Half of a year! Lydia's very first half-birthday. We celebrated by feeding her solid food for the first time. We just started our with a little bit of rice cereal. She did really well and I will be posting about that experience separately. However, it was a fantastic 6-month celebration.
It's been such a fun month. Honestly, this has been my very favorite stage. I adored the newborn stage - but I just love where we are right now. Lydia is still taking 3-4 naps a day, (albeit, only about an hour at a time) and when she is awake she is able to happily play on the ground instead of needing to be held all of the time. She loves to play and is so fun to interact with. Her smile melts my heart.
Lydia's six month stats:
Height- 24.5 in (6.52%)
Weight- 14.9 lbs (27%)
Head circumference- 16.5 in (43%)
Here are some fun things about the last month with Lydia:
-She loves to suck on anything and everything. She loves to grab at her toys and within seconds they are in her mouth. She has a long tongue and she licks and sucks and wraps her tongue around the toys. It's so funny to watch. Pretty much anything that she can fit her mouth around goes inside, fingers, hair, toys, even chins and noses (as evidenced below). It's so funny.
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(What dad? I'm just sucking on my mom's face, thats all!)
--She also loves to suck on the edge of her pink blanket that is bound with silk. It's the blanket that I've started to put her down for her nap with every day because she will put it in her mouth and it helps her fall asleep.
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-Did I mention that anything she can get to her mouth goes right in? This includes her feet and toes. It was so fun to watch her discover he toes, and even more fun to watch as she learned that she could bring them all the way up to her mouth. I don't know why, but I love it when she does this. It makes me laugh everytime. She folds her whole body in half so that she can get her feet in her mouth.
--She still isn't sleeping all the way through the night. Most nights i'm still getting up with her 3 or more times. I'm hoping that once we get her started on her solid foods she will sleep better. (Although she is a champ and sleeps in her bed 90% of the time. I bring her into bed when she wakes up at 5:30 or 6, because then I can sleep in a little bit longer while she plays - but other than that... it's the bed for her!
--She hasn't started crawling, but somehow she is able to scoot herself over if one of her toys gets away from her. She just uses her arms to pivot her body. It's created somewhat of a problem because it's harder to keep her on the center of her blanket.
--She spends most of her time on her tummy because she still can't roll front to back. I honestly think that she will be crawling before she figures that one out!
--Around 5 months she started to be able to sit up a tiny bit, but only if you were right next to her. Most of this last month has been spent sitting up with limited assistance, like leaning up against the boppy pillow, or placed in the corner on a couch. Just recently she has really gotten the hang of it and can sit by herself without toppling! She is getting so great at balancing herself and she loves to sit and play with her toys. The transition from a baby who lays all the time to one who can sit up has been huge. She seems so much older and more capable to me.
--She is a happy baby and loves to play with her toys and has really started to love playing in her little bouncer. However, she is only happy if she knows that I am nearby. I can now take a shower if I bring the bouncer into the bathroom and poke my head out of the curtain every once in a while. (Thank goodness for not having to wait until naptime to shower!)
--She is still bald, bald, bald. Her sweet little round head has barely any hair at all. Just within the past couple of weeks it's started growing a tiny bit of hair, but you can only really see it if you are looking at an angle and you see the light bouncing off of it. She definitely got her mama's high forehead and hair tendencies. I had no hair until I was over one year of age. But then it grew out long and blond and thick and full. In fact my years 3-7 were probably my best hair years ever! I'm pretty sure that she will have blond hair, because that's what I had when I was younger and so did David. It will be fun when she has hair, but i'll be honest, I love this little bald head.
-- As I mentioned above, most mornings Lydia comes into bed with us around six a.m. I feed her and then set her between us and we take turns playing with her. (By playing mostly I mean letting her suck on our fingers or making sure her toys stay where she can get to them.) However, some mornings after an hour or so of that, we bring her out and put her in her swing. I just have to include this picture - because it is so funny. She tends to lean her head over to the right and one morning when we came out, we found her like this. She was totally asleep and still rocking back and forth.
--To prevent her from rolling over during the night, we have put tightly rolled blankets in her bed (please don't judge - it's either that or have her screaming all night because she rolls over and cant sleep on her tummy). One day when I put her down for her nap, I gave her one of her favorite toys - her kitty - to chew on as she fell asleep. I came in to find it tucked safely under her arm as she slept. It was so sweet. (This coming from a girl who slept with a stuffed bunny for years and years and years. I loved to see her hugging her little animal.) My mom gave us a set of these little pets; a dog, a cat, a bunny, and a bird - Lydia LOVES them!
--Lydia's chubby little legs have started to thin out again. They aren't stick skinny like they were when she was born, but she doesn't have as many big rolls. It is so sad! I just love her baby rolls. I love to kiss them and eat them up. I'm hoping that this is just a stage and she will fill out again when she starts eating solids. Luckily she still has plenty of tummy, arm, and upper leg rolls for me to love on.
--L has such beautiful eyelashes! Honestly, they are so long and curled and gorgeous. I love love love them.
--We finally transitioned Lydia into her crib. We thought that maybe we could put it off until we moved into our house, but we decided to just bite the bullet and do it. It's been good, but not great. I thought that she would sleep better because she would be able to see out of the slats - but that hasn't seemed to make a difference. All that has happened is that she scoots up higher than the rolled blankets then sticks her arms out the slats. Then she cries and cries. It's getting better though. I'm thinking about getting something like this
mesh liner. (A recommendation from my friend Barbara.)
Here are some more pictures of her during this last month:
We love you Lydia!
