A Typical Day at 7 Months

Dearest ‘Dela, For the first 6 months of your life, your development have seemed gradual. It’s been relatively easy to go with it, to adjust. But all of a sudden this month there are big changes in the works. And I’m not just talking milestones. It’s personality, what you need from me, what our day looks like. It’s all changing. I’m trying to hold on for the ride.

Seemingly all of a sudden, you frequently cry when I put you down, you whine, you are beginning to be intolerant of the Bumbo (which you used to enjoy with my company), you no longer enjoy entertaining yourself in the baby gym, even for a few minutes at a time. You want my arms and my attention and my company, or perhaps your Daddy’s or your Mima’s, all the time. But mostly It’s Momma Time All the Time because I’m the one home with you the majority of the time.

I’m flattered, baby. Those smiles I earn from you are little treasures. But I don’t know that I can sing you songs, tickle your tummy, dance you around, and wiggle toys in front of your face for the entire approximate 9-10 hours you’re awake every day.

I understand the ever-decreasing “me” time. I expected it. And I love spending time with you. It’s not like I want to get away from you. It’s just that, up to this point, you’ve been content to join me in whatever activity. If I’m cooking, you’ve been content to watch me in the Bumbo. If I run to the bathroom or am getting dressed, you’ve been content to play in your gym. If I want to sit down and just hold you, you’ve been content to sit on my lap. If I need to fold laundry, you’ve sat on the bed propped up with pillows and watched me. When you’re awake, I include you in whatever I’m doing, singing and talking and narrating to you with breaks of active play time. You’ve always been okay with our arrangement. Suddenly, the way things have been is not enough anymore. There is a growing demand for constant physical contact.

 As so many people remind me, it’s a fleeing time, a short while, a passing moment I will some day wish I could have back. Before I know it you’ll be all independent and won’t need me anymore. So, as usual, I’m trying to soak it up and enjoy your demand for my attention as much as possible. I have to relearn how to be with you. We are on a journey to find a new normal. As soon as we get there, you’ll start crawling, walking, driving and I’ll have to relearn everything again. Haha! You keep me on my toes, little one.

MILESTONES

You continue to hate being on your tummy. You will tolerate it for a couple minutes if you’re in a good mood and someone is willing to distract you from your misery. And this week you started rolling over from back to front – at least mostly – when you’re on your back and you decide you really want something that is out of your reach. You get all the way over, but your arm remains stuck under your body, so you flop back the other way very quickly as soon as you realize you’ve been tricked into your least favorite position. We’ve instituted brief but mandatory baby torture… I mean TUMMY… times every day now since you’re 7 months old and you really need to get over it. This is you saying “uh no you didn’t!” right before you started wailing to be rolled back over.

Although you are perfectly capable of sitting for short periods of time, you much prefer standing. I think you would stand all the time if someone would balance you.  You really are just going to take off walking one of these days. When you’re standing and you get excited, you flex all your little abs and I can hardly believe how solid you are. You are one buff baby.

You haven’t rejected anything I’ve tried to feed you. The thing you liked the least, at least in my estimation, was peaches. Hm. Maybe you just weren’t hungry. I’ll have to try that one again. You are eating 2 or 3 2^nd foods jars (or the equivalent of homemade stuff) every day. The baby whisperer was smoking something when she said 2 tsp in the morning and 2 tsp at night for a 6 month old. That’s like one swallow! You are a little chow hound. I’ve started nursing you BEFORE meals, just to make sure that you’re getting enough milk. I asked the doctor at your 6 month visit, if I could feed you too much. And he said, yes. I asked what was too much and he said I know I was feeding you too much if you were fat, which he followed up by saying that you are the perfect weight for your height. So, he said to keep on doing what I’m doing. But it sure seems like a lot of food. We’ll just keep an eye on it I guess. Here’s what happens if I don’t give you enough food. First square was carrots, then we ran out of carrots, then in the bottom left corner – with tears in your eyes – I gave you prunes, then in the bottom right after 2 jars of baby food – finally – contentment.

