(no subject)
Francisco is 5 months old now. Well, 20 weeks. I guess he'll officially be 5 months on April 10. We moved him into his crib this week. Up until now, he's been sleeping in our bed. It's gone a lot more easily than I thought it might. Considerably more easily. In fact, at nighttime, he seems to go down more peacefully in there than he did when I put him in our bed, though he seems to resist the naps even more in the crib. I don't get it. I actually think the move has been more sad for me than it has been for him. Honestly, if we had a bigger bed that didn't have indentations from our fat asses sleeping on it that caused the baby to roll into us, I would have liked to keep him in there longer. As it was, though, no one was getting any sleep. Of course, I was worried about suffocating him every single night. We both disturbed one another constantly, and I'd been sleeping on the couch of late until he woke up to nurse because once I went to bed, he didn't seem to be able to settle back down. Also, the night before I decided to try the crib, I came in from the couch to find that he'd scooched himself perpendicular to Gilbert, and the more he's writhing around, the more I worry about him getting wedged up in our pillows and blankets and ceasing to breath in his sleep. So, while I feel more than a pang of sadness in having him out of our bed, we've all slept a lot better over the last few nights, him included. It doesn't feel quite right to me to have him in a room by himself, but I was thinking that if we tried to move him into the play-yard napper thing we have next to our bed, that would mean just making yet another transition down the line, so I decided to go straight for the crib. He seems to like it in there. The last two nights when he woke up to nurse, he wasn't even crying, I just heard him making normal awake baby sounds over the monitor. Again, I'm shocked by how well this has gone. I expected it to be far more harrowing for us all, with the end result of me breaking down and putting him back in our bed.
So, while I do miss him, it's nice to be able to stretch out and relax in my own bed, pull the covers all the way up to my neck, and snuggle with my husband. I think it's been months since we snuggled in bed up until this point.
The baby is beginning to discover his feet, and was exploring them with his hands today. He still hates tummy time, but he's getting closer and closer to crawling. He can get up on his knees, and he can scooch, but he's never happy about it, grunting in protest all the while. I suspect it won't be long before he gets his arms coordinated so that he can be up on all fours and be mobile shortly after. I feel like his motor skills are developing pretty fast; he's been turning pages of books (clumsily, of course, but these are unmistakable page-turning actions!) for weeks already, has been bearing weight on his legs since he was a few weeks old and can do the one-handed reach for objects. I'm a little worried about his verbal skills, though. He does a few "A-Goo's" here and there, but mostly it's uuuuh and aaaaah sounds. I don't really hear any "Eeeee's," few "Oooooh's" and no "Iiiii's," and as I understand it from the books, he should be "Eeee-ing" in delight at this point. I'm sure he's fine, and I try to tell myself that babies all do their own things at their own pace, but I can't help but worry.
When he was a tiny baby, he used to do this Mr. Mackey cry, where he'd be like "Mmmm-gaaaaaay!" I noticed a few weeks ago that he didn't do that anymore. I'm not sure when he stopped, but I don't want to forget that he did it. I'm worried about the details of his babyhood disappearing into the void of my terrible memory, which is why I'm trying to write these things in here.
His hair continues to be hilarious. It's been kind of a mess since a few weeks after he was born when he grew that mullet and then lost almost all of his hair besides the mullet patch. So now, he has curls popping up on the right side of his head (a few more sprouting every day), super long pieces in the back that never fell out, a patch of short, darker, bristly hairs above that, which must have just started growing in, a bald stripe above that, and then kind of wavy, normal baby hair in the front.
We've tried giving him rice cereal a few times in the last few weeks, and that cereal seriously pisses him off. I'm not really ready for him to start taking solids in earnest, I was more curious about WHETHER he'd take it. Haaaaated it. We'll try again in a few weeks.
Oh! His new trick this week is sticking his tongue out. He's really practicing maneuvering that thing. No raspberry blowing yet, but I expect we'll see some soon!
It's good stuff. All good stuff. More and more often I find myself playing with him and thinking to myself, "This is the stuff. I am so glad that this experience is a part of my life."
I'm doing decently lately. The work at home job is tedious and annoying, and I can't seem to get very fast at it, which means I don't make a lot per hour, but it's better than making nothing. Part of me wants to try to find a normal part-time job, just to be able to get out of the house more and possibly make more money, but the great thing about working from home is not having to get up at 5 in the morning to make sure myself and the baby are fed and ready (it honestly takes a minimum of three hours to do this each day) before I have to be at work at some specific morning hour. Plus, looking for a job is a lot of soul-crushing, mostly fruitless work that I don't have to energy to do. I guess I'll probably just keep working from home until I get fired because I, for the most part, have no idea what I'm doing, or my vertical goes away.
