Tuesday 1 July 2014

Six Whole Months (07/01/14) Part 1

And a few days.  Where has the time gone?  Before giving birth I figured I would be documenting EVERYTHING on here, so much so my few readers would be bored with the posts.  Alas, babies take too much time, and my writing mojo seemed to be depleted.  I am hoping it is coming back.  Today is actually Canada Day and I am getting the morning off of mama duty.  Deb took Spencer to visit family elsewhere in Alberta for the morning.  My lung infection is back, the last round of antibiotics, around Mother’s Day, didn’t quite kick it and it was starting to come back with vengeance, so I tried to be proactive in going to the doctor’s this time.  I am now on a heavier set of anti’s and it seems to be helping.  Yay.  But that is why I got the morning off, so I could rest and nap and sleep in without feeling guilty and without Spencer needing me. 

It was at the six month mark that we were going to do the cry it out to get Spencer to nap in his crib instead of his lamb swing.  We didn’t really need to do that.  For a large part of his naps he goes down without a fuss.  We have such a peach of a baby.  Don’t get me wrong there are a few bad days of crying but overall he gets fed, and then knows it is nap time and watches his fish mobile till he falls asleep. 

On a hope, I am going to try and at least do the monthly updates of information.  I’m taking inspiration from 2momstobe.blogspot.ca

Physician’s Checkup – For Spencer’s 6 month check up; we got his latest stats.  He now weights 7.23 kg which is a pinch away from 16 pounds.  His height is 65 cm or 25.5” and his head is 42.5 cm or 16.73”.  He seems to be following the right curve of growth from birth, at around the 25th percentile, so that is good news. Our current doctor is a little flaky, she asked some very general questions like, has he found his toes, can he roll over, etc all to which I answered yes.  He found his toes ages ago.  She also asked about his feeding habits and I mentioned that we have started him on solids a little while ago due to the fact he wanted to eat every 60-90 minutes.  She didn’t seem too concerned that we started food a little earlier than the recommended 6 months. 

Spencer (and Deb) go in for the next set of vaccine’s next week.  I seem to trust their measurements, for his head and length, a little better.  Weight seems to be on par and our weekly Wii Fit weigh in’s are pretty accurate with both doctor’s scales. 

He still goes for physiotherapy once a month, for the torticollis.  Last month we got into a little trouble for not doing his neck stretches enough.  Oops.  Lately he has been doing a lot better with his stretches at home.  We also need to carry him right side down and do repetitive motion exercises with him when we can a few times a day.  Some days we are better than others, but we keep trying.  He seems to be doing much better. 

Sleep patterns – About a month ago Spencer decided that around 8:00 was his bed time.  That is when he goes down for the major sleep.  Before Deb and I go to sleep we feed him, so that is around 11:00 and he can eat usually around 100 ml or a decent feed from the breast, aka yaybie.  (The term came from a comedic bit we heard and stuck.)  Some times he will then sleep till about 6:00 but other times he wakes up around 4:30 and then again around 6:30. 

Food -  Food started a little earlier than six months.  He has done quite well.  We started him with Oat cereal.  That was a hit.  We then introduced pumpkin, liked but not quite as much as cereal.  He has now had butternut squash, peas, broccoli (that took a few days to acquire a taste for it), carrots, yellow beans (those were a big hit surprisingly), banana, honeydew melon in a food sock (that is funny to watch, he LOVES it and when you take it away to adjust the food in it, he gets upset), watermelon, and chicken.  All of which, except the cereal was made by us to puree.  We usually mix the chicken in with a vegetable as he doesn’t quite like it by itself, he will eat it, but not a favorite.  We started him with dinner, then introduced breakfast.  We have tried to introduce lunch, but so far he doesn’t seem too interested in eating mid day yet, for solid foods.

The few things that we haven’t made are as follows: he had a jar of Gerber Turkey and Sweet potato, while we were in Fernie as we didn’t travel with solids for lack of a freezer.  One night we were at a restaurant and we had brought cereal thinking it would be enough, and were dead wrong, so he got Montana’s Garlic Mashed potatoes.  I kind of fretted about the salt and garlic and miscellaneous seasoning in there, but they were a hit and he didn’t react to anything in the days following.  Just the other day at the zoo he got his first taste of Tropicana Orange Juice.  I know juice isn’t good to introduce too early, but I don’t plan on giving it to him on a regular basis, just on occasion. 


Feeding times are difficult.  He won’t usually take to the breast throughout the day, he prefers taking pumped milk from the bottle or formula.  I’m still a little short on producing enough milk.  I have even started domperidone to help milk production which has help, but I still need to supplement with formula.  He isn’t fond of taking a bottle while being held either though.  So I usually still give it to him in the swing, or laying on the change table, or I’m trying in the high chair after eating.  We are now introducing a sippy cup for milk/formula drinking.  That is still a work in progress.  So he usually takes the yaybie first thing in the morning and any times he wakes up through the night.  He occasionally takes it as he just wakes up from naps, and just before going to bed if it is me putting him to bed.  Then his additional bottles varies from day to day, some days he has a lot of 60ml bottles other days it will be 120 mls but less frequent.  


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