Mach Four

Time is flying by. I blink and days are gone. Whole weeks just slip by. Life is just busier now. And not in ways that would typically define a busy life. Our schedule is mostly clear. We're not out and about all over the city. In fact our little town has a big festival this weekend downtown and just about everybody goes to some part of the festivities. It's definitely the place to be, but it's not on our agenda. Our days aren't filled with meetings or events or parties, but the days go by faster than ever before. In a lot of ways, it feels like I got the call just a week or two ago. And yet, in other ways, it feels like Garrison has always been here. He's just part of our day now...  the very best parts. Somehow, enough days have passed and he is FOUR months old. This one seems like a really big deal to me. Thee months still seemed small, and insignificant in terms of time passing, but four months? Holy moly, I feel like I better start planning his first birthday or I'll blink and forget to mail invitations.

Name: still Garrison. : ) And we're REALLY close to making that official. More details to come.

"Hey ma, if I sit here real nice, can we stop this all ready?"

Nicknames: Gosh, I really thought I'd land on one nickname, and let it carry us through, but that has not been the case. He gets called Whiny Butt a good bit. Stinky Butt every now and again. Chunk-a-lunk... which is hilarious because he's anything but chunky for his age, but he is developing a few rolls, dimples, and dints, which are obviously precious.

Cutest baby ever

Stats: 11 lbs 14.8 oz and 22.5 inches. Some of you have already heard from me between yesterday's appointment and today. I am admittedly starting to worry a little bit. At first, I really thought he was going to catch up in no time. I wasn't worried in the least. From 3 lbs 14 oz to 7 lbs 3 oz in just a little over a month seemed really great to me, but things have kind of slowed down. Especially in the length department. Only a half inch of growth this last month. That's umm, kind of sad. I think I was mostly upset about the length... that curve is definitely starting to flatten out. 17" to 19" to 21" to 22" to 22.5" I think I was also just kind of surprised by the numbers. Most of our clothes are from Carters. Their size chart says up to 24 inches and 12.5 pounds. We're struggling to snap onesies these days and they body suits aren't tight but it's not like his feet are in the knee bend either. I was guessing he was at least 23 inches and over 12 pounds. I think the culprit here is the cloth diapers. Cloth diapers, especially pocket styles, take up far more room than a thin little disposable. I knew that, but didn't realize that it was making that big of a difference. We'll probably have to move up to the next size before we actually hit the mark because of cloth diapers.

"Don't let this tush fool ya!"

I talked to my pediatrician about it, and she feels good about his growth. It admittedly makes me nervous. Am I stunting his growth forever? Will he always be a smaller, skinny kid who never gets picked in gym just because we can't pack on the pounds right now? But I'm trying to let it go. He's eating as much as he wants. I don't ever hold back ounces from him. If he wants more, he gets it. I asked about fortifying his formula to a higher calorie content (like 24), but the pediatrician wants to stick with 22. I'm laying it down and saying I'll worry again in two months.

Monthly height and weight chart

Eating: He still eats about every three hours, but has increased to 4-4.5 ounces during the day. His morning and night feeds are iffier. Some days he'll eat well, and some days he won't. I think the projectile vomiting episode has me a little scared to coax him to eat more. Once he spits it out three or four times, I call it and try again in 5-10 minutes. If he still doesn't want it, I call it. He's dropped to six bottles in a day (from eight) so the increase in ounces has kept us right around the same total caloric intake. Hopefully, he'll take a bit more here soon and we'll see some improved growth (and sleep).

"I get this mom."

Sleeping: Garrison definitely doesn't appreciate sleep as much as Sam and I do. We L-O-V-E to sleep. It can take me a while to fall asleep, and I'm a light sleeper (whereas Sam crashes in six seconds and sleeps through earthquakes), but I really love a good nap or an excellent night of sleep. It's definitely "the thing" that I miss from my pre-Garrison days. It's a small sacrifice, but I admittedly do miss the ability to take some Sleep PM and know I'll wake up 8-10 hours later.

Garrison blessed us with two nights in which he actually slept through the night. And by that I mean he slept from his dream feed at 9:30 or 10:00 until 6:30 the next morning. I unfortunately didn't sleep through the night myself on either occasion and both nights woke up hysterical knowing he was dead. Once I chilled out, I was pretty pleased with my little guy. Here I was about to purchase all the sleep training books in the world and he was going to figure it out all by himself. Yeah, umm, no. If anything, those nights have just made it more frustrating because now I know that he can sleep through the night, he just doesn't. For the last three weeks he's been waking up 4-10 times a night. He soothes quickly with the paci, a little shushing, and or light pressure on his tummy, but it lasts approximately thirty minutes before you have to do it all over again. He never really cries, so we haven't been feeding him (unless he actually wakes up crying and won't soothe with a paci, at which point I assume he actually is hungry and in need of calories). If we let him fuss, he does just that, he fusses, and fusses, and fusses and gets himself more and more and more worked up. He rolls and squirms and and wiggles until he gets his Halo all messed up and then he really DOES wake up and cry. In an attempt to prevent that, I've been doing the jump and run thing as soon as I hear him fuss for sixty seconds or more, but I know I'm feeding the frenzy and probably creating unbreakable habits. Sigh.

"Who's tired? Not me, ma."

Our pediatrician is recommending the Ferber method and dropping the swaddle ASAP. Like literally, she told me to just not swaddle him again. We're umm, not going there quite yet. My goal is to transition him to his room and slowly begin the swaddle transition after he's been in his room for a week. At this point I'm trying to decide between transitioning with the Halo (one arm out, then both arms out, then sleep sack) or transitioning with the Zipadee. I swore I wouldn't buy a ton of baby crap, but it appears that the fastest way to get me to purchase baby paraphernalia is to promise me good sleep. I'm also starting a night time routine this weekend. I was hoping to have a really simple night because between bottles and cloth diapers our evenings are already full, but I think for consistency I'm going with a bath every night, followed by lotion/massage, followed by a bottle, and then a book, and then bed. I'm hoping the book will give enough time for his bottle to settle and his reflux meds to kick in so that I can lay him down "drowsy but awake." Little Butt definitely needs to learn the art of putting himself to sleep, but with reflux, that has been really hard.

morning stretches

Likes: Garrison really like music. He likes when I sing ridiculous made-up songs, so I do that a LOT to keep him happy. He also likes baby toys that play music. It's been pretty fun to watch him fall in love with sounds. Out of desperation I turned on a Baby Einstein video on my phone one day when we were stuck in Atlanta traffic. I didn't let him see the screen, but just the sounds of bees buzzing and ridiculous sock puppets beeping and squealing at one another instantly shut him up. Such a fun thing to watch. I admittedly use that a good bit now that I know it works, especially when I'm getting ready in the morning.

Jammin' to some morning tunes

He's also a BIG fan of laughing. I thought he smiles were the best thing ever, but then he laughed and I almost died. His laugh is the cutest thing in the whole wide world. In case you missed his sweet little laugh, I'm posting the video here. It's that good. It deserves a double dose of social media exposure.

Dislikes: I still feel like I don't really know what Garrison dislikes. One day it's laying on his back, the next it's sitting in the bumbo. One day it'll be pacifiers, the next baths. He's a confusing little dude. Most of the time, I just carry on. He fusses, we shush.

"I can't even remember why I'm crying!"

Undecided about: He's suddenly very undecided about riding in the car. This is heartbreaking. I thought I was used to the sound a baby screaming, but oh. my. gosh. Garrison has cried for over an hour straight while we've been traveling on more than one occasion. It's AWFUL. Some days he's fine, but others are just so bad. I used to pretty much bank on a nap in the car, but not any more. Now I have to schedule it to be nap time so he's really sleepy, or get him to sleep, shove him in the car and run for it.

"You're not gonna buckle me in again, are ya?"

Looking forward to: Oh my gosh, I'm like pee in my pants excited... his crib is FINALLY here. We ordered that bad boy on February 14th. I got the call on June 22nd that it was finally, finally in. I can't wait. It's the last piece I've been waiting on for his room to be finished, but it's a pretty key piece. I'm SO excited to go to Atlanta to pick it up this weekend. I'm also looking forward to moving Garrison into his room, while quietly shaking in my boots with fear over how insanely craptastic sleep may get.

Sweet, sweet baby

I'm also really looking forward to the future suddenly. I don't know why, but in the last week or so, it's just hit me. He's ours. Like forever ours. We'll finalize soon. His name will change. He's our son. Suddenly it isn't just about day to day living but I'm dreaming about the future again. I don't know if I can contain my joy over Christmas this year. We may start singing Christmas carols in July. I already bought him his first Christmas present and I cannot WAIT to see his little face on Christmas morning. There's so many other things too. I'm not wishing away the baby days for anything, but I'm so excited for all the growing he has to do. It's amazing to think that there's this whole, big, beautiful life being written just for him. I'm so honored that I get to see the story unfold.