I took about 50 photos of Robin at 5 months and she is smiling in every single one of them. I have never seen a happier baby. Even when she’s over tired or not feeling well (R had her first fever last night) she is smiling.
Robin is doing the inchworm thing and is a pro at grabbing items around her. She adores Lilly and has a strange obsession with having her feet in her mouth at all times. She is definitely teething.
We moved Robin into her own room last weekend. She is starting to sleep better at night (knock on wood) and after a few weeks of stirring frequently she has just been up once to eat and sometimes an additional time looking for her pacifier. She takes two naps (9 and 1) and a catnap before dinner, but the naps vary in length and sometimes are as short as 35 minutes.
Robin continues to eat solid foods once a day and has tried accouple fruits and vegetables (doesn’t seem to like bananas) but the servings remain small. She has plenty of time to explore new foods!
As Lilly is getting older her intelligence amazes and sometimes confuses us. She is changing so quickly and expresses herself with ease, talking in more complex sentences all the time now. These changes have brought forth some behaviors we’re not used to, one of which I discuss below.
Over the past two months Lilly has developed some anxiety with bedtime. She repeatedly asks if she’s okay (“Lilly okay?”) and we typically go back into her room 3 or 4 times before she falls asleep. She also wakes up once in the night asking us to cover her up and wants to hear that she’s okay. Her bedtime routine has stayed the same and we can’t think of any real reason this started (started after her 2nd birthday when she had her first bad fall so that could have set it off). We’ve tried various things to make her feel more comfortable and have talked to her about it but nothing has changed. She does not seem very fearful and does not get upset so we’re not too worried about it but we hate thinking that she’s not comfortable by herself (we’re seriously considering having the girls share a room when we move). I’ve been tempted to ignore her but don’t feel that it’s right at this time given that there seems to be some anxiety attatched to the behavior. At this point the act seems almost habitual and this past week we contacted some professionals for advice so hopefully things will change for her soon.
Meanwhile I’ve seen a nutritionist a few times to work on improving meal time and Lilly’s diet, which over the past 5 months has been lacking in variety. Our strategy is to offer Lilly 3 or 4 foods of our choosing at mealtime and if she chooses not to eat any of them that is ‘okay’ but she does not get any more food until the following meal or snack time. This is a common practice for children and has been well researched and documented by Ellyn Satter. We reluctantly started to give her cow’s milk instead of rice milk for the time being so she has a better source of protein while her food intake remains low (she has always loved vegetarian milk and seems to like cow’s milk as well). Lilly is already doing much better and I’m seeing an improvement in what she eats. I’m determined for our girls to have healthy eating habits and not fall into the same traps that I did!
Update: We started leaving Lilly’s door open a crack for nap and night time and it seems to have changed the behavior completely. She rarely asks if she’s ‘okay’ and doesn’t get out of bed.
We had a fun 8 day visit with Grandma! Our week was filled with our favorite things: the zoo, a ladies luncheon, lots of good food, shopping, and more shopping! It was so nice to have her here. Bill and I went out for our first ‘date night’ since Robin was born and we spent lots of time with the girls. We love you, Grandma!
Robin had her first taste of food today! We decided to start her on brown rice cereal since she continues to struggle with acid reflux and gas. We made it a fun event and I’m not sure how much she actually ate, but she seemed to like it and was grabbing for the spoon right away. Lots of food exploration in the near future!
Lilly started going ‘pee on the potty’ back in January but these past few weeks her interest in potty training reached a new level. She has often refused to wear a diaper and has been using the potty more frequently. After talking to her doctor and teacher at school we decided to take potty training a bit more seriously to avoid the risk of her losing interest again (even though Mom wasn’t feeling 100% ready). Friday morning Lilly said ‘bye bye’ to her diapers and went bare bottom all weekend. She had two accidents Friday morning but other than that she quickly got the hang of things. We were surprised by how easy the whole event was for her – she was completely unphased by the change. Instead of spending hours on the potty like we were expecting, she would sit down, do her business, and quickly get off (she even went ‘poo on the potty’ for the first time ever on Saturday). She didn’t even fuss when I told her it was time to sit on the potty.
So for now we are leaving diapers and pull-ups off when she’s at home (pants only or bare bottom) and are using pull-ups for nap time, bed time, and when we leave the house for awhile (including school). She’s doing great using the potty at school while wearing pull-ups so in a week or so we will probably just switch to underpants. Can’t believe how fast our little girl is growing up!
Our baby girl is 4 months old today! She is such a joy! Robin is rolling over often now (mostly back to belly) and recently started doing the “happy baby” pose by grabbing her feet. She is content for long periods of time and sometimes I need to remind myself that she is awake because she will sit and play with her toys without making much noise for quite awhile. It takes some effort to get her to laugh but she is always smiling and Bill spends lots of time playing with her chubby cheeks.
We’re working to extend her naps to one morning nap, an afternoon nap and a catnap before dinner – almost there. She is asleep by 7:30 or 8 and wakes up around 7am but some nights is up frequently with gas, etc and stirs often around 5:30 or 6 am (just eats once). Last night was the first night in weeks when she was really only up one time and I got some decent sleep. Maybe a sign of good sleep to come? We will continue to have her sleep in our room until she starts doing better at night. I can’t get over how similar her habits are to her big sister’s. She definitely has her own personality though!
Weight: 15.06 pounds
Length: 24 inches
Head: 41.5 cm
Here is a video of some of her first belly laughs:
Check out this video of our Robin and her belly laughs:
Todd came to Michigan for the week to see the girls (and meet Robin for the first time) and it was a wonderful visit. He was a big help with Robin and Lilly loved playing with him. We frequented the local parks in Birmingham and went to the zoo on Saturay. Todd cooked us some delicious food and did lots of cooking in the kitchen with Lilly. We look forward to spending more time with Uncle ‘Favorite’ very soon!
For the complete set of photos, click here.
Two of our good friends from Darden, Davide and Chiara, were on holiday in the US (from Italy, living in Munich) and were able to spend the night with us in Birmingham on their way to Chicago. They have two beautiful daughters (Carlotta, 3, and Federica, 20 months) and it was so fun to watch the girls play together. We went to Booth Park in the afternoon and had a nice dinner and bottle of champagne after the girls went to sleep. We’re hoping to plan a vacation together following the Darden 5 year reunion in 2013 and can’t wait to see them again!
We had a fun-filled family of 4 vacation this past week. We drove to Frankenmuth early Saturday morning and stayed there for one night with the girls. We stopped at Grandpa Tiny’s Farm so Lilly could see the horses and baby animals, then checked into our hotel at Splash Village. We spent the morning at the waterpark and were able to check in to our room in time for both girls to get in a long afternoon nap. When they got up we went back to the waterpark and of course ate dinner at Zehnder’s. Believe it or not they had fabulous vegetarian food! Lilly LOVED Drumstick (the chicken mascot) and wanted to know where he was every minute. The next day we retuned to the waterpark (so much fun) and then headed up to Nipigon for the week (not an enjoyable car ride – I wound up sitting in between the girls in the back seat and it was cramped to say the least!).
Our week up North was great. Lilly had a blast on the beach, feeding ‘Robert’ chipmunk with Boppa, and finding giraffes on our evening walks. Robin got plenty of attention and Bill must have spent hours playing with her cheeks 🙂 . Nana and Boppa came up on Tuesday night and stayed with Robin on Thursday so we could spend the day on Mackinac Island with Lilly. The weather was almost perfect and it was nice to spend lots of quality time as a family.
For the complete set of photos, click here.
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