Sleeping is the ever long and boring, detail-rich topic I’ll save for another time. For now, I’ll just mention that you continue to be an excellent napper. You take 2 or 3 naps every day without incident for a total of 4 to 5 hours of daily nap time on average, so I can’t complain. We’re still working on lengthening your night stretches. But you’ve gotten a little better, giving us at least one 4 or 5 hour stretch almost every night.  I’ve also started reading to you before bed again. You love your Tiny Bear Bible. It’s all fuzzy on the outside, has stick-out ears you like to grab, and has board book pages that you can’t destroy. The Bible stories are short, cute and rhyme. We read a story from that book or one of the other classics we have on hand. You try to grab at the pictures and seem confused that you can’t “touch” them.

OTHER FUN STUFF…

Your favorite place to be seems to be outside. You adore it. It instantly calms you down. You smile at the wind and the trees and the all the animal noises. Too bad it’s summer now and it’s too hot to be outside much. But I am going to try to start taking you to the park regularly. We’ll just have to go early, before the sun starts melting things.

You are laughing more and more. That was a gradual, gradual process. I think I recorded a “first laugh,” but I don’t remember when it was. It came on so slowly. It’s GREAT though. I laugh every time you do. It makes my LIFE when you giggle. Things that make you laugh these days: Bouncing (of any kind especially when paired with silly faces), nibbling (especially your sides under your arms), Getcha-ing (slowly coming at you with waggling fingers and a suspenseful voice), Sounds (all kinds of tongue and lip produced nonsense), Hair (brushing my hair back and forth across your face), Dancing, and Silly Faces.

A new trait I love, love, love is your newfound appreciation of cuddling and rocking when you’re sleepy. For the longest time I could never rock you because you’ve always been so intent on getting in your crib and getting down to the business of falling asleep when you’re tired that you’ve squirmed and complained and fussed whenever I’ve tried to do it. You have given in, and discovered that you truly enjoy being in my arms and being rocked. It’s sooooo wonderful. And you love lullabies when we’re rocking. You stare up at me with big eyes and pat me on the cheek with your little body limp and relaxed. It melts me.

Your aversion to loud noises continues. I can produce an instant quivering lip with any of the following Scary Noises – hair drying, coffee grinding, tape gunning, blendering, vacuuming, etc. I make sure I always explain to you that I’m going to turn on something loud and that I won’t let it get you before I turn up the volume, but it scares you every time.

You’re doing a few new cute things these days. You’re favorite pastime when you’re awake is to be standing against a low table (coffee table) or ottomon covered in toys. You still don’t balance yourself, but you can support your weight indefinitely and will play like that (with my arms ready to catch you before you topple over) for looong periods of time. And you love to bang, bang, bang, your right hand on everything these days. You slap the table, my chest, your toys. Bang! Bang! Bang! Always your right hand. You’ve discovered the cause and effect of it and you love that you can make those sounds. You also intently watch stuff you drop on the ground now. Here’s your new toy of the month. It’s great. It gives you things to hold on to, beads to slap, cause and effect, and a little bit of balance when you’re sitting and holding on to it. Look at that concentration.

You have so many smiles. I should blog just about all the different grins you give me. Lately,  you do this nose scrunch thing when you’re happy and feeling silly. It’s a new kind of smile that just evolved in the pass 2 weeks or so and it is stinkin’ ADORABLE.  I haven’t caught that one on camera yet, but here’s another smile you just recently started, the tongue smile.

And to wrap up it up, a new quirk I discovered. When I blow on your face, your tongue curls up on both sides (a genetic trait – the tongue curling not the fact that you do it in response to blowing on your face – you inherited from both Daddy and me) and sticks out of your mouth a little. Then you swallow and smile. It’s funny and super cute.

Love ya, baby…more and more and more and more…