Oliver's First Haircut!

Oliver celebrated his first birthday on June 14, with just a little help from cousins and cupcakes. This marked not only my realization that my littlest guy is growing up before my very eyes, but also that his beach curls have gotten way out of control. Joel and I decided to go ahead and give him a trim, which commenced with scissors, but quickly escalated to buzzing with the clippers (which I swore I would NOT do!) after I stabbed myself in the finger due to the wiggly nature of a one-year-old. We used the longest attachment, but there are probably still grandparents, family, and friends out there who would have my head for getting rid of his CURLS.

Don't worry, when it's humid and/or he eats peanut butter or cantaloupe, the curls (albeit smaller) pop right back out.

Pictures, you ask? I have been rocking the Before photos lately, behold:

 

  

And after we finagled his ultra-fine hair through the big bad clippers:

Does anyone else think he looks EXACTLY like his Papa (my dad) now? Pardon the unflattering overhead lighting in this last one:

He's still my cutie pie, but he looks like he's five years old now with his grown-up haircut. Sigh. How the time flies!

Oliver at 7 months

Oliver. He is simultaneously the sweetest and most consternating little fellow I ever did meet. Let's just say he does not have the same deep and abiding love of sleep that his older siblings did and still do. We are still up every 3-4 hours overnight nursing, but Joel and I are working on an action plan to hopefully stretch his sleep out a little further, a plan involving somehow finding nourishment that he will allow past his cherubic little lips.

Anyway, he didn't have a checkup this month (not another until nine months) so I don't have official stats to share. But he's outgrowing (outgrown, really) his 6-9 month clothing, and the Gerber 12-month footie jammies are pathetically tight as well (but then, they run small). 12-month clothing in general is a bit roomy but it works. I could have sworn I had a bunch of actual 9-month clothing somewhere but I have yet to find it. That's a project for the upcoming week, Lord willing.

He sits up, he rolls, he army crawls. He's never in one place for very long. He prefers to stand up when you try to set him on the floor. He does the standing hip thrusts that come before a baby starts cruising - it may be awhile before we get to that point, but I love his strong legs and enthusiasm for dancing. He head bobs all the time. Dude's got rhythm. Maybe to the beat of his own drummer, but nonetheless.

Speaking of his own drummer, I mentioned the sleep thing above, and will note now that he refuses to take a bottle and has been rejecting solid food lately. He was doing ok with oatmeal, but only sometimes. Then sweet potatoes were doing ok, but then not. Pears and peas have both been met with the kind of face usually reserved for when someone offers you blood pudding and sweet breads. The bottle rejecting has been across the board - he accepted a bottle of breastmilk way back in days of yore, but with me being at home now full-time, there was a long time where we didn't need to give it to him. Possibly a big mistake. He now hates the bottle with the fire of a thousand suns, whether it contains breastmilk or formula, which we've sampled out of desperation in the last day or so. (See above: sleep issues. I need to get that belly fuller!)

I'm normally a subscriber to the make-your-own baby food school of thought. I mean, what does the packaged stuff have over my at-home versions other than a more astronomical price? (I went to the store once with the full intention of buying baby food in pouches/jars to make Christmas week easier. I could not bring myself to purchase a $1.49 jar of baby food. Have prices gone up since my others were babies?) I made my own pureed Oatmeal to start him out before branching to fruits and veggies. I attempted rice cereal this one time but OH MYLANTA the sound of rice grinding in the food processor for like 45 minutes to make it fine enough to cook into baby food puree. It is not worth the torture of huddling in the kids' bedroom UPSTAIRS with books and our fingers in our ears. And he didn't even eat it.

All that to say, when Joel today threw out the idea of grabbing a box of rice cereal just to see if our little prima donna would eat it, my first instinct was to mentally search for a better at-home method. My quick brain scan confirmed what my heart was saying: nothing else is working. I'm desperate. I don't think his belly is getting full enough. Why in the world would we not try it? So Joel grabbed his shoes and even changed into real pants (even as I type this, the light bulb goes on - Isaac and pants. Hmm.) and headed to our local SR.

