It’s hard to believe how fast this month went by. We have a two month old!! Aili girl has been progressing so much this month and I can’t wait to see what the coming months have in store!
Sleep has been up and down. She had been doing so good with four hour stretches in her fourth week of life and then had a regression her fifth week of not sleeping well at all. Hard to go down, only sleeping two hours at a time maybe. Not napping well during the day. Extra fussy. But then I took a class from Taking Cara Babies online called “will I ever sleep again” (LOL RELEVANT MUCH??) that is done by a NICU/L&D nurse who’s husband is a pediatrician. It seriously changed our lives. It isn’t sleep training but tricks and tips to help your baby go down on their on in their own space. It isn’t a strict schedule but more flexible to help your baby adjust to life from weeks 5-12 of life and then how to keep things going after that in the 3-4 month class. The FIRST night we did it, she slept 7 hours. No joke. Now she didn’t sleep seven hours every night but she slept better and went down easier. Before this at night she was sometimes sleeping in the pack n play great and sometimes on me because she would not go down in her own space. Same for naps, she now takes 1-2 naps per day in the pack n play. The naps range from 2.5 hours to 30 mins lol but they are on her own and give me time to take a freaking shower and sit without another human attached to me. But she gives you grace to feel like you can also hold your baby for some naps and sometimes she will nap in the car, ALL OKAY. It’s incredibly freeing. So needless to say, if you have a baby and your sleeping isn’t great check her Instagram and blog out but seriously TAKE THE CLASS. Best money I’ve spent on baby items.
She has been doing awesome with tummy time! She actually enjoys it and is very talkative during it as well! She’s holding her head up a lot and pushing up on her arms a lot for good amounts of time as well. She has rolled belly to back now multiple times as well! Just not consistently yet. This is one of my favorite parts of the day with her! Nike loves to watch her during tummy time too, probably because she’s so vocal during it haha.
We definitely have been having lots of social smiles and lots of coos and “conversations”. The car rides have been hit or miss. If we keep moving she doesn’t seem to mind it and will fall asleep but if we are stop and go she is NOT a fan. We will be heading to Florida next week and so I will be curious to see how she does on the journey! Hopefully we don’t run into any bad traffic.
This month has been really hard in the area of emotions. I’ve had some postpartum anxiety and have had a hard time with being alone during the day. There were many times where I would burst into tears for no real reason and would have gripping anxiety about things that aren’t a big deal. Talking to and with people have been really helpful for this and I’m hoping getting back to work and into a routine will help my mental health greatly.
Favorite products this month:
- TAKING CARA BABIES CLASS
- Shussher for on the go car rides or stroller walks it helps her fall asleep for real. Only lasts 30 mins before shutting off and the design is kind of poor because of you set it up the speaker is on the bottom but otherwise we love it! It seriously has made going out so much easier.
- Haaka silicone milk catcher and manual pump. We got a combo deal on Amazon for these two gadgets (but they weren’t the actual Haaaka brand) and it was well worth the $30. The Haaka is this genius device that you use on the opposite breast to catch your letdown milk on the side opposite of which you baby is feeding. If you are exclusively breast feeding this gadget is SO worth your money!! You can build a small freezer stash from it easily! I wish I would have bought it sooner to have in the early days when my oversupply was really bad before everything regulated. The manual pump is something I never thought I’d need, but now since Aili has had some 8-10 hour nights, I keep it by my bedside and if I wake up before she does (or after 8 hours) I go ahead and use the manual pump and put that in the fridge to avoid clogged ducts and mastitis. SO much easier then getting up and pumping with my electric pump!!!
So that’s it for this month! Now we head into our last month before I go back to work! Can’t wait to see her progress over this month!
Thanks for keeping up,
- Olivia :)