Part Three: Liam's First Birthday, Walking, 7 teeth, Weaning, Poor Sleep, Lead

Liam and Grandma V

This is a much needed update and I am sorry to all my readers for it being SO late. A LOT has happened in the past couple of weeks, with both myself and my little toddler.

First Birthday: At the end of this post I will have more birthday photos. He had a great first birthday at his Grandma Vs, considering the circumstances. We were going to throw another at my moms but I was just too sick and wiped out. His first taste of cake was Strawberry Short Cake (my favorite!) and he LOVED it. He didn't want to let go of the spoon the entire time (we kept the spoon). He did get his hands dirty in cake but it wasn't an all-out mess. Next year will be different.

He received some great presents, including a singing toucan flashlight, bedroom glowing sea-horse, Legos, clothes, and stacking cups (to name a few). He got to spend time with his Great Aunt and Great Grandma and had a really great day. Later, during our trip to see family, my mom (Grandma S) got him his first pair of shoes (Nike sandals), his first chair (see pic below) and tons of clothes. All in all, I think he had a great first birthday.


Milestones: We have a walker! Liam took his first steps for Daddy on July 3rd and more on July 4th. He still prefers to crawl but will walk from one stationary object to the next. He becomes very proud of himself when he does walk and very upset when he falls but he's doing such a great job.

He is "talking" up a storm, mostly saying "yaya", "dada", "momma", "baba" and baby gibberish. He points, sings, and just is such an animated little boy. His personality really is starting to shine through. We taught him to share but he is still getting used to the idea of giving something up. He will hand an object to me but will still want it and take it back. It's pretty cute. He is also understanding more phrases. He knows the word no (and will yell "YA" back), he know "Give it to me" or "Let me see" and he will pass something to me. He is also getting into shows a bit more. His favorite are Veggie Tales and the Despicable Me 2 Trailer Banana Song. He could watch them over and over and over.

I noticed last night (a bit late) that he has his 7th tooth (probably about 1 week old) and the doctor says that his back right molar is coming in as well.

Weaning: I am going to right a separate post on weaning but here is a breakdown of how it is going. As of June 25th, Liam was weaned cold turkey off the breast. I would NOT recommend this to anyone unless you have a great support team AND it was medically necessary.  I am still very emotional over it and so is he. There are days where he will take the sippy cup with no problem, and there are days where he will throw it at me and pull up my shirt. Things are slowly getting better but those first few days were rough. He doesn't like the taste of cows milk and so I am mixing in my frozen stash. I currently have about 130 oz that I am going to try and space out. I haven't pumped in about 1 week and its still pretty uncomfortable (I will spare you all details).

Naps and Bedtime: Naps are a daily battle. Some days are great and he will sleep for 2 hours in the morning, an hour in the afternoon. Other days, he won't nap. Bedtime, however, has become a bear. He goes down relatively well but his night wakings are wearing me thin. The next couple of weeks, we are going to have to come up with something new. I am still in the process of figuring that one out.

Doctor's Visit: Well he had a great visit minus a couple of issues. Good news first: he is just under 25lbs (90 percentile), 32" long (98 percentile) and on cue for all his milestones. Bad news: He is anemic and has elevated lead levels. His finger prick test came back at 9.9 for hemoglobin and 5.5 for lead levels. We have searched the house and have discovered door nobs that are positive for lead, as well as hinges and a lamp. We are planing on hiring an expert to walk through our home to access our options and look to see if there was anything else that we may have missed. We are pretty sure that the water is lead free but we are testing that next. 

So that is the update thus far. I am sure I have missed something here or there but I will be trying to make more frequent updates as things calm down.

 

 

Liam's First Steps for Daddy!

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49 Weeks: Standing , Kitty, Poison Ivy

 This past Wednesday Liam turn 49 weeks and is exactly 3 weeks shy of his first birthday. We have had a rough couple of days but he is learning so much that it may be overwhelming him. He can now stand on his own in short bursts. Today he learned to stand and then lunge at me, and was quite proud of himself!

Crawling: He is definitely crawling a lot more now. His favorite mode of transport is still army crawling but every once in a while, he will bounce onto his knees and off he goes. 

