First Overnight

Jack had his first overnight babysitter last night! He stayed at Grandma and Grandpa Lang's house while Jason and I went to a trivia night and out to a bar afterward with the neighbors. Everyone survived! Jack was an "angel baby" as Grandma Lang calls him, and we had a great time. I was up until 2:30am, which is certainly a record since before I got pregnant.

Jack also tried acorn squash Saturday morning and lapped it up. We're up to three veggies now. I've been playing around with his meal times trying to figure out what works best. I think I've settled on the following for now:

6:30am - nurse
9:30am or 10:00am - ~7oz. bottle of breast milk
12:30pm or 1:00pm - 2 tbs. cereal w/1 oz. breast milk; 1 oz. veggies
2:00pm - ~ 7oz. bottle of breast milk
5:30pm - 2 tbs. cereal w/1 oz. breast milk; 1 oz. veggies
7:00pm or 7:30pm - nurse

Once we get to the fruits, I will replace one of the veggies with a fruit, and likely increase the other veggie serving to 2 oz. I've have been stressing way too much about this - I was giving him more veggies, then realized his milk intake was decreasing, which is not ideal. I've been going round and round trying to decide, so I hope the schedule above is satisfying to him. If not, we'll go back to the drawing board.

We have a big week ahead of us with day care starting on Tuesday. Wish us luck!!

New Skills

Jack has learned two new skills - one is important and the other is just plain cute. Observe:

Sitting up on his own (almost):

Blowing raspberries:

Day Care

We've recently decided to change our day care situation for Jack. It has just been too overwhelming for Grandpa Clayton to care for our two nieces and Jack. I called Monsanto's day care, which has a long waiting list, and by some stroke of luck there was a part-time spot available for an infant for Tuesdays and Thursdays! Turns out there's a little guy who was born 9 days before Jack that goes Monday, Wednesday and Friday and they needed another baby around the same age to fill in the other days. I am so excited!! The day care is not run or subsidized by Monsanto, but it is on our campus and is available only to Monsanto employees. It is a very nice place and I have several coworkers whose kiddos go there and they are all very happy.

I just got a new job (within Monsanto) and I move to the other side of campus a week from tomorrow. It's perfect because my new desk has a window that looks out across a parking lot to the day care!! Literally, if Jack and his little classmates are outside playing, I'll be able to see him! How fun is that?? I bet I'll be really productive when that happens. In addition to that, I'll be able to pop in and check on him occasionally and even take him to lunch with me if I want.

Jack starts at his new day care on Tuesday, so I will post an update on how it goes. I'm honestly more worried about how Mommy will do than Jack. :)

Veggie Time

As I mentioned in my last post, Jack has officially started veggies. Last Monday he had his first taste of sweet potatoes and, not surprisingly, loved them! Here's the video:

A funny sweet potato face:
This making our own baby food thing is seriously so easy (so far). This weekend I baked 1 butternut squash and 2 acorn squash and after I pureed them they yielded 28.5 tablespoons and 23 tablespoons, respectively. Considering we're only feeding Jack 2 tablespoons at a sitting, that's quite a stockpile! And I think the gourds cost a total of $3.00 or something. Bargain! Jack tried the butternut squash this morning and of course loved it. We'll save the acorn squash for next week.

First bite of butternut squash:
Smiling at his Daddy:
Jack is still sleeping great with his lovey. We have to go in pretty much every night and move it off of his face - he loves to sleep that way! Wednesday morning, I took this picture (poor quality because I turned the flash off so as not to wake the little sleeping man):Jack helped Mommy do laundry this week, and we only had 2 spit-up casualties that had to be rewashed (probably should have done this photo shoot with dirty clothes instead of clean ones)
Why not chew the laundry basket?Jack's latest thing: leaning in to Maggie with mouth wide open hoping for some yummy puppy kisses. We are really trying to teach Maggie not to lick his face, but how can she resist this target?
I loved this picture until I saw the enormous drop of drool on his face. Nice. Might need to invest in Photo Shop one of these days.

5 Months Old!

Jack is officially 5 months old - phew! Time is flying! Our little guy is getting more personality every day. He thinks his parents are the funniest people alive (especially Daddy when he tickles him), and just loves to smile his little toothless grin at everyone. He has rolled over a few more times, but isn't really doing it consistently yet. I just think he has no interest in being on his belly, so why roll onto it? He's also getting pretty good at sitting up - he still topples over of course, but he can sit unsupported for several seconds. This morning I sat him in his Boppy pillow and he was able to sit all by himself for about 10 minutes (good idea Darlene). Big boy!

Last week we discovered the trick to get Jack to fall asleep on his own again - a lovey! He had been doing so well falling asleep but ever since the whole week after Christmas, he's needed Jason or me to stay in the room with him so he could hold our hand while he falls asleep. I was tempted to just keep this habit up for, say, the next 10 years or so because it was so special, but that's not really healthy for the little guy. Plus we would inevitably wake him up when we pried our hands away. Last Wednesday night we broke out one of the loveys we got as a shower gift, and sure enough, Jack snuggled it and fell quickly asleep. Magic! He loves to rub it all over his face and head, so we just check back in with him after a few minutes to carefully move it away from his nose and mouth. I can't believe we didn't try this sooner! We have 3 loveys, so we're rotating them regularly so he doesn't get too hooked on one.

