BABY WINTER’S MONTHLY UPDATE: 9 months old
(All as of July 10, 2014)
Baby’s Age: 9 months old
Height: 27 inches
Weight: 18 lbs 8 oz
Head:
Diaper Size: Size 3
Clothes Size: 9 months
Here is a look back at the past few months:
Here is Winter in her Bumbo:
July 2014 – This baby has gone through some ch-ch-changes… (Tooth, Crawling and Sleeping Through the Night Again)
(Written July 20, 2014) Looking back over the past month, from eight months till nine months, I’d say we have hit some big developments. First of all, the “teething” that Winter has been going through for the past 3 months finally produced a tooth! About a week before she turned 9 months, I started to see/feel the developments of the two bottom center teeth. On the day she turned 9 months (July 10), her bottom right tooth finally began to cut through the gums. It continues to make more and more of an appearance as the days go on. Her bottom left tooth is on it’s way next, but has yet to cut through at this point. It’s exciting for her to finally have her first tooth! Took 9 months to achieve that goal, but by golly, it has finally happened. Perhaps it’s better that it took until she was 9 months old to cut a tooth for the sake of breastfeeding and having yet to get a nipple gnawed off. 🙂 My friends said that biting during breastfeeding only became an issue once the top teeth made an appearance…. So at this rate, Winter might not have any top teeth until she is 12 months, and then she will be going through the weaning process anyway!
Another big development since last month: Winter is officially on the MOVE! She was on the cusp of crawling for the past several months, getting on all fours and even rocking. But finally, on July 3rd (a week before turning 9 months old), she finally took things to the next level and began arming crawling. Not even a week later, on July 9, she upgraded from army crawling to regular crawling! Just one day before turning 9 months old. The more she crawls, the quicker and more efficient she has gotten. No longer can I sit her down on the floor to play with toys and expect her to stay there…no, no. She crawls all over the place, making me have to watch her like a hawk! As exhausting as it is chasing her around, there is such a magic feeling to watch your child learn to do a huge new milestone! Eric and I feel so proud of Winter! It’s overwhelming how much joy she brings us.
In last month’s update, I remember I spent a fair share of time complaining about our sleep issues. For about 7-8 continuous weeks, Winter went through a major sleep regression. She went from previously sleeping through the night (12 hours), to waking 2-3 times every night. I was beginning to feel desperate that my sleep filled nights were never going to resume. At Winter’s 9 month pediatrician appointment, I explained our situation to her doc and hoped for some positive feedback. Well, the doctor explained that by this point, Winter was in pattern of night waking and she was in a trained routine. The best way to break her of this routine was to cut her off, cold turkey. Oh boy! I never thought I’d have to implement the “cry it out” method on Winter, as she was always a good sleeper. But here we were, at a crossroads. If we wanted to get our household back to a good sleeping routine, then it was time to give a new approach a whirl. The doc said that it would take 3-5 continuous nights of letting her cry without going in to rescue and nurse her until she resumed a healthy nighttime sleep ritual. Knowing myself, I knew that if I had to listen to her cry, I would cave and go get her. So, we decided that it would be best to create a sound barrier so that it didn’t allow me the opportunity to cave in. Night one, we made sure both her nursery door and our bedroom door were both closed. We plugged in a huge (and very LOUD) boxfan in our room and turned it on the highest level. That first night, she did wake up around her usual first wakeup (midnight), and we watched her on the monitor. After approximately 15 minutes of crying, she went back to sleep. That was the last we knew of her waking up! I’m sure she has woken up and cried several times in those first few nights of sleep training, but we never heard her. And that was wonderful. She has always been happy in the morning, so obviously she was fine. We have now gone 10 nights where all 3 of us have slept through the night and woken up refreshed, happy and healthy in the morning. SCORE!! Praise God that Winter is back on track in regards to sleep. We went nearly 2 months with sleepless nights, and boy am I glad those are (hopefully) behind us.
Along with crawling has come the desire for pulling up on things. We dropped Winter’s crib down to the lowest level after we realized we were long overdue for that. She is so strong and she constantly tries to pull up on everything. She is really good at getting up on her knees, but she still can’t always pull up to her feet. She has done it a few times, but she’s still working towards that.
In mid June (June 20th to be exact), when Winter was 8.5 months, she spoke her first word. “Mama.” I was thrilled! She now says “mama,” “dada,” “baba” and various other sounds mixed together. She calls our dog, Koda, “a” (as in “ah”). So cute. We love hearing her speak her mind now!
