cereal and lessons for mom

Over the teeth and past the gums, look out stomach, here it comes! Owen had his first experience with rice cereal last night. Boy, did he like it! He started opening his mouth starting with bite two or three, plus he 'helped' me bring the spoon into his mouth. He also fussed when I took the spoon away to get more cereal on it. He was definately ready to start solids!

One of the things I learned last night is that I should nurse him completely (meaning on both sides) and *then* give him the cereal. I tried giving him the cereal between sides last night and he wanted very little to do with the second side. The good news is that he slept through the night last night, something he hadn't done all week - he had woken up hungry in the middle of the night the previous couple of nights. The other thing I learned is to make sure that the spoon is on top of his tongue instead of just inside of his gums. Anything on his tongue made it down his throat. Anything just inside of his gums and under his tongue came right back out.

funny boy!

owen made me laugh so hard yesterday. first, he dirtied his bath water (both ways he can do that!) then last night he managed to roll clear off of his play mat. i'm talking a couple of full revolutions, here, not just rolling one way. when i saw what he did, i said, "look what you did!" he looked up at me and flashed me this great big grin as if to say, "aren't you proud of me, mom!" we need to keep an eye on him and get stuff off of the floor now! watch out for little man!

we've decided that for several reasons we are going to make our own baby food. any suggestions on books to get or other things we may need or need to know. (kristen?) we'll be getting a food processer sometime early next month and we'll likely start owen on rice cereal some time during spring break (next week for me). owen turns 6 months old in two weeks so we're getting close! we have our next check-up on the 14th and we'll ask the pediatrician what order to introduce foods in. i figure at that point that we'll have been doing the rice cereal for about a week.

bilateral otitis media

or in laymen's terms, a double ear infection. we noticed last week that owen had lots of goop in his right ear. i cleaned it out thursday morning and saw that it was slightly runny and darker than i would have expected for just ear wax. when i came home on thursday, the area around that ear was crusty. same thing friday morning. i asked jeffy to call the pediatrician but he didn't see any more stuff during hte day so he didn't. auntie doc (my sister) came in friday night, took one look at his ear and said, "call the doctor." we went in saturday morning and found out that he has a likely ruptured eardrum (nothing to worry about) in his right ear - hence all of the goop oozing out - and a pretty red and swollen left eardrum. poor little guy. the most interesting part is that he gave us no indication that he wasn't feeling well. he was his normal happy self. he's taking the medicine pretty well (amoxicillan and ear drops)

several times this last week i have come in to get him in the morning and he is on his tummy - which is NOT how we put him down. he has officially mastered rolling over from back to tummy, and also from tummy to back. he doesn't even seem to think about it anymore. he is also pulling up from laying down to sitting by holding on to my hands. he doesn't give this a second thought either. he just does it.

it is so much fun watching this little boy grow and change. what a miracle and a blessing!

Ugh

We have only managed one full night's sleep since the week began - that was on Monday. Last night, Jeffy was up with Owen once. We seem to be going back to the 11:00, 2:00, 5:30 thing from earlier in Owen's life. I was pretty snotty to Jeffy last night as I was up with Owen at 11:30, rocking him to sleep, giving him medicine, etc. I was exhausted and frustrated with the prospect of another night of little sleep. I laid a pretty big guilt trip on Jeffy because that was all I could do in my mood. I apologized this morning a couple of times. I also thanked him for getting up with Owen in the middle of the night.

On a better note, Owen is at least smiling a little bit and even laughing at/with/for us. I've missed that part of my little boy this last week. He is usually so fun and smiley. I'll be glad when we have that and can sleep through the night again.

It's Friday!!! Yay!!! Signing class with baby tomorrow morning. Should be fun!