Speed Trials

This week’s post is going to be a short one. Why? Well… because I’m exhausted. Things are starting to catch up to me, it seems, and this week was a bit overwhelming.

For one, the bottom teeth that we’d been anticipating forEVER have finally arrived, so my child’s normally happy demeanor has been dampened somewhat. It also means that he wakes up a lot more during the night. This week has been particularly bad for sleeping, and I’m feeling the effects. I give him Camilia, and it IS helping (thanks to all you ladies who endorsed it!) but I hope that those teeth will be fully cut in the next couple of days so we can go back to our normal nighttime routine.

Also, now that Nico is well into eating solid foods, and eats a wider variety of things, his digestive system is just on overdrive! I know we’re only 7 months in, but I am SO FED UP with diapers! The fact that Nico has all of a sudden doubled the amount of diapers he dirties in a day compounds my feeling of failure with Elimination Communication. I mean, I still put him over the toilet whenever I sense that he needs to, but I would say that the majority of the time he goes in his diaper. I wish I had a better handle on that, because cleaning those diapers is starting to wear pretty thin.

So there you go, this week can be summed up in a whole lot of discomfort for him, and a not a whole lot of sleep or rest for me.

But amidst all that, there are still lovely moments worth mentioning: When Nico smiles now, he sometimes crinkles his nose too, which makes him look like a little scamp – it’s SUPER cute. Bath time is still my favourite part of the day – there’s something very soothing about taking a bath, and I love watching him play in the water. And I’ve made more of an effort to read to him more often, and it’s turning out to be a really nice routine too.

We had a pretty good week over here, settling into the new house, becoming a faster crawler, and eating solid foods (apple is the new one this week).

Angelo went away for the weekend, so he had some serious QT with Nico before and after…

But amidst all the good times, we had some serious challenges this week, too. Mainly, teething (I think… ugh, still no tooth to show for his pains) Nico has been drooling and grabbing his ear a lot this week, and he also developed a wicked rash. When we came home from the Agriculture Museum, it was so red and angry looking that I could do nothing but strip him down and air him out. We also took 2 baths daily, used lots of Vaseline, and I’m happy to say the rash pretty much cleared up by Monday morning.

I have been super hesitant to give Nico anything for his discomfort, mostly because I don’t want to over-medicate, and also because the old breast does the trick anyway. But I did go out and buy him an amber necklace. Amber is a natural analgesic and it’s supposed to do wonders for teething babies. Basically it takes the edge off. He wears it all the time, and it reacts to the oils in his skin to give off its soothing properties.

The other thing I bought was Camilia, which was recommended to me by some moms at playgroup. This is a homeopath that’s supposed to calm toothing aches. I’ve used it a couple of times, and Nico has quietened down. However, like I said, there’s still no tooth, so maybe he’s not even teething at all – but I have noticed that his gums look like they have a slight split in them, so I think teeth are close… After all, Nico will be 7 months old in mid-April. Gah, I can’t even believe that!

Which means it’s high time I started seriously looking into daycares. More on that later, I guess. Have a great week!

This is Nico’s first week in his new home. He fared the move itself pretty well, but I can tell that he’s a little discombobulated now. He is so wide-eyed during the day, taking in all the new sights around him. And when he wakes up from his naps, he’s a little more disoriented than usual, and is a little more ready to cry if I’m not right there when he wakes up. The house just isn’t familiar to him yet. But he’ll get used to it soon enough. After all, we’re planning on staying here for a while, and it will be the first home that he remembers.

Crawling:

And of course, the kid would start to crawl the day after we move from a one-floor apartment to a 2-storey house! Yes, it’s true, he’s now mobile. After weeks of watching him get up on his knees and rock back and forth, he’s finally made the connection and started moving forward. And he can cover some ground, too. I put him down to play in the family room while I made dinner in the kitchen today, and then all of a sudden I saw this in the doorway:

Hello Nico!

And now that he’s on the move, he’s very excited to explore uncharted territory. There isn’t a low shelf that’s safe anymore!!

Eating and Sleeping:

But if crawling was the highlight this week, eating and sleeping were definitely the duds. With the move and everything, I basically stopped giving him solids and returned to exclusively breastfeeding him. It’s just so much simpler and easier. And that sort of messed up his sleep schedule (that along with the general disarray of our lives right now). He now has a 30 minute nap at around 6pm (yeah, I know!) and then goes down for the night at around 9pm. He’ll wake up anytime between 11:30pm and 1:30am, then again between 3:30am and 4:30am. That one is the killer, because I’ve usually only been asleep for an hour or so, and it totally eff’s up my sleep cycle. Then he’ll go down for another 1 or  2 hours, and then be up for the day at 7am at the latest. Basically, it sucks. And it doesn’t seem to matter if he goes in his crib or our bed, he wakes up just as frequently in either place.

