The Michael Family Musings: Nate, Month 4

Stats:

Weight: 13 lbs. 15 oz., 20^th percentile. Given that a month and a half ago he had dropped to the 5^th percentile, I’m pretty happy with this result!

Height: 25.5 inches, 66%

Size: 6 month clothes and size 2 diapers.

Appearance: Nate continues to chunk up! His leg and arm rolls are more pronounced and he’s rocking a double chin. His hair continues to fill in, but he does still have a small bald spot on the back of his head (probably from the car seat and/or sleeping). His eyes get bluer every day, and his ears stick out more and more too (I’ve always been a sucker for big ears, so I absolutely adore this feature). He still looks a lot like Mia did as a baby, but he’s starting to shift away into his own little features. I still think he looks a lot like Jason, even more so than Mia did at his age.

Food:

This has been an interesting month for feeding. Since the main goal was to have him gain weight, we did a lot of experimenting to see what worked and what didn’t. Weight gain was goal #1 and goal #2 was as much breastmilk as possible. As of right now, he eats 6-7 times per day (depending on if he has a middle of the night feed). 4 (or 5) of those feeds are pumped breastmilk in a bottle, 1 is a breastfeed (I really wanted to be able to nurse at least once a day if it was possible), and 1 is a formula feed. Despite all the switching going on, he still nurses well (though still lazy as ever). Now that my supply is more established and I’m starting to have more of a store, we may be able to do away with the formula feed in the next month or so. When he drinks from the bottle, he takes anywhere from 4.5-7 ounces, though it’s usually closer to 6. His record was 9 oz. in one feeding! He’s still eating every 3 hours during the day. Unlike most babies, he doesn’t give any hunger cues (he chews on his hands, but he does that constantly, so it’s not very reliable). He goes from calm and peaceful to screaming in no time flat. To counter this, I’ve found it helpful to just have the feed ready 3 hours after the previous one. When I do this, I usually avoid the screaming.

Sleep:

For the most part, Nate is now sleeping through the night (7-8 hours). He still occasionally has nights where he wakes up for an extra feed, but they aren’t as common anymore. He goes to sleep around 11pm and usually wakes up between 6 and 7 am. We’ve tried a few nights of trying to push up his bedtime, but doing that generally causes him to wake up earlier, so it seems like 7-8 hours is the sweet spot for now. He still takes mostly cat naps, but his napping pattern is starting to emerge. After he wakes up in the morning, he generally goes back to sleep for about 2 more hours. I’m not sure if I consider this a nap, or just a continuation of his nighttime sleep and he just gets too hungry to make it. The rest of his naps are usually between half an hour and an hour long. He generally goes to sleep around 11:30 am, 2:30, 5, and 8:30 pm. I’m hoping by the time he’s 6 months old that we can go down to 2 long naps instead of 4-5 short ones. If he does wake up in the middle of the night, he usually just bypasses that first “nap” of the day, and sleeps until 9 am or so. We have transitioned him to the crib in the last 2 weeks, and for nighttime, he’s doing well. We put him down after his last feed of the night and he usually is able to get himself to sleep with minimal effort on our part. We’re working on naps in the crib, but I’d say in any given day I’m lucky to get 2 of his naps there. The rest are usually in the pack n play, car seat, swing, on the floor and occasionally still in our arms. In other words, I do my best to put him in the crib, but if he drops somewhere else, I don’t move him. He hasn’t yet put himself to sleep in the crib for nap.

Milestones:

Still not a fan of tummy time, so he rolls onto his back from his belly quite a bit. Jason said rolled from back to belly once when he was after a toy, but I wasn’t around when it happened.

He loves standing up and can bear all his weight on his legs when we hold his arms. He loves his bouncer!

I’d say he can pretty much hold his head up completely now.

Whenever he’s on his back, he pushes himself with his feet to scoot. It kind of looks like an upside-down crawl.

He’s definitely teething, so he wants to chew on everything he can.

He can bring toys to his mouth, and he’s getting pretty good at returning his paci to his mouth when it falls out.

He’s showing more interest in toys, particularly ones that are super colorful or make a lot of noise.

He’s found his voice for sure this month! Lots of shrieks and “singing” going on. He continues to babble with vowel sounds, and he’s now using some consonant sounds (mostly ‘b’ and ‘g’). He also sometimes repeats sounds we make.

I’d say he’s a pro at recognizing familiar faces. He’s always looking for sister!

He can “sit up” kind of… he needs to lean forward on his legs to bear the weight of his torso, but he’s probably half way to sitting on his own.

He’s started blowing raspberries.

Things I want to remember about this month:

Nate’s first Texas Independence day and bluebonnet photo shoot (both are a BIG deal around here) and St. Patrick’s day.

Big sister can always make him laugh.

All the “talking”!

His favorite things:

Big sister, hanging toys, his bouncer, daddy’s beard, chewing on hands (his and everyone else’s too), smiling, snuggling, standing up, video games with dad, naps with mom.

And now, the pictures!