You guys. OLIVER ATE THE RICE CEREAL. I laughed. I almost cried. I would have done handsprings if I knew how and I were at least twelve years younger. My husband will be the recipient of numerous favors involving delicious food, foot rubs, and maybe even sleeping in one day. Is there anything that compares to the feeling of filling your child's belly, especially a picky child who seems to PREFER his strategy of waking up hungry in order to spend more time with me (or at least with his milk supply) over actually eating to satisfaction.

So, happy dance over here. Oliver's about to go down for a nap and I can only hope it's a nice, lengthy one, especially since his morning nap was thwarted by his siblings scouring the house to find me. Why they thought I was in Oliver's closed room during his nap is beyond me. They can't possibly know my secret desire to hide with the fudge and not come out.

If that's not a positive enough note on which to end, you have to see Oliver's smile to believe it. You could pour him over your pancakes and stir him into your coffee. He has A DIMPLE. Where in the gene pool he got a dimple I will never know, but there it is, and he does this half smile thing that lights up the room and my world. Not to mention when he goes full-on grin. And after he nurses in the middle of the night, with a full belly and sleepy eyes he melts onto my shoulder and it's so hard to put him back into his crib sometimes. Don't get me wrong, my bed calls louder than the baby snuggle, but I do find some blessing in his nighttime sweetness.

Quick endnote: Of course, since I wrote this a few days ago, Oliver has begun for-real crawling, and has also had a few nights of sleeping a little better - like, a stretch from 10:30 - 3:30ish. He imitates head bops and has waved a few times, and imitates drumming on his high chair tray. Willing to eat rice cereal but rejects all others at the moment. We'll get there!

Oliver at 5 (1/2) months - working on sleeeep

Let's just catch up with Oliver for a bit, shall we? This is more like a 5 1/2 month update, but there are a few things to squeeze in before the big 6 monther in a few weeks. Some day I will write a timely update, but today is not that day. The photo was at least taken at five months, even if it sat on my phone til now:

Don't ask me how big he is. Maybe I'll weigh us together on the bathroom scale this afternoon and get back to you on that. He's easily wearing 6-9 clothes and has been for the last month. He might have some 9 month things in there, I don't really pay strict attention to size these days. (Are you noticing a pattern?) We go in a few weeks for his six month check up and then I'll have some official stats for you.

More for my future benefit than yours, I'd like to chronicle Oliver's recent sleep saga. I'm certain I'll look back and wonder about the time frame for his sleep issues and what we did to get him to sleep better.

For the last several months, I have limited my dairy intake in the belief that it was making Oliver spit up a LOT and contributing to night wakings/sleeplessness. In the past month or longer, it became apparent that even under dairy-free circumstances, he was not sleeping well. I was nursing him 2-3 times per night, sometimes more. And this is not a little peanut baby that might not be able to sleep through the night yet; we're talking a sixteen pound five-month-old who eats enough during the day to carry him through at least an initial 5-6 hour stretch at night. However. In just the last week, his first night waking has crept from midnightish to elevenish to tenish, and last night it was 9:30! Of course, last night I put him down at 5:30 to catch up some sleep (6:00 has become more typical), but still, a four hour stretch is not quite what I consider good nighttime sleep.

Since my parents have been visiting for the last week or so, I sought to minimize the crying and disruption and just went to Oliver whenever he fussed. I think this has contributed to more frequent night wakings and that really short initial sleep span. But he really has been up every 3-4 hours for a long time now. Therefore, also in the last week, I decided to heck with the dairy-free business. Thanksgiving means potatoes and turnips loaded with cream cheese, milk, and butter. Not to mention ice cream on top of pies. Other possible factors contributing to worsening sleep in the past week: upcoming milestone (see below!), six teeth STILL budding but not cut, excitement of a holiday and grandparents, sleeping in our room (albeit in his own crib), and finally, true hunger EVERY THREE HOURS.

