Seven Months Old!

Dear Jackson and Bennett,

You are seven months old today! Wow! I feel like we just started feeding you solids and then all of a sudden you are big enough to get mixtures and new textures and a whole new world of possibilities. I can't believe how fast this past month went.

So far you have eaten (in order of introduction) carrots, apples, sweet potatoes, pears, avocados, chicken (mixed with sweet potatoes), green beans, peas, spinach (which you both oddly loved and gobbled up, even the first day!), whole-fat, unsweetened yogurt, bananas, peaches, beef casserole (beef, carrots, sweet potatoes), and turkey dinner (turkey, corn, carrots and green beans).

We are weaning you off of your nightly supplemental bottles - you definitely don't need them any more, calorically-speaking, and are just in the habit of getting them now. But Mommy wants to stop pumping every night, so they're getting the ax!

You get bathtubs on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays (and in between when needed!). It makes Mommy's life a little easier when she has scheduled days for baths... She could never remember before how many days it had been since you had gotten cleaned up!

You are both on the same sleep schedule now, which is much better for Mommy's sleep and sanity. You wake up for the day between 6 and 7 and then take a nap two hours after you wake up. You take your second nap of the day around 12-1 pm and then usually a third nap around 3 or 4, depending on how long your first two naps were and when. Your bedtime also got moved earlier to 6:30 pm and you are both so much happier for it!

You both breastfeed when you wake up, then have yogurt+bananas for breakfast, then breastfeed around 10:30 or 11:00 am when you wake up from your first nap, then breastfeed around 2 pm when you wake up from nap #2, have a "dinner" meal (usually a beef or turkey or chicken combo with veggies) before your third nap and then breastfeed around 5 or 5:30 pm before going down for the night. You both usually wake up sometime between 2 and 4 am for your fifth feeding of the day.

Jack, today you are a little under 18 lbs. You keep Mommy's arms in shape, for sure.

You are still in 6-9 month clothes, but have moved up to 12 month pajamas.... They are big boy two-piece pajamas and you look more like a toddler than a little baby in them. Sniff, sniff.

This month Mommy had to change up your eating and sleeping schedule, and you are such a happier baby now! She had to switch you from a 2.5 hour eating schedule to a 3-4 hour schedule... And it only took one short time of playing with you before letting you eat at the 3 hour mark, rather than the 2.5 hour mark. You now can nap for up to 2 hours (although you certainly don't do that every time), whereas before you would only ever make it to an hour and fifteen minutes, maximum! She also had to talk Daddy into letting you cry through your midnight-2 am waking and it only took about 15 minutes of fussing on two nights and you were done waking up then. You feel a lot better after 8-10 hours of sleep, rather than doing the little chunks you were doing before!

You love all food... except avocados. Every picture Mama took of you trying out a new food was a super big smile. But you just didn't get the hang of avocados, even after a few days!

You are still my little talker. You are great at your consonants and I am just waiting for the day you bust out a "mama"! You also were the first to sign "please" back to Mommy. We're working on "all done" and "drink" now.

You love to play peek-a-boo. It's funny because you laugh the hardest when you are the most violently surprised!

You are ticklish under your neck, especially when Mommy puts lotion under there after your bath.

This month you decided that you were going to sleep on your tummy now! You wake up with the cutest red marks on one side of your face from where it rubbed against the sheets. You started out accidentally flipping over onto your tummy during naps and then waking yourself up because you could only roll from tummy to back in one direction (towards your right side) and you would get stuck up against the crib slats. Mommy decided to leave you alone to figure things out for yourself... and you did! I always knew you were going to be a tummy sleeper because when you were little you would conk out about a minute after I put you down to play on your tummy. Now you can roll towards both sides like a pro - the second I put you down in your crib you start flipping over! It's funny to me that you actually prefer to be on your tummy, rather than your back now.

Ben, today you are a little over 15 lbs. You are gaining weight just fine, by the way, your brother is just gaining more on the top of the normal range and you are gaining closer to the bottom of the normal range.

You are now solidly in 6-9 month clothes and are stretching out pretty well in the 6-9 month pjs, so you may be moving up to 12 month soon!

You are a touchy napper. Mommy has to get you down at exactly the right time because if she doesn't you will just cry for 1.5 hours rather than nap (don't worry, she doesn't usually leave you that long, she just tried that once or twice to see if you would ever go to sleep). But when you go down at the right time, you are a great napper, usually sleeping for 2 hours for both morning and afternoon naps.

You just learned how to go to sleep without your pacifier and with no crying. The pediatrician told Mommy to make sure you were done with it by 9 months old (you start forming habits by then) and he said that the best way was cold turkey... But first you were so tired, catching up on naps from missing most of them on our Shreveport trip, then you got shots, then you were sick... And Mommy kept rocking and feeding you to sleep until she realized that she had reverted you into a very bad sleeper! So one night (Monday, October 3), Mommy put you to bed without your pacifier and no going back in to comfort you. And you cried hard for 45 minutes, that night and the next two nights, but by Thursday you went right to sleep! You also took all of your naps from Tuesday on without it and did just fine. You look like such a big boy now, sleeping without your bink!

You are very picky in your food consumption. Usually after the first bite of a new food, you clamp down your mouth and Mama has to trick you into smiling, so that she can get a couple more bites in. Usually by Day 3 you have resigned yourself into eating the new food and will eat a decent amount. But you are not afraid of going hungry on Day 1 and 2! You LOVE banana yogurt... You say "Mmmmm, mmmmm, mmmmm," the whole time you are eating it. We are also working on patience and not whining with you. Whenever Mommy is too slow to get you your next bite, you get very frustrated and yell at her. You know how to sign "please" so we are working on saying please rather than yelling.

I feel a little bad posting this, but for the sake of remembering, I wanted to mention that everyone who asks us if you and Jack are twins then asks if you are boy/girl twins... because you are petite and have such a sweet, cute face! (I do wonder what they are thinking, though, especially when I have you both dressed in identical BLUE or obviously boy outfits.)

You love to have Mommy slowly sneak up on you while you are in the swing, jumperoo or exersaucer. She starts out crawling toward you slowly and then gets faster and faster until she jumps at you at last second. You giggle uncontrollably! You also love to be tickled, especially under the arms or under your neck.

We have found you a couple times lately sleeping on your tummy, so I'm not sure if you are changing things up for good, or just experimenting with a new position. But I hope that I can get a picture of your old sleeping position (on top of your two hands) before you stop doing that! It is so unique!

The last couple days you have found your voice again... But this time you are a screamer! You will just randomly yell at the top of your lungs. Not because you are mad or upset, just because you like to yell now. :)

We love you both so much! We are so thankful for our sweet twinkles.

Love,
Mommy