Another big change in our family….we are MOVING! When I say moving, I mean, moving out of our current house and into a new house. We are staying in Denver, just buying a bigger home. Mid June we officially put our house on the market, and received multiple offers within a weekend. We accepted an offer and have been under contract, set to close soon. Meanwhile, we had been house hunting for a while, but could officially begin putting offers on houses once our house was under contract. After putting offers on 3 homes, we were finally able to get one of them. Yay! We are SO excited about our new house. It has 4 bedrooms, 2 full baths and 2 half baths, a big back yard, and is in our desired neighborhood. We couldn’t be happier! These past few months of getting our house staged and ready for the market, selling, house hunting, and now buying a house have been quite the adventure, to say the least. We are exhausted. We can’t WAIT for closing day so that we can move and get our lives back to “normal”….whatever that means. Let’s just say, we hope to live in this next house for at least 20 years. We’d like to avoid buying and selling again. 🙂 But we are so happy that we found a house that we can grow into. Winter will have more space and she’ll actually have a yard to play in!
My brother, sister in law, and their two kids spent about a week with us at the beginning of July. It was fun to spend time with them. Winter really enjoyed playing with her cousins, David (3 years old) and Emily (17 months old). Emily and Winter look a lot alike and could almost be sisters. One day, the two of them were in a stroller together, and someone asked me how old they were. After spouting off their ages, I quickly explained that they were cousins, not sisters! 🙂
Milestones: Crawling, pulling up on things, clapping, got her first tooth, back to sleeping through the night, and learning how to wave goodbye.
Sleep: After cold turkey sleep training, Winter is back to sleeping through the night. She goes to bed around 7:30-8:30 pm and wakes up in the morning around 7:30-8:00 am. She takes two really good naps, usually from 9am-11am and from 2:30pm-4:30 or 5pm.
Best Moment: Watching Winter crawl for the first time. Also hearing her speak her first word: “mama.”
Worst Moment: Feeling like our sleepless nights were never going to end (thankfully that’s better now).
Health: Very healthy! She’s continuing to gain weight and reach her milestones.
Eating: Lots of changes in regards to her eating once she hit 9 months.
1. We increased to 3 times per day of solids (breakfast, lunch and dinner). We used to do only twice per day.
2. I dropped one feeding and now we are doing 4 nursing’s a day (instead of 5 and sometimes 6). Dropping her to 4 liquid breastfeeding’s and increasing to 3 solid feedings, she has really done well with the transition.
Maybe I was a little dumb to drop a feeding at the same time we were sleep training her, but hey—it all worked out! She’s 9 months old and she doesn’t need to be nursing every 2-3 hours anymore. I realized that if I was going to drop a feeding that I needed to be consistent 100% of the time with 3 solid meals per day. When it comes to solids, she doesn’t want “baby food” anymore. She is totally OVER the purees phase. She wants “big people food.” So that’s what we give her. She eats finger foods (ex. black beans, corn, chopped fruit, cheerios, chopped turkey/chicken, etc). In addition to finger foods, she is obsessed with yogurt. SHE LOVES IT! She can eat yogurt nonstop all day long. The pediatrician said that is perfectly fine, but just make sure she is getting the full-fat, full-calorie yogurt, not the low cal Greek yogurt I eat.
Here’s her current eating schedule:
7:30am – Nurse
7:45/8:00am – Eat breakfast (ie, yogurt, cheerios, prune juice)
11:30am – Nurse upon waking from nap
11:45am – Eat lunch (ie, chopped turkey, chopped strawberries, yogurt, puffs, water)
2:30pm – Nurse before nap
6:00pm – Eat dinner (ie, black beans, corn, peas, yogurt, water)
7:30pm – Nurse before bed
Likes: Smiling, laughing at herself, crawling, getting into things, standing up.
Dislikes: Lying still while getting a diaper change.
How Mommy is doing: As I mentioned, we are feeling exhausted with all of the house stuff going on these past few months. There is a light at the end of the tunnel! We close on our new house in a few weeks. I know that once we move and get settled into our new house, life will feel a little less exhausting and there will be fewer elements of stress.
Overall, life is great. I’m beginning my half marathon training for my Denver Rock and Roll Half Marathon (Oct 19th). The first few weeks of training are always easy as I have maintained running and the distances are what I’m used to already. In about a month from now, I’ll be running a little longer distances that always are a little intimidating, but that is why I progressively work up to them!
If you missed her previous updates, you can check out:
Baby Lute x3 