May 27: Sylvia is so engaged and so aware…I just am amazingly in love with her! The last week or so, I find myself making regular mental notes of things I want to post about her. So here’s a stream-of-consciousness update about Sylvia.
- This little girl is strong. She’s been holding her head up well since about four weeks. She’s been standing strongly for at least a month. Of course, she wobbles all over the place, but she has been able to support her own weight since early May. I’ve had the exersaucer out for her to stand in, and she’s getting now where she can (at least somewhat) purposefully turn herself in a circle. She’s able to move toys if her hand is on them, but she still has some steps to make before she’ll be able to have the muscle and brain coordination to grab an object that she wants.
- I’ve moved her up to the size three diapers. I feel like that means that she’s a huge person now. We’ve been using disposables although I have the cloth ones right under the changing table. Maybe soon I’ll start integrating them in:) We moved up to size three when she started having “blow-outs” from both legs and the back of her size twos. Fun stuff.
- She wants nothing to do with her swing. In fact, I should probably give it back to my friend. She starts “singing” the moment I put her in it.
- On the other hand (and I almost feel like I should whisper this so as to not break the spell), she’s not so angry in her car seat any more. After that long, horrible ride home from the Twin Cities a couple weeks back, our driving experiences have been nearly pleasant. I’ve been bringing a soft blanket-y toy for her to hold, and we’ve done several across-town trips without any crying. This is dramatic. This is stunning. I would be so happy if she got over the carseat=torture idea.
- She rolled over twice…with assistance. Late last week, I had her in the middle of the bed on her tummy and she rolled into the mattress valley where I sleep. She’s getting squirmy-er and more interested in being mobile each day.
- She adores her brother…and her dad. Andrew loves to hug and kiss and wildly embrace and “dance” with Sylvia. She has a large tollerance for his physical demonstrations of love, and I can tell from how her face lights up that she things he’s just the bees knees. We tell him to watch her face to see if she’s OK with what he’s doing, and that seems to work pretty well. When he makes her cry, he gives her soft kisses and says, “I’m sorry, Sylvie ba-dilve!”
When Bryan comes home, Sylvie’s face lights up, and both her dimples jump out. She’s doing the open-mouth grin when she’s really happy. And seeing her dad makes her really happy! - She’s waking up a couple times in the night. Usually I feed her around 10:30 before I go to bed. Then she eats at 1 and 4. The last few days, she’s been sleeping a bit later…maybe 7 instead of 6. Then she’s usually awake for an hour before taking a two hour morning nap. She’s been sleeping in her crib except when I’m too exhasuted in the night to nurse her in the rocking chair and bring her to bed instead. While I’m still kind of tired some mornings, she’s pretty good about eating in about 15 minutes and then going straight back to bed.
- I use two white noise machines to help her sleep. For naps and when I put her down at night, I usually nurse her and then lay her down awake. I turn on Mom’s sleep sheep with the waves sound and then I turn on the noise machine that I bought just for her. She often falls asleep without a peep. It helps that she’s using a pacificer.
- She’s wearing a wide range of sizes of baby clothes. She still fits in most of the 0-3 month, although they are a little snug. 3-6 month fit her well, and she can wear quite a few 6-12 month items. This is the heyday for adorable little baby girl clothes! I’ve just started putting her in pajamas at night. Before this, she just wore her clothes because it seemed silly to change her again.
- Sylvie doesn’t spit up. She’s probablly urp-ed about 10 times ever. Sometimes she gets kind of drooly, but that’s mostly when she tries to fit her fist in her mouth.
- Sylvie cries most when she feels she has been offended. Like if I bump her on something or I don’t repsond to her cries fast enough or I ignore her when she asks to be removed from the @#$% car seat. When she is offended, she cries really gustily. It can be a little breath-taking
- If we’re walking and she’s in the front carrier, she’s almost always happy.
- She’s happily passed around to loads of different people. As long as she’s not too tired or hungry, she’s an amazingly social and radient little person.
So that’s a little picture into Sylvia at 15 weeks.