  I also think the formula before bed helps her sleep longer, too.

Developmental Milestones & Firsts: LL is ALL OVER her play area.  I am constantly getting up to move her back to her "safe area".  I'm thinking of buying a gate type area.  I am currently looking at this...

I would purchase 2 of these to make the play area larger!  Seems cruel after looking at the poor girl alone in the picture with no toys or anything....but I would make it like a mini Disney World in there.

LL is not sitting up by herself, but when I sit her up she will stay and balance for about 3 seconds.

When on the floor on her tummy she will scoot both legs under her belly and lift her body up and rock back and forth...which I think is the beginning of a crawl which scares the sh!t out of me.  She has also just started to do the army crawl or the "low crawl" as my dad calls it where she scoots across the floor using her elbows.

She also rolls and rolls and rolls and rolls all around.

Favorite Toys: We bought LL this Baby Einstein Mozart DVD when she was 4 months old but she did not become interested in it until recently.  She LOVES it! 

Momma's Mental State: I'm feeling really good lately.  I'm taking LL out and about everyday!  I just put her in the Bjorn and off we go.  We usually wait until after her first 2 naps.  When she gets tired, I turn her around in the Bjorn facing me, put a blanket over her head, give her her pacifier and say "night-night" and she goes right to sleep.  Love it!  I should have done this from about 4 months on...but I was so scared to leave the house.  With my next babes, I know I'll be in a better state of mind plus not so freakin scared all the time.

I finally feel recovered "down there"!  I can walk 20 feet now without feeling like I need to tee-tee all over myself.  Sorry if TMI but recovering down there was NOT fun.  I really thought it would be like that forever.

****On a side note....went to my first consignment sale called Sweet Repeats last night and bought LL some fun new toys! I'll post on those next week.

5 Months Today...The 4 Month Low Down

I got this great idea from Beach Bum & Baby so I thought I would update LL's monthly happenings this way as well.  I added "Momma's Mental State" to the list because that changes just as much as LL does. haha

Today is LL's 5 Month Birthday -- 4 Month Low Down

Bedtime: between 6:30 and 7:00

Wake-Up: Usually around 6:30

Naps: LL takes 4 naps a day...each one around 45 minutes.  Lately, they have been going a little longer and  she misses some of the 4 o'clock naps  She may be transitioning to 2 naps a day.  When she does miss the last nap, we move night-night time earlier. 

Bottles: I just started to give LL a bottle for her 6 o'clock meal and her dream-feed meal at 9:00pm.  For those bottles I mix part formula/ part breast milk.  We're using the soy formula.   Each of those bottles are 4-5 oz. equal parts formula/breast.  I started doing this b/c 1.) my supply was really low in the late afternoon and 2.) I'm trying to get her used to the taste of formula.  She WILL NOT drink it by itself.

She nurses/bottle about 6 times a day about 4 hours b/w each feeding 5-6am, 9-10, 1-2pm, 5-6, 9-10, 1-2am

Night Time:  I read somewhere that at this age sleeping through the night was about 5-6 hours straight.  LL has done that on occasion.  But we are still very inconsistent with sleep at night.  She'll have 2 great nights of sleeping...then BOOM....back up every 2 hours.  Gotta love it. :)

Foods: She loves food!  We stopped the rice cereal and are now just sticking with Prunes, Pears, Apples, Bananas.  That may seem early, but the girl was literally grabbing at B and I's forks during dinner.

Developmental Milestones & Firsts: Rolling over both ways (she was just rolling from back to stomach but recently started rolling from her stomach to her back), eating, scoots around play mat, while on her stomach she pushes up with her forearms and stays there longer, plays & entertains herself longer.



Favorite Books: She LOVES books!  Hello, Baby! By Mem Fox,   Hooray For You By: Marianne Richmond ,  Goodnight Moon By: Margaret Wise Brown

Favorite Songs: Bryan and I both made up songs for her that we sing to her all the time.  They're both name songs. 

Favorite Toys:  Bright Starts Bounce-a-Bout, Sophie, Bright Starts Tug Tune Pig.
She loves any of those hanging toys that are normally clipped on to car seats, etc.  Her fav is the pig.  You can see it hanging on her Bounce-a-Bout below.

Momma's Mental State: I finally feeling like I'm pulling my head out of the sand.  My hormones seems to be under control.  I had no idea it would be that bad.  I heard it's just as bad when you stop breastfeeding.  Great.

I'm feeling more confident about taking LL out and about.  Before, I was having these strange visions of me dropping her or something totally irrational.

Believe it or not, I still feel like I'm recovering from having her...yes, I mean "down there".  How come no one talks about how traumatizing that is?

Aden & Anais Burby Bibs...Love Them!

I was gifted this Aden & Anais Burpy Bib at one of my showers and I just pulled it out.  It is by far one of my favorites bibs because it covers not only the front of LL but her shoulders and arms too.  LL is constantly moving her head back and forth and her arms up and down during yum-yum time resulting in food covering her arms and shoulders.  This bib covers both areas perfectly.

 It's going to work even better when she's sitting up solo in her high chair!

Rice Cereal

4 Months

So LL and I took a trip to see MeMe and PawPaw this week (I needed a major re-charge).  While there I made the executive decision to introduce cereal.  I've had this gut feeling for a couple weeks that her liquid diet just wasn't cutting it anymore...she just didn't seem satisfied after nursing. Plus, B and I were noticing her eyeballing our food.

We mixed it with formula, put the spoon in her mouth and she gobbled it right up.  Kicking her legs and saying "Mmmmm"  the whole time.  She looked at me like, "What took you so long?"

I NEVER thought I'd try cereal before 6 months, but Momma has to listen to and follow her instincts.

I bought both the Rice and Organic Oatmeal to try.  I'll update with the results of the oatmeal when we try it.