Baby Diary: Week 15

What a busy but beautiful week! Full of smiles and sleeps.

NURSING
Jamison is more social while feeding this week! He did seem to not eat as much at a feeding, coming off more often. Still taking about 20 minutes, 10 on one side, and 4-5 on other. I have been confused about how to do the 3.5 hour schedule without having to wake him twice at night. I have been topping him up and it seems to work ok. Night feed is normally 9.30 and this is great, better than 10.30 so I can go to bed!

NAPS
Naps started really well. I was having to wake him from about half his naps. I even made the mistake of thinking, "I think we might be past the times of short naps." HA! Don't ever think that. After a few days of disruptions (Christmas), it took him only a day to get back on track. Good few resettling attempts. Seems to go past the first 45 minute cycle every nap and sometimes continues for over 2 hours! First rest of the day can be unsettled. This nice napping was less common towards the end of the week, after a couple of days of the routine being slightly out.

WAKETIME LENGTH
Wake time lengths are at 1 hour and 10 minutes, sometimes 15 minutes. He does find it harder to settle if any longer, or shorter. Seems to sleep better with this extra time. Found his first wake time challenging some mornings when he has been awake since 5 or so. Likes to talk to himself at this ungodly hour!

Jamison doesn’t seem to have an ‘arsenic’ hour or time of the day where he is grumpy. He did have a couple of times where he cried heartily and was quite distressed in the morning, but it was usually followed by a mighty big poo! This pattern continued all week - one or two settled mornings, then a very unsettled one, followed by a poo explosion!

NIGHTTIME
Jamison went back to waking early in the morning. I would feed him from one side only and then put him back to bed. By the end of the week, he had woken at the same time around 4 am for a good few nights in a row.Now this seems to be settling down and he is not feeding until 6.30 or 7.

MILESTONES
Jamison is really reaching for his toys and is more coordinated in his putting them to his mouth, although he often sucks his hands rather than the toy! Really strains to crawl, lifting bottom and legs off the floor. He will move if something is placed behind his feet. Likes to almost pivot on his mat. Lifting head and chest with ease and looking around.

Seems much more aware of us around him and tracks us around the room with ease. Talking more and making squealing noises.

WAKING HAPPY
Jamison wakes happy from most of his naps that are longer than one sleep cycle. Will flap hands and kick legs in excitement when he sees me and gets picked up. Will cry if he hasn’t had long enough, or has taken ages to resettle. I read that if your baby isn't doing this by this age, not to panic. Babywise says baby starts to wake up happy around 5 months.

SWADDLING
We are still swaddling. I am, however, closely watching and monitoring for the time to stop. At times I will wrap him more loosely, so that he gets the point that it is rest time.
Sometimes we have one arm out. I do notice though  that he settles to sleep quicker if he is tightly wrapped.  The wrap has been very saturated this week from him sucking on it!

I don't think there is any rush to drop the swaddle. Some moms swaddle up until a year old! I do want to drop it as soon as he is ready for it, but I am not going to drop it until we can do so without causing problems to sleep. One exception I would make for this rule is if he started to roll from front to back while swaddled. It would then become a potentially dangerous situation to be swaddled and I would stop the swaddle to maintain safety.

Jamison has been in a sleeping bag over night for a few weeks now. I am not using it during the day until he sleeps without the need to be pinned!

OUR SCHEDULE

6.30am                 feed

7.45                        bed

10.00am               feed

11.15                     bed

1.30pm                 feed

2.45                        bed

5.00pm                 feed, then play, then bath

6.30                        top up feed then straight to bed

9.30/10                 dream feed

It has been very hard to keep to this for some days this week so it has been a bit out. Worked really well for the last couple of weeks, so will persist and then look at moving to 4 hourly.

OUTINGS/EVENTS
Christmas, my birthday. Lots of visiting etc. Jamison coped very well and recovered very quickly on Monday, sleeping 3 2hour naps with only 2 resettling with not much protest. Rest of the week was more unsettled, obviously catching up on us. Few days at home are in order I think!