Now that the baby's been on more of a regular and reliable bedtime schedule, I've been going to exercise at the apartment complex's fitness center a few days a week after he goes to bed. All I can bring myself to do is 30 minutes on the elliptical, but it's better than nothin', and I do think it's helping me to lose more weight. I was losing quite well for a few weeks there, but it seemed like it was affecting my milk supply, as the baby appeared frustrated often while feeding, and I had to resort to pumped milk a few times (and my pumping yield was also lower), so this week I added back 200 calories per day. This helped, but I've only lost about a pound this week as opposed to two by this time last week. Obviously, the baby's food is more important than my weight loss, so I do what I gotta!
And now, before this dull, house-wifey post draws to a close, a few of my favorite pictures from the last few months:
So, while I do miss him, it's nice to be able to stretch out and relax in my own bed, pull the covers all the way up to my neck, and snuggle with my husband. I think it's been months since we snuggled in bed up until this point.
The baby is beginning to discover his feet, and was exploring them with his hands today. He still hates tummy time, but he's getting closer and closer to crawling. He can get up on his knees, and he can scooch, but he's never happy about it, grunting in protest all the while. I suspect it won't be long before he gets his arms coordinated so that he can be up on all fours and be mobile shortly after. I feel like his motor skills are developing pretty fast; he's been turning pages of books (clumsily, of course, but these are unmistakable page-turning actions!) for weeks already, has been bearing weight on his legs since he was a few weeks old and can do the one-handed reach for objects. I'm a little worried about his verbal skills, though. He does a few "A-Goo's" here and there, but mostly it's uuuuh and aaaaah sounds. I don't really hear any "Eeeee's," few "Oooooh's" and no "Iiiii's," and as I understand it from the books, he should be "Eeee-ing" in delight at this point. I'm sure he's fine, and I try to tell myself that babies all do their own things at their own pace, but I can't help but worry.
When he was a tiny baby, he used to do this Mr. Mackey cry, where he'd be like "Mmmm-gaaaaaay!" I noticed a few weeks ago that he didn't do that anymore. I'm not sure when he stopped, but I don't want to forget that he did it. I'm worried about the details of his babyhood disappearing into the void of my terrible memory, which is why I'm trying to write these things in here.
His hair continues to be hilarious. It's been kind of a mess since a few weeks after he was born when he grew that mullet and then lost almost all of his hair besides the mullet patch. So now, he has curls popping up on the right side of his head (a few more sprouting every day), super long pieces in the back that never fell out, a patch of short, darker, bristly hairs above that, which must have just started growing in, a bald stripe above that, and then kind of wavy, normal baby hair in the front.
We've tried giving him rice cereal a few times in the last few weeks, and that cereal seriously pisses him off. I'm not really ready for him to start taking solids in earnest, I was more curious about WHETHER he'd take it. Haaaaated it. We'll try again in a few weeks.
Oh! His new trick this week is sticking his tongue out. He's really practicing maneuvering that thing. No raspberry blowing yet, but I expect we'll see some soon!
It's good stuff. All good stuff. More and more often I find myself playing with him and thinking to myself, "This is the stuff. I am so glad that this experience is a part of my life."
I'm doing decently lately. The work at home job is tedious and annoying, and I can't seem to get very fast at it, which means I don't make a lot per hour, but it's better than making nothing. Part of me wants to try to find a normal part-time job, just to be able to get out of the house more and possibly make more money, but the great thing about working from home is not having to get up at 5 in the morning to make sure myself and the baby are fed and ready (it honestly takes a minimum of three hours to do this each day) before I have to be at work at some specific morning hour. Plus, looking for a job is a lot of soul-crushing, mostly fruitless work that I don't have to energy to do. I guess I'll probably just keep working from home until I get fired because I, for the most part, have no idea what I'm doing, or my vertical goes away.
Now that the baby's been on more of a regular and reliable bedtime schedule, I've been going to exercise at the apartment complex's fitness center a few days a week after he goes to bed. All I can bring myself to do is 30 minutes on the elliptical, but it's better than nothin', and I do think it's helping me to lose more weight. I was losing quite well for a few weeks there, but it seemed like it was affecting my milk supply, as the baby appeared frustrated often while feeding, and I had to resort to pumped milk a few times (and my pumping yield was also lower), so this week I added back 200 calories per day. This helped, but I've only lost about a pound this week as opposed to two by this time last week. Obviously, the baby's food is more important than my weight loss, so I do what I gotta!
And now, before this dull, house-wifey post draws to a close, a few of my favorite pictures from the last few months: