3 months!

My little one turned 3 months old on Tuesday! It's a testament to how crazy busy I am (or feel) that I've been wanting to post since then but have not yet found the time. But it's Saturday night and our social calendar is pretty wide open, so we are home and hopefully by the end of the evening this post will be finished. I hope. But it's looking like a long one, so buckle your seatbelts.

Basics on his growth -- Mr. B is now 13 lbs 3 oz and 24 inches long. For those of you keeping track of these sorts of things, he is smack on the mean for his age now in both height and weight, which is pretty awesome considering he was in the 5th % for both when he was born because he was early. He's still lagging on head size, but since my head is small too, and I seem to be just fine, we are not worried. He's super healthy and we appear to have his reflux under control, but he's still sleeping in his carseat (it sits in his crib) for a while longer until we are sure its under control. And once again, he was smiley and adorable for the appointment, and didn't cry at all. Yay B!

Key learnings of the past few weeks -- A couple of things really surprised me, and they are all pretty yucky:

- Babies make ear wax. Or at least my baby does.

- When your baby's hands are clenched into little fists a lot of the time, icky stuff gets between his fingers and needs to be washed a couple of times a day.

- When your baby only poops every 3 days, it's pretty dramatic when it happens. And it will happen when he is dressed and ready to go out and you have somewhere to be. Another bath will usually be required.

- It's amazing how much goo can get in the folds of the neck every day, despite a good scrubbing during bath time.

Our challenges -- B is not a super consistent napper. That means that some days I get only a couple of 20 minute naps between 6am and 7pm. This not only makes me worried for his health and happiness, but it makes me kind of insane, since I can't really do ANYTHING during the day without figuring out where to park the baby. I'm pretty much in love with the swing and bouncy seat on those days, as it makes it possible for me to pump, eat, wash bottles, shower -- you know, just do stuff. But sometimes we get a good 2+ hour nap a day, and that is awesome. I love my baby, but I also love when he sleeps.

- We need to break up with our swaddle, but it's going to be tough. If B isn't swaddled, he shocks himself awake with his moro reflex, and so will only sleep about 30-40 minutes at most. However, he loves having his hands in his mouth now, and is super kicky, so being swaddled when he is wide awake just pisses him off and he will struggle against it. What that means is that I have to rock him to extreme drowsiness, then swaddle, then rock some more to get him mostly asleep before I can put him down. This takes a fair amount of time, and it's also training B that he will be rocked to sleep every time, which is likely to be problematic in the future. So we are trying to break up with the swaddle by leaving one arm out during naps, and then will move to both arms and just hope it coincides with the diminishing moro reflex. I spend a lot of time strategizing about this. Too much time, probably, but I don't want it to start messing with his sleeping.

- I wish the reflux would go away. It makes him so unhappy and I hate putting him to sleep in his carseat. Our ped assured me that it's fine, but I just would prefer to have him in his crib on his back, and we will need to once he starts moving more.

What I am loving right now -- B is super smiley now -- he started slow, but now he smiles all the time, and I can make him laugh pretty easily. It's not a real laugh yet, but just the most adorable squeal. I cannot get enough of the smiling.

- He is in love with the little monkey on his bouncy seat. He looks at it and smiles and laughs. It's such a huge change from him not even noticing the lights and movement a few weeks ago -- I'm amazed at how fast he has changed.

- He has started to grab at things. He's not super coordinated yet, but he's pretty happy once he gets his hands on his toys.

- He smells so good. I cannot get enough of how he smells. My DH goes in every night to smell the baby, and I totally get that.

- B loves his bath -- he is smiley and happy the entire time if the water is warm enough. The drying off and dressing time usually elicits some crying, but it's mercifully brief.

- I love when he falls asleep on my chest. He's been napping on me a couple of times a week, and I love it. If that could go on forever, I would sign up for it right now. It just makes me feel so lucky; I'm just so grateful that I get to experience that.

- On a more prosaic note, he is a good night sleeper -- we get a 7-8 hour stretch from his bedtime (about 7.30pm) and then are back to every 3 hours. We had one 9 hour night, but that appears to be a fluke, which makes my DH very sad.

What scares me -- we started interviewing for nannies when I go back to work in July. I actually think we found one who we really like,, but I am terrified of how I will feel when I have to leave B at home and go back to work. I'm already sad about it, honestly. But I know I will be a happier person working, so that's the plan right now. But it doesn't lessen my sadness about missing any of the moments of his childhood -- it goes so quickly, I can't imagine not being present for every moment. Sigh.

This was kind of all over the place, but that's what happens when 3 or 4 posts get jammed together, I guess. Maybe once he starts napping, I'll be able to post more!