Miriam's Life

Well, we are still getting used to supplementing with bottles after nursing, but I am starting to see a pattern on the days that I can stick to schedule.  He seems to be nursing better overall though, or perhaps I am just less frustrated.  :)

He is sitting better each day.  Here he is this morning playing on Elise’s room.  Elise was enjoying sharing her toys with him.  We’ll see if that lasts. . .

On Sunday he was dedicated.  Our church’s ceremony is a chance for the parents, grandparents, other family members, and members of the church to publicly commit to raise the child in the Lord.  Left to right: Miriam with Will, John, Elise, John’s Dad and Mom, and my Mom and Dad.

Will enjoys all his family members.  A couple weeks ago he spent some time with Pop watching football:

Today, Aunt Hannah came to watch the kids for a couple hours.  We are going to start this once a week to give me some non-interrupted time to get some much needed things done.  It was wonderful today!  It’s amazing what you can accomplish when you don’t have to worry about stopping right after you get started.

We finally found something besides bananas and avocados that Will likes!  Sweet potatoes!  Yummy!  Somehow this is the messiest thing I’ve fed him so far.

Well, that is all the news as far as Will is concerned.  Elise is doing well, though we are still struggling with some discipline issues and acting out.  She also has some odd worries associated with her 5th birthday coming up.  She told me the other day that she didn’t want to turn 5, although when asked she did indeed want a party.  The only explanation I could get from her was that she didn’t want to be as big as one of her friends.  This girl is quite a bit taller than her and is also losing teeth (perhaps that is a worry for Elise?).  She was partially reassured when I explained to her that changes like growth don’t happen overnight.  I think she somehow thought that she’d wake up on her birthday and be suddenly bigger.  With more digging I discovered that she seemed to think she’d have to stop some of her activities as well.  We had talked about all the changes that would happen when she turned 5, like going to Sparkies, and she was afraid she’d have to start them right away.  I assured her she would finish Cubbies first, and that when she did go to Sparkies, her friends would be going with her.  I also reminded her the other good things that would happen once she was 5 (though again not right away) like going to ballet, something she’s really been looking forward to.  Anyway, if you think about it, pray for her birthday party this Saturday.  She gets overwhelmed and at risk for meltdowns in large groups of people, so I’m not sure what to expect with all the kids over here for her birthday.  Hopefully she won’t crash until the party is done.

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It was nice going to the doctor today with just one kid.  Thank you Laura for taking Elise even though it was right in the middle of naptime.  :)

Here’s the update on Will’s health:

-Height:  still growing.  He’s up to 27 1/2 in. tall.  That is around the 90th percentile.

-Weight: Unfortunately, Will is not doing as well on weight gain as he had been.  I knew that he had been dropping on the growth chart, but he had at least still been gaining.  Today he weighed in at 17 lbs. 6 oz, which is a 5 oz. drop from a week ago.  The doctor pulled up his growth chart and said that he is in a consistent drop on the chart, and he would like to see him at least stick in the same percentile.  Now for those of you who have seen Will lately, you will know that he is still as chubby as can be.  He places in the 50th percentile right now, so don’t worry about him too much.

-Feeding issues:  Now, the reason for the weight gain drop.  Most likely this has to do with some issues we’ve been having with nursing lately.  Will has not acted satisfied with just breastfeeding.  We’ve started some solids, and he likes some of those (though not cereal!).  There have been a couple times in the last few days that I have actually given Will a bottle because he still seemed hungry after a feeding and he drank the whole thing.  I even tried formula for the first time yesterday, and he will take that just fine.  After discussing things with the doctor today I have decided that we will continue breastfeeding, but will supplement after nursing sessions with a few ounces of breastmilk or formula.  This hopefully will be a temporary thing, but I am prepared that we may be on our way to weaning from nursing.  I’m sad about that, but hate to think of Will as being hungry.

-Sleeping struggles:  We had been having some issues with Will waking again at night, but he is finally sleeping 12 hours straight again.  I think the ear infection was probably to blame for some of the wake times.  He is not napping well in the afternoons though.  The doctor says that some babies do not have as much of a need to nap if they are happy and content in the afternoons, but Will I think still shows he needs a nap, he just doesn’t seem willing to take one easily.  If he is tired, there is no problem with just putting him down for a scheduled naptime and letting him cry the whole time according to the doctor.  So that takes some of the stress off of me.  We’ll just try to stick a little better to a schedule so Will knows when naptime is and then he can decide if he’s actually going to sleep or not.

-Milestones:  Despite the fact that Will seems to have skipped the milestone of rolling over, he met the sitting up one without a problem.  He also babbles like a normal 6 month old.  (Although today in the Dr.’s office he was quieter than usual and I realized what a difference it makes when I have both kids and they compete with each other).  Other things we are supposed to look for in the near future are switching things from hand to hand, turning to his name, and picking things up with finger and thumb.

-Misc. items:  I had the doctor take a look at Will’s feet.  He tends to have feet that are mottled and blue in color and his hands are often the same color.  The doctor says this is not usually normal, but doesn’t necessarily mean there is an issue.  He checked his pulses on all extremities and says they are all normal and strong.  He says we’ll wait until warmer weather to see if the problem resolves itself when his feet are warm rather than cold.

