Emelia at seven months

I feel like I’m reliving that same weird panic I did with Olivia at this age: that Emelia’s more of a one-year-old than a newborn now. It’s wild, thinking that seven months ago at this time I was visiting her in the NICU and living that surreal life that is day 0 postpartum.

Life with a baby and preschooler is rough during COVID, but this baby brings so much light to our home. Olivia is obsessed with her and I love how much they’re interacting.

We’ve hit the monthly update where the sticker has become much more interesting than anything Mom is doing.

Olivia wore this same outfit for her seven-month photo and I’m dying a little bit. She’s just so stinking cute.

OK, can I post a few more of these? I know, I know, obnoxious. I can’t choose just one.

But look at her!!

Nicknames: Meals, Mealie, Squish, Squeaks, Squishy

Weight: 16 lbs 6 oz according to home scale

Length: 26.5 in long according to home scale

Head circumference: 43 cm

Diaper size: 3

Clothing size: 6 months

Eating

Dare I say this is the easiest month yet. Nursing Emelia was hard in the beginning. She had latch issues related to her prematurity. I had issues with oversupply and leaking and hard patches. I know others have it a lot harder, but it was still rough. But now it’s not. Now it’s easy. I knew this day would eventually come and now here we are, doing our thing. She’s still distracted, especially when her sister is in the vicinity, but overall, it’s been going well. She nurses right away in the morning depending on when she wakes up, before and after her two naps, and again before bed, but she may do more depending on the day. At night, she’s nursing 1-2 times, sometimes three depending on how long she’s in bed with me before I kick her back to her crib.

Obviously, with shelter-in-place we haven’t done any sippy cups since I never leave her, but I just had the conversation with Chris a few days ago about trying to bring them back in a few times a week to get her used to them and maybe this summer Chris and I will actually be able to get away by ourselves for a bit. Maybe.

I haven’t started baby-led weaning with her since she can’t sit up on her own yet. She’s lost her tongue-thrust reflex and she’s definitely interested in food, but we just need to get this sitting up thing down before we can officially begin. I have given her tastes of foods every so often: sauces, yogurt, etc and let her suck on a pickle one night. She was obsessed and then smelled like a dill pickle afterward which was gross.

This past weekend we grilled chicken with Trader Joe’s chili lime seasoning and I handed her a strip of it. She was…not impressed? I don’t know. She made a lot of weird faces and was generally unhappy, but I also know she was tired as evidenced by rubbing her chicken wedge in her eyeball. So BLW is going slow, but we’ll get there. Things were better with the strip of steak I gave her this week. She enjoyed that, even if she was righteously confused about it all.

Sleeping

She’s been sleeping in her room in her crib for the last month and it’s been going pretty well. I would say she was averaging being up twice a night, with one of those not long after I’d get in bed. So roughly 10:30-11:30 pm and then again around 2-3:00 am. There were three glorious nights where she slept from 7:30 pm allllllll the way to 3:30…then 5:20…then—wait for it—6:40 am!!!! And the angels sang amen.

Now she’s back to waking around 11:30 like clockwork. There was one night recently where she slept until 2:30, but otherwise, she’s up twice. I know she’s in a regression at the moment, so that has something to do with it. She does sleep through the evening generally and that definitely helps. And she will sleep in until usually 8:00, but has also slept until 9:00! Olivia did the same until she was a bit older so I’ll take it.

Naps used to be pretty good, but have been sucking lately due to a very obvious regression. And I know that because she’s always had good morning naps and afternoons were a hit or a miss. But now she’s been refusing her morning naps, choosing to wail instead. So I guess it’s another hurdle to overcome.

I did catch her one day for her nap sleeping on her stomach and of course, it unsettled me because of her prematurity. I was quick to go in and roll her back over, but I’m trusting she can manage herself. She’ll roll in the mornings in her crib sometimes and then fuss because she can’t get herself to roll back onto her back. Ametuer.

Milestones

This girl loves nothing more than sucking on her toes and thankfully it’s gotten warmer so she can hang out in a onesie, leaving her legs free of pants (the easiest when you want to shove all five toes in your mouth). And she finally rolled back to tummy! She rolled not long after Easter and she’s since taken off. Rolling is nuttin’ now. But hilariously enough, she doesn’t realize (every single time) that once she rolls to her tummy, she remembers how much she hates it and fusses and squeaks until she’s rescued.

When she’s on her tummy, she will spin herself around and grab at toys which makes me happy because she wasn’t there last month.

She’s been working in PT on sitting up and her core strength. It makes me sad we’re not there yet (understandably, because of her adjusted age) because I want to officially start baby-led weaning and I can’t until she’s sitting up on her own. She is getting better in her exersaucer at holding herself up, but we tried her in the Johnny Jumper last week, but I think it was a bit premature.

She loves to use her voice, but she doesn’t lie there and scream incessantly as Olivia did. My favorite is when she’ll quietly and calmly say, “Ooooo. Oo. OOOOOOOOOO.” She still loves to holler, “MmmmmAAAAAAmmmm!!!!!” when she wants to get my attention.

Health

We learned that her little acne and rashes on her cheeks and chin are actually a result of so much drooling, which I believe because she drools like no one’s business. No teeth though. I check every so often.

Besides for a bit of reflux in which something will come up when we lay her down and spends a few seconds swallowing it all again, she’s been doing great. She’ll spit up every so often, but really, she seems to have outgrown the reflux.

The PT seems to be helping, but she still has some tightness with the torticollis and weakness in her neck, but her rolling now has improved it.

Personality

This baby continues to be all smiles and laughs. She especially loves seeking me out from across the room and acts like it’s her personal goal in life to get to me at all costs.

Now that she has rolled and is practicing scooting around (her favorite is traveling by head and she looks like some creepy baby demon from the exorcist as she’s coming toward you) she seems very much like she’s going to take off just so she can keep up with her sister.

She continues to be a pretty chill baby, as in she’s perfectly happy until she isn’t, but she can be soothed pretty quickly (mainly by boob).

Likes

Bath time: she’s all about it and has even started kicking and splashing a bit. I’m still in there with her (of course along with her sister) since it’s just easier to bathe her that way. Chewing toys, or anything really. She doesn’t discriminate. Her sister. Toby. Being outside. Walks in her stroller. Us singing to her. Her feet. Sucking her toes. Sleeping with mama. Nursing.

Dislikes

Going to PT. Not being paid attention to. Going down for naps (most of the time).

Undecided about

Real food. Her swing. Being in her high chair.

Looking forward to

Oh man. What to say. We can’t go anywhere, so I’ll have to settle with having her experience the outdoors more. Also, with the warmer weather brings dresses and rompers and teeny tiny baby shorts.

This girl is just developing like crazy every day. It’s strange to think of her as the tiny baby in the NICU.

Past monthly updates

One month

Two months

Three months

Four months

Five months

Six months