Last night we gambled. After a successful nap extension in the afternoon leading to a three hour nap for Oliver, I put him to bed at his first yawn at 5:30. I figured, let's get this kid well rested so that we can start into some sleep training. Can you tell I've been researching sleep issues and sleep training while nursing in the whee hours? I'm learning the lingo, y'all. But back to last night - he woke at 9:30 and I decided there was no way he needed to eat already. Just no. I sent a man to do a woman's job, and Oliver seemed happy to receive his pacifier from Joel. He rolled around awhile and cried off and on for about half an hour, sometimes very loudly and angrily. But always with the slightest decrescendo at the end that told me he wasn't truly hysterical, but protesting and annoyed at not getting what he wanted. Joel finally went in again toward the end of the thirty minutes and picked him up briefly. He said Oliver was over the moon to be held on his side (no doubt mimicking a nursing position) and when he put him back into his crib, he again rolled right onto his side. He was asleep a few minutes later. He stirred again around...um...sometime in the 11-1 range. It all blurs together, honestly. But he went back to sleep of his own accord without crying, and didn't truly wake to nurse until around 1:30/2:00. That's pretty good! And his next waking was this morning after 6:00! I put him back in his crib around 6:30 and he stayed there until 8:30, awake for the last part of it but content to hang out.

I'm hoping this extinction thing carries over to tonight (and forever) and that we have officially dropped to one night feeding for good. And, by the way, this amazing night's sleep comes on the heels of me eating both stromboli and pizza in the same day. Hello again, dairy! Welcome back, happiness! I don't know if it ever was truly an ongoing dairy issue, but we did document significant reflux that seemed to correlate with ice cream intake over the summer. And he had some awful nights that happened after I splurged on yogurt or super cheesy dinner. Coincidence? The world may never know.

The milestone to which I alluded earlier is Oliver's newfound ability to roll back to front. No more stranded turtle! He's been rolling front to back for awhile now (I'm sure I documented that...right?) but now can roll every which way and maneuver himself all around his crib. I *think* I saw him sit up once in bed, but that was probably accomplished by rolling just the right way toward the side rail and kind of working his way up by rolling. That said, he seems very close to sitting up by himself; just needs to engage his core a little more (don't we all?). Also he is strong enough to stand up on his own but can't balance for long; he enjoys standing with his hands held, or hands around his waist to steady him.

Oliver is the happiest little guy ever. I'm his favorite, which is as it should be. He is also a captive audience to his brother and sister; he hears their voices, and it's curtains for nursing, much rather watch them bound around the room than enjoy the nectar of the gods, apparently. We're considering offering some oatmeal or sweet potatoes sometime soon, to help him with that nighttime sleeping.

We've started putting him under his play gym, and he rolls all about. I should probably start keeping a closer eye on him now that we have a Christmas tree whose branches are within his grasp if he rolls beneath it. Nothing like the risk of glass Christmas ornament shards to secure that Mother of the Year nomination.

Well, the big kids are throwing laundry and pinching each other's cheeks. They seem to be saying something about hungry and lunch, I don't know. It's like they expect the same thing to happen every day at noon? Toddlers are so needy.

And I love them. The end.

Oliver at 4 (1/2) months

Younger children often complain that there are fewer pictures, fewer detailed accounts of their infancies and childhoods than older children, and jokingly (I think?) assert that their parents must have loved them less. I'm here to argue that the lack of documentation is rather because we love them enough to spend all our time protecting them from their older siblings. I think Oliver would rather be alive than well-documented. Just a hunch.

So this is his four and a half month update, which might just be only his first or second blog update, I'm not sure. That's not to say he hasn't been doing noteworthy things! This little charmer is all smiles and babbles lately. His favorite thing is still his momma (the open-mouthed grin when he sees me! EVERY. TIME.) but his fingers and toes are a close second and third. One day, he was working so hard to get those little toes into his mouth during a diaper change. He squealed with delight when I helped him go that last quarter inch and pop one into his mouth. On another occasion, he was fussing quite angrily as I was simply holding him in my lap while doing something else. It finally dawned on me that he was irritated at not being able to reach his toes! As soon as I shifted him to where he could suck his big toe, he was again his angelic, smiling self. Adorable.

He's been rolling over for awhile...yeah, mom of the year, I know...and who knows when his first smile or first laugh were. Or the first time he grasped a toy. He can boogie all over his crib, though I'm not sure whether he does his scootching before or after he flips over onto his back. All I know is that he winds up really annoyed, and requires help to get back to his favorite little corner to sleep in.