Words: He has momma and dadda down very well. Sometimes he will say daddy (never mommy) and I swear he is either saying kitty, cat or kitty-cat. He talks up a storm of baby babble and although hard to make out any tangible words, its so damn cute.

Food: Boy can my boy eat! He loves his fruit and i have bought those Dole fruit cups (I think its Dole. I could run down and look in my cupboard but I really don't want to get out of bed. Yea... I know. ) that come with fruit in fruit juice. I always drain out the juice and he can eat an entire cup. He loves the apples and pears, though I tend to find bits of hard pear in the container that he cant really chew well (I get to eat those pieces). I also bought mandarin oranges but he hasn't had them yet. Oranges are not recommended until 1 year due to the acidity, however it all depends on the baby. Tonight was his first real acidic food (tomatoes). He had homemade lasagna and he liked it (not as much as his fruit but much more so than peas).

I read that you are suppose to wait till 1 year with strawberries but thankfully I haven't had any allergy issues with them. He LOVES them and its such an easy fruit for him to pick up and eat.

Besides his fruit, he loves his cheerios. He has this wonderful habit of saying "mmmmmmmmmm" while he is eating.   And he is saying mmmmmmmmmmm alot.

Sippy Cup: Well since my last post he has had two sippy cups of breast milk. Both went ok and he finished the entire cup (though it took him about 45 minutes). I also discovered that he likes his milk COLD, which I find very odd. I heated up his first bottle and he didn't touch it. I put it in the fridge, let it cool, gave it to him 30 minutes later and he loved it. I am also giving him water (1-3oz) in his sippy cup too.

 This last week we both got poison ivy, though I have it much worse. It has been very uncomfortable and I am so ready to have my face back to normal. I have been giving Liam baking soda baths and putting cream on him.

This next week should be fun. We are going to try going to the library tomorrow and then every Wednesday (if naps don't interfere). I want to make sure that he is getting some exposure to other babies.

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11 months! (and 4 days): Up and Down, Daddy, new food, crawling (finally!)

Today my William is 4 days past his 11 month birthday! He is on the move constantly and really has built up his confidence. He can get up onto the sides of things (wall, couch, legs, dresser etc.) and then down just as easily. He can effortlessly travel from one side of the room to the other by army crawling, cruising and semi-crawling.

1 day shy of this 11 month birthday he, very softly, said Dada. Excitedly I told Steve but I know it wasn't the same as actually hearing him. That very next day, both Dada and Daddy were being said and Steve got to hear them. That same day he (Liam) got to see his very first parade! We all went down to the town historical society and watched the Memorial Day parade.

In the title of this post, I mention crawling (finally). Liam IS crawling but only in short spurts. This shows me that he knows HOW to crawl, but chooses not to. He will crawl to an object if he is planing on shortly pulling up on it. If the object is across the room, he much prefers to drag his little body across the floor. Maybe its because we have wood floors.

Food has become easier to fix for him. I can give him a nutrigrain blueberry waffle for breakfast, some cheese and fruit for lunch, and veggies and fruit (or egg) for dinner. He loves fruit and will eat strawberry slices off my plate, apricot slices, pears, bananas etc. He doesn't care too much for watermelon but I may try that again today. Also the quantity of food has increased.

He is still nursing well despite some recent challenges. I just got over a slight bout of Thrush which made it almost unbearable to nurse. It felt like pins were being driven into my breast and then it would burn. After some prescription cream and lanolin, I am 90% healed. I have one tender area that is slow to heal but it is miles better.  Another nursing challenge are the awkward positions that he tends to put himself in. Upside down, sideways, right side up. He will latch on, nurse, unlatch, move to another position, latch on, nurse and so forth. The only time he is quiet is late at night.

Am I ready to wean? No, not really. Just yesterday he was nursing and hitting me in the head. I decided to playfully tap him back. He thought this was hilarious and started giggling, making milk dribble down his chin. This made me laugh and he laughed harder. But I know with my overload next year that I will not have time to pump so I have to get him on a sippy cup this summer. As mentioned previously, I have a ton of frozen milk that needs to be used up. Today is day one.

