Strawberry Fields Forever

Six Months Old!

Lennon hit 6 months old on the 14th!  Wow, does time ever go fast.  She's growing and changing every day.  She is now able to sit up on her own and is getting better at balancing herself.  She can go quite a while without tipping over now.  She also "talks" a lot more.  It's very cute to hear her babbles and squeals!  She's always full of smiles too.  It's great!  Lennon is happy to spend most of her playtime on her tummy now.  She quickly flips herself over when I put her down on her back and wiggles herself around to get at various toys.  She really likes crinkly things right now.

We were at the doctor for Lennon's 6 month check up yesterday.  She's doing great!  Weighed in at 16 lb 15 oz and measured 27 inches long.  She's in the 75th percentile for length, the 50th for weight, and her head has shrunk down from the 90th to the 75th percentile!  Normally the doctor would be worried about a head size going down so much, but since Lennon's started out so big (thanks, Fred!) she wasn't concerned.  The doc was very pleased with how she's doing overall.

Banana, Sweet potato and chicken (she might be wearing more than she ate!)

We have started to try some solid foods.  She's not too sure about it yet.  We have tried chicken, sweet potato, and banana.  No strawberries yet :)  Her first taste did not go well.  She gagged and spit up!  We had the most success with mixing the sweet potato and chicken together and making it really runny (gross!) although she's still not too keen on it.  Next I think we'll try some carrots and maybe some apples.  It's a fun adventure!  I wonder what the first thing she really takes to will be?

Sleep still continues to be inconsistent.  She's goes down for bed at the same time every night really well now which is great.  However, she is up many (many!) times in the night.  I feel like she has just gotten into the habit of depending on being nursed back to sleep every time she wakes up.  We're not sure that we want to (or can!) let her cry it out in the middle of the night.  It seems cruel.  I am exhausted though so we may have to re-evaluate that in another month if things don't improve on their own!  We'll see.

Getting Better

Well, we've been doing some sleep training for just over a week now and things are getting better!  We changed Lennon's before bed routine.  I was still nursing her to pretty much asleep before.  Now our bedtime routine is: feeding, diaper change, pajamas, wash face/"brush" teeth, read a story, then into bed.  We also stopped putting her in the swaddle sack.  She's just in a regular sleep sack with her arms out.  I think fighting the swaddle may have been causing her to wake up more.  The first few nights of our new routine had some crying but she eventually went to sleep.  We did check ins after 5 minutes and then progressively longer and only had to go in once before she'd settle herself to sleep.  The last two nights she went to sleep with absolutely no crying!  Yay!  It was hard to let her cry a bit but it seems to have worked, or is working!  The night time wake ups have also started to become less frequent.  The first few nights she still got up three or four times.  We made a "rule" that if it was at least 3 hours since her last feed then I'd feed her in the night.  She pretty much followed the 3 hour rule to a tee the first few nights.  The last three or four nights she has only gotten up two to three times.  Last night was particularly good: to bed and asleep by 7:30, up at 11:00 to eat, up at 4:30 to eat, and then up for the day at 7:30.  I'm trying not to get too excited by this as we haven't had much consistency yet.  But it's promising!  Nap times are still inconsistent too.  Although she goes down for her naps at pretty much the same time every day the length of them varies greatly.  She'll nap anywhere from 40 minutes to over an hour and a half.  I do everything the same so I'm not sure what's causing the differences.  She's a happy girl the rest of the time though so she must be getting what she needs!

First Stampede! unimpressed, with George who was equally unimpressed, sleeping while Mom has some Stampede fare

Twist and Shout

It's been a while since I've posted.  Happy Canada Day!  Hmmm, what's been going on?!  

Well, Lennon is rolling over all the time now.  She rolls from her back to her tummy and will play on her tummy for a while.  The last few days she's been lasting longer on her tummy and doing some baby push ups.  After a while she gets mad and can't get herself back over to her back yet.  So I help her roll over and she'll stay on her back for a bit before rolling over again!  She's babbling a lot more now too.  She'll entertain herself with "yayaya," "dadada," and buzzing her tongue and lips.  It's all pretty cute!

More exciting news...Lennon's getting her first teeth!  At 5 and a half months.  There are two teeth starting to poke out on the bottom.  One of them is already coming through, the other can just be seen.  It hasn't seemed to be bothering her.  She's still pretty happy all the time.  She puts absolutely everything in her mouth.  But, so far, no complaining about the teeth!  Fred's dental hygienist suggested wiping her gums with xylitol to help control bacteria which cause the pain.  She swears it works.  We've been using just water up until now, so we'll try that.

Lennon will be six months old in a couple of weeks so we're starting to think about introducing some solid (pureed) foods.  We're looking forward to that and to see what she thinks of it and how she reacts.  More on that when we get there.

We took a last minute trip to Penticton for the long weekend.  Fred had Monday off instead of today so we thought we'd take advantage.  The weather was ok.  In the low 20s and a bit cloudy.  Of course Monday, when we had to leave, was absolutely beautiful and hot.  We had a great time though.  Did lots of walking and got in a couple of swims in the pool too.  It was a bit cool for the beach and the lake is pretty chilly still.  It should be better when we're back at the end of the month.

Sleep is still an issue.  Lennon is waking up four, sometimes five or six, times a night.  I think she's made it a habit to use me to get back to sleep when she wakes up because she's definitely not eating every time.  We all need more sleep.  Waking up a couple of times to eat would be fine.  It's all the extra wake ups.  We're going to try some sleep training.  Hopefully that will help!  I'll keep you posted!

Rock Star, excited by Jolly Jumping, Cutie in the exersaucer, Tummy time smiles

In Penticton, she's quite indifferent about being in the pool!

Teeth!  One coming through another starting beside it