Sleep, by the way, has been a little different for this kiddo than for our first two, but then he has experienced a whole lot more transition than either of them at this age. I'm not sure if it's related. Also, dairy sets him off and keeps him from sleeping well, so there's been that learning curve. Mostly he goes to bed around 6:30-7:00ish, and sleeps until somewhere in the ballpark of 3:00-4:00ish, when he nurses again, and then up at 6:30ish to nurse, and up for the day closer to 8:30. However. There has been SO much variation on this lately that I have to wrack my brain even to come up with what's "usual". Some days he nurses at 7:30 a.m. and then goes to sleep or stays awake, who knows.

Over the weekend, though, he ate FIVE TIMES from bedtime to morning feeding: 6:30, 8:00, 11:30ish, 3:00/4:00ish, and 6:30ish. That was two nights in a row of insanity. The third night he was super angry at bedtime, unwilling to settle, which is so unlike him (thankfully, like my first two, you can usually just chuck him into his crib after nursing and he will go to sleep on his own), so in desperation I gave him Ibuprofen. Boom. He slept til 4:00 a.m. Aha! As an experienced momma, I thought perhaps this was related to all his drooling and fist-chewing lately. Mikayla got her first two teeth at four months of age, so maybe he's an early teether too, right? But those bottom gums have been looking totally normal, when he lets me get a glance. I've been second-guessing my teething hunch, but if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck....? So just this morning I sat down to nurse him, and as has become my custom, checked his gums. The bottom ones still look normal BUT...his top gums are the hardest, whitest, most swollenest things I've ever seen! Mommas, have you had top teeth come in first? I find this highly irregular but, apparently, possible. He's doing it his own way, I guess!

We've had him back in cloth diapers since we moved into the new place, despite flooding the basement twice with the extra rinse cycle (Finally got it figured out. No more lint trap. I am not sorry about this, as I had to climb on top of the washing machine to check and change it.). Nursing has thankfully been very easy with him, and when he is not teething he eats like clockwork at 6:30, 9:30, 12:30, 3:30, 6:30 bedtime, and once overnight. I am quite looking forward to getting back to it!

Naps are not quite like clockwork, as it depends on what time he gets up in the morning. I've been struggling with that third nap; some days he wants it, some days he pushes through until he's a cranky mess at dinner time. I usually slap dinner on the table, wolf down a few bites, and head upstairs to do his bedtime by 6:30. But other days he takes that 4:30-5:30ish nap, and bedtime isn't til a luxurious 7:00 or so. Once these two top teeth break through, we'll get a truer sense of normal, I suspect.

Developmentally, he's been on target, if not slightly ahead of the curve. At his two month appointment he was holding himself up on his arms at a four-month level. He's been picking up toys and putting them in his mouth, and can darn near get his pacifier into his mouth correctly. He LOVES his exersaucer, which is a Godsend while I am fixing a meal for the big kids or doing school with them.

Speaking of the bigs, they love their little brother so much! As I type, he is in his swing, and his siblings have been taking turns jiggling him around, cooing loudly in his face, and attempting to remove articles of clothing. I used to worry about them being gentle, and I do still keep an eye on Isaac especially, but Oliver is really pretty well adjusted to their volume level and proximity. Which is good, because it would personally drive me NUTS to have a three year old THISCLOSE to my face screeching, "Do you have a BOOGIE in your NOSE????" a hundred times in a row, in an obnoxious voice that she thinks is how you talk to babies. The biggest issue the siblings have with Oliver is when they get over-enthusiastic and pull on his arms or legs because they want a hug and a kiss. Provided he survives infancy without being dismembered, I think we will all be a very close and demonstrative family.

That is really it. Oh, at his four month check up he weighed 15 lbs 3 oz, and was 26 3/4 inches long (woooaaaaa, big baby! according to Dr. Chi). He is projected to be 6'2" and 165 lbs as an adult, very close to his dadda's young adult measurements. Weight is a little above average, whereas length is up in the 97-99%ile range. His head circumference is fine, but if you think I can remember that detail, you obviously overestimate me. He's also a quick forgiver like his siblings when it comes to vaccinations. My tough little guy!

Joel, if you're reading this, have I forgotten anything?