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47 Weeks Old: Cruising, End of Daycare, New Car, 6th tooth!

William is 47 weeks old and only 35 days away from his first birthday!!! Cruising has commenced in full swing and he is up on EVERYTHING. He even scaled the wall of his bedroom in order to stand up. As you can tell from the above photo, we had to lower his crib since he is at risk for going right over the railing. He also refuses to sit in his exersaucers but will stand and play with it that way. He will grab onto the seat and push it forward, like a walker.

One thing that Liam still needs to learn is how to get down. He is great at going from army crawling (yup, still not crawling regularly) to sitting, to pulling up on something. However once he is up, he doesn't really know how to get down. This makes bedtime especially hard when hes cruising in his crib but cant go back down to go to sleep. 

Daycare is officially over till the end of summer which means that I too am officially on summer break. This summer will not be much of a break for me, as I am going to be working on lesson plans for a new course I am teaching, end of the year evaluations, and building two websites.

Over the last week I was teaching Ecology, at a summer camp, to rising sophomores. I taught from 9am till 3pm. It was a pain to find time pump but the challenge didn't really come until Saturday when Liam wasn't in daycare. This was the first time in a long time that my husband had him ALL DAY. It was a disaster. Liam refused all his bottles from Daddy, was fussy, and a winy mess. I ended up taking him to camp with me the following day but this has me worried about when we begin to wean him. If he wont take a bottle from me or daddy, how am I going to wean him over the summer?

This is my plan. Once he turns 11 months, I plan to drop his 9am feeding and substitute with a bottle of frozen breastmilk (I still have about 200 ounces that need to get used). If he wont take a bottle, I will try a cup or sippy. If I see that the sippy creates him biting me, I will try something else. In a typical day with me he will nurse: around 6am, 9am, 12pm, 3pm, 6pm, 9pm, 3am. Some nights he will drop the 3am feeding and other nights he wont. Last night he went to sleep at 6pm and didn't wake up till 11pm. So once I have the 9am bottle established (probably by the time he is 1 year), then I will spend the next month slowly dropping another daytime feeding. By mid august, I would like to have the only time nursing him be 6am and 9pm (and 3am if he wakes up). I also need to talk to his pediatrician about what to feed him once my frozen milk runs out.

Two days ago we bought a new car for the family, a Honda Odyssey! We are so excited. It is going to make getting him into the car so much easier and long trips down to see family a breeze. Memorial Day is coming up and it will be Liam's first parade.

**edited to add that upon brushing his teeth this morning, his 6th tooth popped in! He now has 4 at the top, two at the bottom.

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First Mother's Day! 10.5 Months Old!

Today is officially my first Mother's Day (even though I was pregnant with him last Mother's Day).

The one thing that I wanted for Mother's Day was not to cook breakfast (something I do ever weekend). We decided to go out to Denny's and it was actually really nice. My little man had eggs, pancakes and a bit of white toast. After breakfast, we went out on a nice walk.

The last couple of weeks he really has been doing well with getting around. He now gets up on his tippy toes, with his butt in the air, and either plops right back down or flops into a sitting position. He also can walk rather well while holding onto my hands.

Something else that happened within the last two weeks: Liam got his 5th tooth! This pearly white popped through a day after his 10 month birthday.  He's been great at solids and there really isn't too much that he doesn't like. He loves pancakes or waffles for breakfast (self-fed) or oatmeal if I have time, a fruit for lunch (pears, peaches, etc.), and usually veggies, fruit and grain for dinner. Last night he had couscous, with sweet potato pure and spinach. He loved it. I do try to get some protein in him (usually eggs) but if its not an already-made jar, its hard to prep chicken or turkey for him. I am thinking of cooking some ground turkey ahead of time for him, freezing it in portions and taking it out for dinner.

Daycare happily reminded me that he will be one next month. ONE! Where did this year go?! The talk of weaning has come up from one person or another and I never thought I'd feel this way but I am actually really sad to even think about beginning to wean him. Nursing him really has become a joy and I can't imagine that cuddle time gone. I know I have mentioned this in the past but I plan to slowly cut back daytime feeding starting in July and ending in August. If he nurses still at night, that's fine with me.

