Tommy celebrated his 3 month birthday on Thursday, 12/10 with a visit to Dr. Nito, where he received another vaccination - part 2 of the Hepatitis B series. Of course the poor little guy screamed, but he recovered pretty quickly. He weighed in at 11 pounds, 1 ounce, up 2 pounds from last month. John thought he'd be over 12, the nurse thought 10 and change. While I picked a range, between 11 and 12, Mommy's intuition was right on! Just over that 11 pound mark! He did end up having a HUGE diaper blowout when we got home so the nurse could have been right after that point! The pediatricians we see are a husband and wife team, and we really like them. My OB/GYN recommended them as he takes his kids there. Tommy seems to respond to both of them very nicely. He got a little nervous when Dr. Nito started examining him and Mommy stepped away for a second, looking back and forth from him to me as if he was unsure, but Dr. Nito's voice seemed to eventually soothe him enough. I let him know I was right there too - could TJ already be getting some separation anxiety pangs? I mean, we are together all the time...hopefully this won't be a problem next month when we start day care!
Dr. Nito was happy with TJ's growth and where he is at with his milestones. He said our goal is for him to drink between 24-32 oz. right now, and we are definitely in that range since Tommy is taking about 30 ounces a day in his bottles. We are officially on the bottle feeding ONLY system now, as we are up to 6 ounces per bottle approximately, 5 bottles a day. He seems to cluster feed in the morning - usually 7am, 9:30/10, 12:30/1, then takes a nice afternoon snooze and next bottle is usually around 4:30/5, and then last bottle around 8:15/8:30 before he goes to bed. He has been EXCELLENT going in his crib and sleeping through the night. John and I know how lucky we are, and that things could change when he goes through teething or something else. Usually he goes in around 9/9:15 and we get up with him around 7/7:15. He is stirring before that, but seems to be happy enough talking to himself or doing whatever he is doing in the crib. We were out Friday night at a dinner with him so his routine was a little off, but he adapted nicely to the situation. I think the noise and so many people at the dinner might have thrown him off b/c he was not taking his bottle well at the place, but eventually he settled down and we got home a little before 10pm, changed and rocked him, and put him to sleep. I tell John and myself on nights like that to "not be surprised if he wakes up" as he might be out of sorts. Plus, the shot he got the day before might have made him a little fussier than usual. But, he did not wake up.
Dr. Nito also told us that when we are ready we can start experimenting with rice cereal with him! Every pediatrician is different, but he said between 3-6 months starting 1-2x a day with 1-2 tablespoons as "dessert" is acceptable. TJ might refuse it at first, so he said to wait a week if that happens and try again - he'll let us know when he is ready. I have to admit that I was surprised, since most of the books say to wait until 6 months, but then those SAME books will tell you that if your pediatrician gives the green light, you could start doing what Dr. Nito suggested. We did go out and buy a small box of the cereal yesterday though I am not sure when we'll try it - maybe this next week, just for fun.
As for TJ's other measurements, he was 23 3/4 inches, so he grew 1.25" in a month, and his head circumferance was 40.5 cm, an increase of 1.5 cm.
I am still pumping and while TJ is still getting mostly breastmilk, because he is taking more ounces per day in his bottles and I'm only producing so much, he is now getting about 6-10 ounces of formula a day, depending on what I have pumped for that day's bottles. So far we don't notice anything other than smellier dirty diapers and sometimes the color is a little different, and occasionally it's a little more watery in consistency. He is actually going less frequently than he was the first 2-2.5 months, but there is no real consistency in his pattern. Sometime he skips a day and then goes 4x the next day, while sometimes he will go every day 1-2x. And then there are the blowouts that occasionally happen, as mentioned above!
Not that you all want to read about this, but these are some of the funnier stories we have! Yesterday we went to 5pm mass and sat in the "cry" room because we were a little late and we knew TJ was going to want a bottle, as he woke up right before we were leaving. Although I had taken the bottle out about an hour before mass to let it sit at room temperature for a bit, TJ must not have thought it was warm enough because he was playing games and being very fussy about it. He kept pushing the bottle out of his mouth (yes, the kid is using one or both hands to do this, AND he even puts his hands on the bottle to hold it - which he can do very briefly when John or I remove our hand!) and then was cooing and giggling - we think he was flirting with the 5 month old girl sitting in front of us, but she saw it as teasing because she wanted his bottle! So we put the bottle away and he sat and was awake on my lap. After we came back from communion, the noise that came from this little boy's bottom was SOOOO loud that I could not help but react! If we were in the main part of the church, I can only imagine how everyone would have reacted, as the couple with the 5 month old laughed out loud like John and I. John says that my reaction was actually funnier than the noise from TJ. He had a few more for us, so we decided maybe we should change him before we leave. Well, change him indeed we did! Thank goodness we packed a change of clothes because it was all over him. This situation even warranted a bath last night to make sure we got him good and clean!
Tomorrow we are planning to go visit the daycare that Tommy will be attending next month, as we have to drop off paperwork, pay the balance for our first month enrollment, and also to just kind of do a walk through of the procedures. I debated about putting him in for a few days this month as a trial run, thinking it might make things easier when I go back to work, but after talking with several people decided no matter what it will take us a few weeks to get into a routine when I go back to work, so any trial days won't mean that much.
We did have one milestone hit last week - though only once and it hasn't happened since - Tommy did roll over from his stomach to his back on Tuesday, 12/8. We were doing tummy time and just all of a sudden he propelled himself over. John came running in since I was gushing over him and tried to get him to repeat the feat, but no luck. So it might have been somewhat of a fluke, but it was one of the best tummy time sessions we had. And he was happy at the time, not crying and upset like he usually is when he is on his tummy! I don't want to be pushing him to do stuff he is not quite ready for, and if that means rollovers, so be it. A friend who had a baby in late July just told us that their baby's first rollover was 2 weeks ago, so I know the milestones are different for every baby!
The top photo is not the most flattering one of our little guy as he looks half out of it, but I wanted to show off his Santa boots that we got as a gift from one of my friends! They are so cute, but he keeps kicking them off as they are a little big. Might have to stuff some tissue paper in them!
The second photo above was taken on Friday before we went out to the event and dinner we were going to for my brother-in-law. I think he looks so big the way he is sitting (or sleeping!).
Hope you all continue to enjoy this holiday season!
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