Oliver at Two Months

So, my babies grow fast. Oliver had his two-month check-up this morning, and Dr. Chi was thoroughly impressed at his advanced development. He weighed in at 13 lb 4 oz, which is in the 75-90th %ile range and according to Dr. Chi, the size of a four month old baby. His length was 24 1/2 inches, which remains up around the 97th %ile and comparable to a six month old baby. Growth projections remain the same as at his one-month check-up; Oliver is likely to be 6'2 and 180-200 lbs. Yup. Now accepting donations toward groceries.

Relatedly, I saw another mom at the pediatrician's office with her son, who must have been 16ish years old, six feet tall and with hairy legs. So then I stood there holding my infant son, trying to picture him and his big brother at that size and oh my heart. I just can't even. I debated asking her grocery budget but who am I to be able to handle that kind of truth this early in the morning.

Oliver is advanced in other ways, too, not just his hearty size. He sleeps an average (starting in the last week) of 9-10 hours overnight. Bedtime has been around 8pm, and he makes it to at least 5am, with his record standing at 6:30am. THAT is my boy. He's either a great sleeper, or I am (his bed is right next to mine, so surely I wouldn't snooze through him wanting to be fed?). The big turning point was when we moved him from his Rock n Play, where he slept on his back and at a slight incline, into a travel-size Pack n Play where he sleeps on his belly. That kid LOVES his new bed, and even during the day when he feels sleepy, he tends not to sleep well until we put him in there (as opposed to his swing, car seat, or even being held).

He has half-rolled over a couple of times, from his back up on to his side. Once he made it over onto his belly (that was at least a week ago now, around 7 weeks of age) but more often he makes it up to his side and hangs out there. He's able to push and hold himself up on his arms and holds his head up high as he looks around. We get numerous smiles and coos from our social little guy.

[Edit: He just rolled again, right in front of me, as soon as I turned my camera on! Sometimes the stars just align.]

I might add that all of this is tremendously encouraging because there are times when I seriously question whether Oliver will survive infancy, due to the trauma he regularly experiences at the hands of his big brother. It started early. Most notably, the other day I was making breakfast while Oliver lounged in his swing. He was just across the room, safe and sound. Or so I thought. Suddenly I heard a crash, and then my two boys wailing like someone had died. Never have I made it from kitchen to living room with such speed and agility. The swing was lying on its side, Oliver facedown on the floor screaming, and Isaac weeping dramatically - whether out of fear or pain, I'm still not sure. I felt simultaneous impulses arise in me to snatch my baby from the floor to be sure he was ok, and to snatch my older son and let him know how NOT OK this was. Oliver won the internal coin flip, and turned out to be just fine; Isaac, well, I guess time will tell whether he's learned the lesson I imprinted upon him. Firmly. I will now be watching Oliver for all of the minutes of all the days until he is old enough to learn self-defense.

And I'm sharing this with you all because I'm 99% sure that my Mother of the Year nomination has already been revoked. Something about seven episodes of Daniel Tiger back to back while I fell asleep nursing the baby. I can't help it that Netflix auto-queues one episode into the next.

There are so many moments that I would love to share with you. I mentally bookmark them all the time - oh, that was so funny! So precious! So brilliant! So mind-blowingly chaotic that nobody will believe me unless I detail it on the internets! But then all of my mental bookmarks go the way of my abdominal muscles, never to be seen again. Le sigh. Perhaps during nap time today (which just started rather smoothly, knock on wood and throw salt over your shoulder and don't jinx it by talking about it) I will wrack my brain for all of the blog-worthy things I've been forgetting over the past few months.

Mental bookmark to take a two-month photo of Oliver with The Teddy Bear and post it along with comparison photos of the big kids. Think I'll remember? (Hint: we have no such one-month photos of Oliver. Third child syndrome. Oops. Hopefully he'll understand and be grateful that I was too busy keeping him alive and out of the clutches of his older siblings and making sure everyone was fed edible things at somewhat regular times of the day.)

Also? We bought a house. I know. Would I just drop that on you all right at the end of a blog post and peace out? Yes, yes I would. BOOM. Oh and Joel and I just celebrated our eight year anniversary. No gifts, figuring that between me birthing him a son and him buying me a house all within two months of our anniversary, we were probably good to go. Although, I feel like it is probably all downhill from there in terms of future anniversary gifts.