Oh well, here’s hoping that with a return to routine and solid foods, we’ll make a good sleeper out of him yet!

Happy Easter everyone, and see you next week!

Nico was born on Tuesday September 20, so today is really really his 6-month half-birthday.

And to celebrate, I thought for sure he was going to crawl for the first time today. He is SO CLOSE to crawling, I can’t even tell you. Rolling over is no thang for him anymore, he just does it without thinking, and he now gets up onto his hands and knees pretty easily too.

Yesterday he started lifting his butt up in the air and laying his foot flat on the floor for traction. The only thing he has left to figure out is how to put all these motions together to move forward. Pretty exciting for sure!

He’s also developing quite the attitude. He actually had his first tantrum a few nights ago. I had scolded him for shrieking (more on that later) and I gave him his bath without his toys as a punishment for it. So he was in the bathtub with no toys, and he was not happy about it, and he started kicking his feet, and then splashing with his arms, and he made really funny disgruntled sounds as he thrashed about. I just let him get it all out, and then when the bath was over we both felt better and had pretty much made up. But it was a very informative glimpse into what I’ll be dealing with as he gets older and comes into himself more and more. (and if he takes after his maman, there will be lots more tantrums to deal with. I was pretty much the tantrum queen when I was little…)

We also finally set up the high chair for him, and we’ve started him on sweet potato. He LOVES it!!! I roasted the sweet potatoes in the oven and then pureed them with some water, and split them up into little servings for the freezer. It’s pretty handy since 2 sweet potatoes made 16 Nico-servings! (he’ll be eating sweet potato for-EVER!)

So, I’ve been reading up a lot on Baby-Led Weaning, which encourages parents to forgo the purees and simply introduce foods in their whole form to babies right from the start. It also discourages parents from spoon-feeding their babies, because that’s too much like force feeding and the baby doesn’t have any control over what they’re eating, their pace, or how much. So what I’ve been doing is I put a little sweet potato puree on Nico’s spoon, and then hand him the spoon. He then takes it to his mouth and eats at his own pace and comfort. And when he’s had enough, he usually lets me know by dropping the spoon.  It’s working pretty well, and I’ll try to incorporate other foods in their whole form from now on.

Anyway, so far Nico has eaten Sweet Potato and Hummus. This week I’m going to try Banana and Avocado. I’ll let you know how that goes!

And finally, can I just talk a bit about how absolutely beautiful the weather has been lately??? 25C and sunny. There’s nothing like that day in Spring when you venture outside without your coat for the first time after a long cold winter. I had Nico in some baby leggings and socks and a sweater – just in case there was still a chill in the air, but after being outside for a little bit all that stuff came off and he was hanging out in his onesie and nothing else. It was glorious, and just gets me really excited for the Summer. I can’t wait for Nico to start crawling and walking, and to bring him up to the cottage, and to hang out by the park near our new house (hello wading pool!)

So happy half-birthday my beautiful baby boy! I have a feeling that the second half of your first year will be even better than the first!!

I’m happy to say that Nico is feeling much better these days. Good as new even. And he’s becoming a very busy boy! Here’s what he’s been up to this past week:

Sleeping in his crib: it happened quite suddenly that his bassinet just stopped being comfortable for him. He would only sleep for 1 1/2 hours at a time in it, so we knew it was time to move him to his crib. I’d been getting gentle (and not so gentle) urgings from people to put Nico in his crib for a while now, but I’m glad I waited till I was comfortable and sure of my decision. I have no reservations about it at all, and he seems to like it well enough.

Rolling over and beginning to crawl: Nico can travel to the left, the right, and backwards. The only way he can’t go is forwards, but he’s been getting up on his knees and rocking back and forth, so I imagine it’s only a matter of time before he’s moving forward!

Baptism: Nico got Baptized on Sunday. It was a lovely affair, and his grandparents and uncles were there to help celebrate. Lots of fun times! And cake!

Nico had a bath in the kitchen sink: This was a photo op more than anything else…

Nico is ready to eat food:  Nico is VERY interested in our meals lately, and grabs for our plates whenever he’s at the table with us. So I gave him one of his little spoons and he took to it right away (perhaps from seeing us use our cutlery??) and knew how to hold it and put it in his mouth. And sometimes he’d look at us while we were eating and just hold his head up towards us with his mouth gaping open, like a baby bird waiting for his food. So today Angelo and I were eating carrots and hummus and Nico had his spoon in his hand, and I just put a bit of hummus on it. He took it to his mouth and after being initially surprised to find something on the end of his spoon, he managed to get it in his mouth and eat the hummus. He liked everything about it, the taste, the texture, and I topped up his spoon three times before he’d had enough! I was so impressed with my little one.

Anyway, so you can expect some posts on the adventures of Nico the Eater over the next few months!