-Shots:  Will was due for two shots, but one of them is back-ordered, so he only got one.  Maybe that is better anyway, since the doctor says this will be a tough one (fever and grumpiness will ensue).  Will came home zoned out and is now sleeping soundly.

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Will can now sit up.  Here’s some pictures of him doing just that.
   Oops, he fell down.  (That’s what the pillows are for.)

Notice his two little teeth when he smiles.  Isn’t he cute?

This is what he does when you lay him down.  He would much rather sit up.

He will be 6 months old in a couple days and I think he’s the handsomest little boy in the world.

Health update:  Will is over his ear infection.  He has been really fussy today though, so I wonder if he is cutting another tooth.  Elise is now sick.  She has been having a headache and off an on complaining of her ears hurting.  :(  She missed dance today for the first time.  Here’s a picture of her sick today.

And here’s a picture of her normally happy self with one of her friends.

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I woke the kids early this morning to get to the eye doctor by 7:00 am.  Both kids were getting routine exams.  Elise needed one just because it is recommended for kids her age so as to catch any eye problems before they began schooling.  Will needed one because we were noticing some crossing of his eyes and we knew if there was a problem it needed to be treated as early as possible.

Elise went first.  She let them do the automatic reading on her eyes as well as take a picture of her eyes.  Then she got to cover each eye and tell the doctor’s assistant what certain pictures were.  She passed that test without a problem.  The doctor came in and after doing a quick look with the microscope, put some drops in her eyes to dilate her pupils.  He said that they always do that the first time a child comes in because at their age their focusing muscles are so strong that it is easy for the doctor to miss some far-sightedness.  Elise had done fine until the drops began stinging her eyes.

Then Will got the same stuff in his eyes, though his were diluted so he didn’t even fuss.  Then we had to sit in the waiting room while the drops took effect.  Before long both Will’s and Elise’s pupils began to widen significantly.  The doctor had warned that this would cause Elise’s vision to blur close up.  Once she was not able to see the toys she was playing with clearly she started to cry.  She still let the doctor take another look at her eyes though, even though at first she said she wasn’t going to.  I tried to explain that this is the way that some people see all the time and that she should be thankful her eyes are healthy and strong.  The doctor said he was glad that she was upset that her vision was blurry as that meant she normally has clear vision.  He checked her eyes and took another reading on them.  The result is that she is 4 points far-sighted.  This, according to the optometrist, is perfect.  He explained that our eyes tend to get more near-sighted as we grow, meaning that Elise’s eyesight will get better over time, rather than worse, at least for the beginning of her life.

Will was very cooperative for the doctor, following the light just as he should and letting the doctor look in his eyes.  He is even more far-sighted than Elise, but being younger, that is not bad.  He could not get his eye to wander at all, so he said even if we are seeing a wandering eye at times, as long as his are working together a good portion of the time they will develop correctly.

So that was good news.  Elise’s eyes will remain dilated all day, perhaps longer because she has blue eyes (which are more effected), but she seems to be accustoming herself to it now.  She told me she can already see better than she did, but still needs her sunglasses outside.

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Actually it is not OUR first ear infection.  John and I have had quite a few between the two of us as children.  But for our children this is the first ear infection we’ve dealt with.  I took Will back to the doctor today as he has been still running a low grade temperature off and on.  He also hasn’t been eating or sleeping as well as usual.  I debated back and forth on whether it was worth taking him, but decided to go ahead and go today.  I was totally expecting to be told nothing was wrong.  But apparently he shows signs of infection in one of his ears.  He didn’t a couple weeks ago when I originally took him in.  Since he had finished his batch of antibiotics, we were prescribed another kind to see if it will get rid of the ear infection.

The interesting thing is this seems to explain a lot of the little symptoms I’ve noticed but was unable to tie together.  This is possibly why he’s been waking in the night and not finishing his naps.  Most likely this is why sometimes he is not interested in nursing and even wimpers while swallowing.  And this would explain his slight grumpiness that was annoying me, but not necessarily enough to attribute it entirely to sickness.  He’s actually been quite good for having an ear infection, so perhaps we caught it before it got too painful.  Of course he is crying right now, so we’ll see how tonight goes.  I just gave him some tylenol to see if that will help him sleep better.

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I’m sitting here thinking how content I am and what a good day it was. Remembering how I wrote “A Day in the Life” on what turned out to be a not so good day, I wonder what it would look like on a day like today. So here is how my day went today. [...]

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Happy New Year from the Leins.  We hope you enjoyed the holidays as much as we did.

We have reworked our daily schedule to reflect Will’s new longer naps.  Thankfully he is sleeping in longer chunks making my days seem much less interrupted.  I have added back in exercising, which hadn’t lasted very long when I originally put it in.  :)  We of course have time for preschool and now piano time for both Elise and I.  Will has his own playtimes as well as specific playtimes alone with Mommy, Elise and Daddy.  Elise loves to play with Will, so I sometimes recruit her to entertain him when I have something important to get done.  We’ve put one specific playtime right into the schedule for the two of them together.  We’ll start this brand new schedule next week.

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