Jack's still loving the cereal and has now eaten rice, oatmeal and barley. I decided to put the wheat cereal on hold for awhile since I've read wheat tends to be more of an allergen than other foods. That means it's time for veggies!! We have decided to make our own baby food, and thanks to Leslie we have nice starter kit complete with ice cube trays with lids and recipe books. Lisa also pointed us to a useful website that gives all kinds of info on making your own food. Turns out it's pretty simple and super cheap! Last night we baked one medium and one small sweet potato and after I pureed it with some breast milk, it yielded 19 tablespoons! Wow! Jack will be tasting sweet potato for the first time tonight, so more on that in the next post.

More New Things

First and most importantly, Jack rolled over Thursday! I was working from home because of the snow and Jason was home for the day. He laid Jack down on his back and instantly he rolled over onto his belly. Then a minute or so later, he rolled back to his back. Big day! He of course hasn't done it again since, but it's still exciting. We debated if that actually counts or not because it was kind of a fluke, but we decided, yes, that counts as his first roll over.

He's also easily making his way through the cereals. Last Sunday he started oatmeal and loved it, and tonight he tried barley and...you guessed it: loved it. I'm beginning to think our son will love everything we put in front of him. We'll see when we get to the veggies and fruits. I imagine the cereals all taste pretty similar. I tasted the barley, and it seemed a lot like oatmeal to me.

Here are some pics of the little guy:

Snuggling with Maggie:
Oatmeal!His new thing - sucking on his bottom lip. Too cute!

New Year's Eve

Jack celebrated his first New Year's Eve with some of his closest friends. The Ashers had a party where babies were invited. By about 9:00, each of their four bedrooms housed a sleeping baby (well 3 of them, the 4th bedroom housed Jack, who was still waking up every hour). We had a lot of fun, and of course had to torture the babies for good photo ops with their party hats on:

Mr. Jack:
Reghan Lade:Addison Asher (and Shea):
Zoey Kuehler:
Maggie Neu (she missed the hats photo session, lucky girl!):All the ladies (after babies were asleep)The menWe had a fun night.

Happy New Year to everyone!!

Another Doctor Visit

On New Year's Eve, I took Jack to the doctor again. I had called the day before to discuss his sleeping issues (he had been waking almost every hour every night since Christmas, and his naps were not good either), and the nurse suggested it could be an ear infection. He wasn't really showing any other symptoms, but I thought better safe than sorry. The nurse practitioner that we met with said his ears were fine, but he was congested. She suggested using a humidifier, which we already were, and squirting saline drops into his nose three times per day. They seem to be helping, and he is finally getting close to back on schedule. Phew - that was a long week. I'm so glad I was off work - I don't know how I would have functioned on such little sleep.

Strangely, Jack weighed 21 lbs., 10 oz. at this check-up. Granted, they don't strip down to their diaper for "sick" visits, and his diaper was probably a wet one, but really? 13 oz. more than his check-up only 8 days earlier?? Crazy.

Back to the subject of sleep, we are still waging the 'to swaddle or not to swaddle' battle. I have talked to lots of people and there are a LOT of different opinions. Many say that you should stop swaddling at this age so the baby can continue to develop his motor skills. Others say swaddle the baby as long as he wants to be swaddled. We are leaning towards the latter at this point, but there are times when Jack just really doesn't want to be confined. Some nights he's fully swaddled, some he's swaddled with his arms out and some he's wearing a sleep sack. It seems to be going OK and like I said, he's pretty much back to his normal sleeping patterns.

New Friend and Other Updates

Jack met another friend on Monday. My friend from work Stephanie and her family, including little Owen, who is 8 weeks younger than Jack, were in town from Louisiana for Christmas. Stephanie and I compared notes our entire pregnancies and have continued to do so now that our sons have arrived, so it was great to finally get the little guys together. Owen was kind of sleepy, but they did get in a little playtime on the floor, and even held hands for a few minutes. We can't wait until the Dahls move back to St. Louis so Jack and Owen can have more play dates!Jack also tried out his new ducky bathtub Monday. He was getting way too big for the baby tub, but he's not quite sitting up on his own, so during the in-between phase I have determined bath time is a two-parent job. Doesn't he look cute?? Our little chubster.
Jack has another new skill as of about a week ago: he loves to grab his feet. Pretty cute!
We also got out his exersaucer again - last time we tried, he was a little too short, so we put it back away. Now he's big enough, and he loves it! He's already learned how to bend each of the little toys so they reach his mouth.
I have to post this quick video of Jack in his Jumperoo - he loves to bounce. I recently started watching his feet when he jumps and he brings them together like he's clicking his heels - it's so funny.