Today Elizabeth is 3 months old, or 12 weeks depending how you look at it (the wrong way or the right way if you ask Matt).
A LOT has changed since my last baby update. E has gotten so much bigger. People are always shocked when we tell them her age. Even more so when we tell them she is solely breastfed. Breast feeding was one of the things I was initially very worried about, more so than birth (ha, more fool me!), and I count myself very lucky to be having such an overwhelmingly positive experience, I love it. I'm not sure how long we'll continue (kind of missing wine) but I'm hoping we'll make it to 6 months. I'm happy and she's thriving (such a health visitor word!) so why stop.
E is fast becoming a lively, giggly baby. She is happiest when you are smiling and talking to her and her latest skill - standing (supported by a willing volunteer) - elicits shrieks of pure joy. Her motor skills are improving fast. Yesterday she gripped a rattle and brought it to her mouth for a taste. I'm sure this isn't interesting to anyone who doesn't know her but to me it's auh-may-zing. I didn't realise just how fascinating watching your baby develop would be. It's so rewarding to be encouraging and supporting her development.
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Sleeping is not so great. Before we moved she had fallen into a bedtime routine all by herself. We'd put her in her moses basket at about 9.30 and by 10 or 10.30 she would have fallen into a deep sleep all by herself with little fuss. Result we thought. Then we moved and it stopped. She would cry furiously when we put her in her basket and only stop when we picked her up. The move has unsettled her we thought. We went back to her newborn routine - feeding her all evening and putting her to bed when we went. Then this stopped working. After reading up on it I think she has developed 'bad sleep associations', so along with a bedtime routine and scheduled daytime naps, we're trying to correct this. It. Is. Hard. Once we've put her down we are up and down stairs constantly trying to settle her. We even tried a bit of sleep training but I'm worried she's too young. Night time is a battle, and with me trying to enforce structured naps daytime is fast becoming one too. I need help. What are your experiences? Is she too young to sleep train? How do you encourage daytime naps? Any advice would be welcome :)
Am so bad and drink wine despite breast feeding :/
ReplyDeleteBugger to E still not sleeping. Do you leave her for anytime to see if she'll self settle? M is currently going through of phase of waking up at 3&5. Maybe E is going through a bit of a growth spurt? Unfortunately I've nothing too helpful as we're still trying to get M to sleep in her cot (with no success!) xxx
She is the cutest, most adorable baby.(Posted by her completely impartial, unbiased grandmother.x
ReplyDeleteThe Baby Whisperer book method and the pick up/put down routine works for us but it's pretty hard work. Going to do a little blog post on in this week but it's definitely possible to get E sleeping better, at least she's young enough not to have bad habits.
ReplyDeleteAmy - I drink wine too but only half a glass or so. Our breast feeding counsellor told us as long as you don't drink more than the recommended weekly amount for a woman (not all in one go) then it's ok, so at first I drank a few glasses at a time and didn't worry about it, then I read so much conflicting info saying you should only have one or two units a few times a week or give up altogether that I felt guilty and stopped. Talk about confusing! Do you ever have more than a few units in one go? And we do leave her to see if she'll settle herself but she just gets more and more worked up :/ my folks think she's teething so we might try some calpol tonight and see if that helps.
ReplyDeleteJosie - I havent heard of the pick up/put down method. Looking forward to reading your post about it. I think she's to young to 'cry it out' so would like to try a gentler method...
I think the maximum of wine I have is two glasses but I tend to have my wine with shed loads of ice in it so it's perhaps not a large glass of wine? People keep saying to me that Matilda is teething but then when I said to the nurse about this,when she had her 2nd jabs,she practically scoffed at this idea! One of my friends said that they won't necessarily be coming through yet but the teeth will probably be there.Oh and the self settle technique,yeah..that's only worked once with Matilda :/ xxx
DeleteWe think she may be starting to teethe too as she was dribbly at the weekend. xx
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