I went and saw his new Daycare on Friday. They are 2 miles from where I work and are a lot smaller than the daycare he is at right now. I really hope that he does ok there. He will be starting up there when he is 15 months.

Lastly, his sleep has become so much better. I can put him down to sleep at night or for a nap completely awake and for most of the time he will fuss for about 2-3 minutes and then put himself to sleep.  His nightly wakings have also decreased. He usually wakes about 9/9:30, midnight and around 5am. 

For those Moms who read my bog, HAPPY MOTHERS DAY from one blessed mother to another.

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10 month Birthday Hike!

 My little man is 10 months old today! It's a beautiful day and so we decided to go for a family hike. There is a trail right down the road and we had heard that there were some nice views. This was also a great opportunity to use my Kozy Carrier (which I love!).

We had a blast and although I should have been wearing proper footwear, it was well worth the venture. Liam even passed out into such a deep sleep that I was able to get him out of the back carry (all on my own) and into his crib without a peep.

Sleep Training Update: So I have decided to throw out sleep training and just go with it. I like to get him to nap twice in a day but I am not going nuts if it doesn't happen. Same thing with bedtime. If he goes down at 6 that great, but if its earlier or later, its no big deal.

Some nights are better than others and we even have some pretty awesome nights. Two nights ago, for example, he went to sleep at 6pm with out so much as a squeek of protest. He slept till 9pm and I nursed him. Then he was asleep till 5:30am! My boobs were super engorged and screaming but I was so happy that he slept through the night. Last night wasn't as good but he still didn't wake as often as he has in the past. He is also taking two naps at daycare!!! They are short naps (30 minutes) but its much better than before. They have figured out that he needs little distraction and so he is isolated in the corner with his crib turned around (so he can't see any of the kids).

Solids: Liam had a blueberry nutrigrain waffle the other day and loved it! He is doing well with chunky food and is able to feed himself well. I need to gather more finger food recipes for him. I have been mixing his pures with chunky frozen veggies like chopped squash. He loves this but its not a food that he can really feed himself. I am thinking of trying him on some pasta again.

Crawling: My little man isn't crawling yet but he is scooting around the house. He is so fast and gets from one side of the room to the other very efficiently  Today I went out and picked up two baby gates; one for his room and one for our room (to block off the stairs). We plan to get more gates in the future.

Can't believe he will be 1 in two months!

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42 Weeks Old! Semi-Cruising, pancakes, waving, gardening

Liam is 42 Weeks old and 10 days shy of his 10 month birthday! Over the past couple of weeks, Liam has become a pro at getting around, and has now started to semi-cruise. He can't quite pull himself up on furniture but he did take his first full (but wobbly) steps from one side of the room to the other while holding onto my hands.

As the weather warms, we have started to spend much more time outdoors. He loves it! On warm days, I will walk to the library, and he will snooze in his stroller. Last Sunday, we did some gardening and he just sat in his stroller and watched. When it gets a bit warmer, I plan to bring the pack-n-play outdoors for him to enjoy.

About a week ago I decided to make the family pancakes. I made Liam special ones, without the baking soda. He LOVED them. I got the recipe from wholesomebabyfood.com and tweaked it a little  I added 1/2 a cup of flour, 1/4 cup of barley, 1/4 cup of oatmeal, 1 tbsp of flaxmeal, handful of blueberries, and watered down pear puree. They were not as fluffy as regular pancakes but it was nice to give him something that he can feed himself with.

One milestone the doctors mention that he should be doing is waving. I always assumed this meant on command and waving bye bye. I now think they mean just in general, which he now does. Over the past 2 weeks, he will wave both hands very excitedly in the air, almost like he is dancing.

This Saturday is the Great Diaper Change! I will be sure to take photos and will try to blog about it next week!

Don't forget to check out my post on updated videos of Liam.

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40 weeks old! Wiggle Worm, Mastitis, Easter

Our first Spring flower.

