Miss Sonia is 7 months! And her personality is really starting to blossom!
Some of her favorite things are: playing in front of the mirror, rolling around everywhere, knocking over stacked objects, and getting her tummy nuzzled by mommy & daddy.
This past month gave us plenty reason to worry, but also, plenty of new developments to get excited about. First, the developments 🙂
Sonia cut her second tooth a little over a week after her first, and they are now really starting to show – especially since she is such a smiley little girl! Luckily, it doesn’t appear that any more are imminent, so she (and we) might get a little respite from the pain.
Sonia has also been working really hard on her gross motor skills. Just recently she has started to get forward motion using a full body army crawl (using head, legs and arms) when she’s really motivated. However, she hasn’t figured out how to get into a sitting position by herself yet. She lays on her side and pushes up from her elbow, but hasn’t figure out how to get up onto her palm even. I’m sure it won’t be long though before she’ll be tearing around the house!
One other odd development is in her vocalizations. Last month she was really into blowing raspberries. This month, she seems to have graduated to a slightly finer movement which is like a puffing sound, which neither Eric nor I can appropriately replicate. She is our little beat box. 🙂
Now for the worries 🙁
Sonia’s sleep has not been the same since we left for Hawaii. Even after she adjusted back to Pacific time, she kept waking up crying and taking 3 feedings a night. This just wasn’t sustainable, so we decided we’d have to sleep train again. Given the lessons learned the first time around, we decided to take it a bit slower this time. At first, if I didn’t go to her right away, the cries would escalate in intensity. However, I kept giving her a few minutes, and then in early November she gave signs that she would go back to sleep rather than escalate the crying, so we let her CIO at the 1am feeding. After a few days of success with that, I started weaning her from the 4am feeding until we were left with only the 10pm dream feed remaining. I experimented with omitting that as well, but she woke up cranky and early when I did, so I went back to it after a couple days.
Luckily nap times are still going very well. It helps that we have a lullaby that we sing to her every time. She can be active or fussy, but when we head back to the nursery and start singing the song, her thumb immediately goes in her mouth and her head goes to my chest, ready to go to sleep. It is so precious!
One of the things I thought might be contributing to her night troubles was the fact that we started a more frequent regimen of solids after she turned 6 months. Sonia has seemed to have a sensitive digestive system when it has come to solids from the start, and this ramp up was no different. However, this time, within about a week of her being offered solids 3x per day, her poop changed dramatically. At first I thought it was constipation, but an internet search brought me to a blog that called what we were seeing the “veggie wedgie”, “the best baby poop to ever walk the earth”, and a sure sign that her digestive flora has matured to the point of starting to get nutrition out of solid foods. 🙂 I’m not so sure I fully believe it, since Sonia still wakes up crying at night a lot more than I would think necessary and often passes gas during night feedings, but it makes me feel a little better at least.
One thing is for sure, all this solids eating has really helped her hand eye coordination. She already is getting close to a pincer grasp, and really, there hasn’t been anything yet she didn’t like. I think it helps that she has a Chef Daddy excited to make her nice, healthy meals.
Unfortunately, just as Sonia’s night situation started to get better due to the sleep re-training, she experienced her first real illness and fever. 🙁 Eric had Veteran’s Day off, so he took Sonia to get her flu shot. That same day, the nanny happened to have some remnants of a cold, which I then got. Between all of that, poor Sonia had a high fever for 3 nights and a stuffy nose that caused her to “snore” all the time for another week. The saline and snot sucker weren’t able to clear her nose, plus she made it clear we were torturing her every time we tried to use it. I wished I could teach her to clear her nose, but unfortunately, we just have to wait it out.
Even as she’s getting better from the illness, though, we are noticing her clinginess is increasing, and a little bit of stranger danger creeping in. She still loves to smile at people from out of the K’Tan, but is not so comfortable being held by them. Perhaps that is contributing to why she continues to cry and wake us up a lot at night. 🙁
So, lots to worry about, especially being the worry-wort that I am, but lots to be thankful for and happy about as well! As always, the joy of seeing her grow outweighs any worry when it comes down to it.
Finally, a personal milestone – I’m back to Pre-Preg weight! Now pre-preg muscle tone, that’s another story. Maybe I’ll get to work out more once she’s sleeping through the night again. 😉