Lavinia Grace: 5 Months Old

Lavinia turned 5 months on Monday. This past month with Liv has been one of my favorites, she is growing and learning so much each day. It’s been so much fun to watch! 

STATS: There is no 5 month check-up so I don’t have any official stats for this month but she has definitely grown a bit since her 4 month well-visit. Like when she was 3 months I recently did the weigh yourself-weigh yourself and the baby-subtract method recently and she is around 13/14 pounds. She is beginning to outgrow her 3 months clothes, and even though I’ll squeeze her into them sometimes when I really love the outfit she is mostly in 3-6 month clothes. For her nighttime disposable diapers she is still in size 2 and her cloth diapers on still on the smallest rise – she has 2 more pounds to go until we can move up to the mid rise. 

EATING: For almost a month now Liv has been intently watching us while we eat, reaching for our food and imitating chewing when she watches us eat. Around 4.5 months we thought it wouldn’t hurt to see how she did with solids so we gave her a little bit of butternut squash in the mornings for a few days in a row. While she was loving it she still has the tongue thrust reflex and she got a little constipated from the food so we figured that her digestive system just isn’t ready for solids yet. We’re going to hold off until she is 6 months to start solids again, but I’m glad we experimented a bit because she really was showing some signs that she was eager to eat real food!

Breastfeeding has still been going well. I’ve loved being off most of this month because I’ve barely had to pump (which is my least favorite part of breastfeeding) and I can just focus on feeding on demand rather than stressing about pumping enough when I’m gone from her. She’s feeding every 3-4 hours and on a typical night only has one nighttime feed.

SLEEP: Liv has been such a good sleeper since the beginning that I was really nervous for the dreaded “4 month sleep regression”, which luckily didn’t hit us too bad. She is still sleeping 7/7:30p-7:30/8a most days with 1 wake up to eat per night. Towards the beginning of this month that wake up was usually somewhere between 1:30 and 2:30a but this past week it’s shifted even later to more 3:30-4:30a. I’m crossing my fingers that she is on the way to stretching out her sleep towards no wake-ups at night!

The area that I feel was affected by the sleep regression was her naps. She went through a 2 week period at the beginning of the month when she wouldn’t nap for longer than 45 minutes (compared to her usual 1:30-2 hour naps) and she was really feeling it, extra cranky and ready to go down for the night super early. But we’re mostly through that rough patch which I’m thankful for. The past week she has been napping like a champ… so we’ll see how long that lasts. ha

LIKES:

• “standing” up – sometimes when you try to make her sit she REFUSES!
• playing in her activity center
• bath time
• going for walks
• being in her Ergo or Moby wrap (especially when she gets to face out in her wrap)
• sleeping
• babbling
• peek-a-boo
• Christmas music
• when people blow raspberries at her

DISLIKES:

• having her diaper changed
• getting out of the bath tub when it’s cold

FIRSTS:

• first stroller race with daddy
• first Thanksgiving
• first picture with Santa
• first Christmas jammies
• first Christmas tree
• first time pooping on mom – yes, I made it almost 5 months before I was at the receiving end of a diaper blowout haha
• first time tripod sitting (hands on the floor in front of her)
• first solid foods – butternut squash and bananas

THINGS I WANT TO REMEMBER:

• how she’s starting to recognize me and Henri and smiles at us when we walk into the room
• her little giggle and the face she makes when she’s trying to hold back a giggle
• the way she can be upset or fussy but when I pick her up and hold her close she settles down and snuggles in close
• her determination and focus when she is trying to do something new

5 MONTH FAVORITES

• Skip Hop Explore & More Activity Center
• Oball Rattle
• Sophie la Giraffe
• GapBaby Knit Pom-Pom Hat
• Boppy Pillow (we’ve graduated from using it as a nursing pillow to using it as sitting assistance for Livy)