My little wiggle worm is 40 weeks old. There really isn't too much to update except that he is MUCH more mobile than he was just a week ago. This past week he inches and wiggles around like a little worm. He can make it from one side of the room to the other but after a while, he will get upset and want to be picked up. We have also solved his constipation issue. I now add 1 tbsp of flax meal to his oatmeal every day and so far, so good.

This past weekend was Easter. My mother in law came up and we had a wonderful Sunday brunch with ham, mash potato and roasted veggies. The weather was beautiful and my husband even planted 5 large rose bushes in the garden.

A breastfeeding update: I had mastitis! Let me start at the beginning  Last Tuesday I felt a lump in my breast while at work. This was after Liam slept 6+ hours in one stretch and another 4 hours before he was up for the day. I called my lactation consultant who advised me on how to get rid of it. Heat, pressure and pump, pump, pump. She also instructed that I nurse him with his nose pointing towards the lump. Well... that would require one of us to be upside down. It's hard enough to hold his attention while he nurses. Any other position other than the cradle hold usually causes an upset, so needless to say, I did not nurse him upside down. The lump, however, disappeared and all was well. Fast-forward to Easter Sunday. For reasons unknown to me, the lump appeared again. Same spot, same breast. This time, however, no amount of heat, pressure or nursing helped relieve the spot. By Monday, my breast was red and according the doctor (who I later I saw that day), looked like I had been burned.

"But I don't have a fever?!" I told my OB. What I have always learned about a clogged milk duct vs mastitis: mastitis causes chills, sweats and a raging fever. I had none of that. I did, however, have the red inflammation. According to my OB, you don't necessarily need to have the fever to have mastitis. I was prescribed antibiotics that same day. I have seen an improvement but I am still healing. The redness has gone away, but things are still not 100%. Nursing on that side is very painful (like it was in the beginning of my breastfeeding journey).

The last quick update I wanted to write was that his new nighttime diapers are AMAZING. I will write a review (probably over the summer when I have more time) but I have not had a major leak in a while. I will say that I should have ordered more covers (its not easy to just rise and reuse after a full night).

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9 Months old! Doctors Visit, Dairy Update, New Diapers, New foods

My precious little boy is 9 months old! I am shocked at how fast time has gone.

Since last week, he has put himself onto his tummy more (especially at daycare) and I am hoping that his crawling skills will improve. Right now he is able to push himself backwards but he doesn't go very far.

Liam is such a flirt and really loves people. We were in the grocery store (in his new shopping cart cover) and he was just smiling at everyone walking by. If they happened to notice his gummy smile, they would make a comment and he would tilt his head while smiling. Very cute.

On his 9 month birthday, we went to the doctor and he had the usual check-up (minus the shots). He is 29.5" tall, 23.5lbs and besides a slight touch of eczema on his forehead, a clean bill of health. We spoke of solids and his doctor said that he can eat anything except honey and a choking hazard. She mentioned again (same as his last appointment) that the high allergy foods should be tried before he is 1. We also talked about his dairy intolerance. I told her that I had incorporated dairy back into my diet and that besides green poops, he seems fine. She suggested that I try him on yogurt and cheese to see how he does. I went out and bought the yobaby stoneyfield baby yogurt (blueberry) and he loved it. What was even better.... NO REACTION! Besides his constipation, he is doing great on solid food. I am still making most of his food and he has like 95% of what I have been giving him.

Lately his night-time cloth diapers have been driving me crazy. Every couple of days, they will leak around 4am and I will have to change him, his diaper and the bedding. I decided to try two new cloth diapers. If they go well, I will write a review in more detail. The first is an itti bitti boo fitted diaper and the second is a sustainablebabyish (sbish for short) prefold with cover. I have yet to use a prefold on Liam but plan to just fold it up in the diaper cover instead of putting it on him.

Lastly, this weekend is Easter. My mother in law will be here and we plan to have a nice Easter. We also plan to plant a couple of rose bushes out in the garden. The weather is getting nicer and it is finally starting to feel like spring.

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37 Weeks Old! Stomach Bug, Sleep Regression, Trying to Crawl, Peekaboo, Breakfast

Liam is 37 weeks today! We have had a rough two weeks but things are getting back on track. Last week I came down with a horrible stomach bug. I was throwing up, and had tummy issues. I was out of work Tuesday and Wednesday and by Thursday I was feeling better. It returned on Saturday but not as bad. Poor Liam and Steve got it too but thankfully not as bad.

Sleep Regression: Liam isn't sleeping! It's really been a battle. He will maybe nap at daycare for 20-30minutes for the entire day. This sets him up to be a cranky pants for the rest of the day. By the time he gets home at 4, he crashes. I've been trying to keep him up because if he sleeps at 4, he will sleep till 6, eat and want to stay asleep. Hes also not wanting to be in his crib. As soon as I walk into his room, he starts fussing. As I put him in his crib, he gets hysterical. I have a music box that I put on and so far it has worked on distracting him for the past two days.  The music box trick does not work at night and he was in bed with me again last night between 10pm-2am. It's exhausting.

Crawling: He is trying! Usually I just sit him down on his butt and he wont move too much. The last couple of days he has been flipping over onto his tummy and trying to drag himself places. His little feet are kicking and most of the time he gets himself all worked up (hot mess). While I change him, hes flipping himself over, which is rather frustrating when I am fighting to get his diaper on. His changing pad got pee-soaked and stinky, so we are in search of a new one.

Milestones: His top teeth are getting longer, he is moving more and he is also playing peek-a-boo. Below is a video clip of him getting very excited over it. He still has separation anxiety from me and while in someone elses arms, he is grabbing and reaching out for me. We play a cause/affect game where I will stick out my tongue. He will try to grab it and as soon as he touches it, my tongue goes back into my mouth. He loves this game. His speech is getting better. His only word still is Mama but he has learned to say "Ba". I think he likes the feeling of his bottom lip hitting his top teeth.


Food: Solid food is going slowly. He is eating two meals a day (4oz at lunch, 4oz at dinner). I was planing on introducing breakfast today but we had a rough morning. I will try again this weekend. I thought it was squash that was making him constipated but now I am not too sure. His poops are still hard and hes only eating pears, prunes and sweet potatoes. He used to love peas but this week he doesn't and spits them out. We tried peaches but that gave him a diaper rash. I think I am going to try blueberries next. I am also going to introduce oatmeal back into his diet for breakfast and mix it with a tbsp of prunes.

I also decided to change his eating schedule. He was eating 3oz every two hours. I have changed it to 4oz every 3 hours. He had this schedule on Tuesday at daycare and it went well. I will see how he does on Thursday.

Dairy-Free: Sunday I decided to eat a yogurt and see how he was over the week. I also had hot coco Monday night. So far he has been ok. I plan to eat another yogurt today and monitor him.

Breastfeeding/Pumping: Breastfeeding has been going ok and he is still eating multiple times during the night. When I got sick, my supply dropped drastically and so I was thankful that he was still able to get some milk in him. At one point he was so frustrated that I pumped and pumped and gave him a bottle just to calm him. But after eating lactation cookies and drinking tons of gatorade, my supply is back to where it should be.

Pumping at work has become such a chore. When I was sick, I was power pumping (pumping for 10 minutes, stopping for 10mins, pumping for 10 minutes etc.) just to get some milk. I was pumping for 40+ minutes and only getting 2oz total from both breasts. Normally I can get 6oz on my first morning pump and 4oz on my next couple of pumps. I am back to where I was but my pump isn't as efficient as it used to be (or my breasts are rebelling from the pump). I will be a lot happier when I dont have to pump. I am done teaching at the end of April but then I am teaching a summer class in Mid May. Two more months!

I had a conversation with a friend on my plans of weaning. In two weeks Liam is 9 months, and then in three months he will be 1 year. My plan is to breastfeed him up until  August (13 months) or until my supply runs out (which ever comes first). Once August hits, I want to switch him to milk for daytime (if he can drink milk) and breastfeed him at night. My ultimate goal is to get him to sleep through the night, only nurse right before bed and possibly when he wakes up in the morning and to not have to pump when I return to work in September. As far as completely cutting him off of breast milk, I am not really sure.

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