Where to begin with a post about our little bundle of joy? I can’t believe she’s 4 months old, and yet I am even MORE surprised to report that she is ONLY 4 months old. It seems as if she has been part of our family for much longer, and we are totally smitten.
If I only had one word to describe Emma, I would choose “angel.”
If I had two words, I would choose “juice box.”
If I had three words, I would choose “OMG, where hair?”
Okay, so I would probably need more than three words to convey that last sentiment, but let me give you a brief (HAHAHAHA…you aren’t buying that, are you?) rundown on the other topics.
1. Angel. Emma is such a good baby. I mean SUCH a good baby. Such a GOOD baby. She is one of those mythical babies who usually only cried when she was hungry. She even took it to the next level and didn’t even cry when she SHOULD have cried because she was hungry. Oops! (more on that below). For the most part, though, she is very happy, and such a flirt. She just lights up whenever she gets attention from anyone (or to elicit attention), and gets a huge grin on her face. She coos and gurgles and blows raspberries and makes monster noises. Early in March, she started to figure out that she could set fuss-traps. That means she would fuss to get someone to come running over, and then hit her victim with her dazzling smile to get them to flirt with her. What a sly little gal. She loves being in on the action, and you can tell she loves watching Lily. She takes 3 naps a day, and I actually get her long mid-day nap to sync up pretty well with Lily’s – hallelujah! She stays up until 10:30/11:30 and sleeps until 6. She nurses and then she goes back to bed until 8:30 or so. She has slept all the way through the night a few times, but we’re back to usually getting up one time. She has kicked her middle-of-the-night swing habit, and goes back to bed in her crib after her nighttime feeding (she always has slept in her crib for the first part of the night). She is still using the swaddle and a pacifier, but I have no complaints because she sleep trained herself.
Let me put that in its own paragraph.
She sleep trained herself.
ANGEL.
We never had to cry it out or work at it really – I just realized one day that I didn’t really NEED to hold her until she fell asleep before putting her down – I can put her down awake and she gets herself to sleep. I’d love to take credit for that, and I did try to put her down while awake more often when she was a newborn, but I abandoned that months ago and we had developed all sorts of bad habits (only putting her down asleep and letting her nap in the swing) that I was dreading having to break. Our little angel had other plans, though, and just fixed our bad habits herself. This just underscores that I shouldn’t take too much blame for Lily’s early sleep problems, nor may I take too much credit for Emma’s sleep success – we pretty much did the same things with both kids, and they just responded differently. Emma’s just a more laid-back kiddo, and I’m SO eager to see how her little personality develops as she gets older. She is such an easy baby, and a true delight to be around.
2. Juice box. Emma’s new nickname around here is “juice box,” due to the insane amounts of drool, milk, and spit-up that are constantly emerging from her mouth. She is just a drool-monster, and constantly does raspberries that make the drooly, bubbly mess even worse. That part’s kind of cute, though, so we’re willing to look past it. The milk and spit-up are a bit less sweet, though. When she was a newborn, she never spit up much at all. In the last month, though, the spit-up is much more prevalent, and I’m not sure if it’s just her, or if it’s because we ended up having to supplement with formula (although she does still spit-up when she doesn’t get a supplement, so I doubt that’s the whole problem). Anyway, I was nursing her full-time (like I did with Lily for a year), but for some reason she just wasn’t gaining weight fast enough (which seemed to be due to a higher metabolism from what the doctor could tell, because she was getting enough volume of milk from me per her age/weight). Anyway, once we added a bottle of formula to supplement each nursing, Tubby McTubberton gained 2 pounds in 8 days! For a 9 pound baby, that was pretty significant, so she’s back on track and now gets formula after half of her nursings until we can figure out how to wean her off of that. With all of these bottles, though, she has kind of turned into a bit of a glutton, and will gorge herself on formula to the point of it just leaking back out of her mouth and then spitting up a lot. This is pretty much our day.
“Oh, Mommy, did you come to talk to me?”
“Oh, I’m a happy baby!”
“Happy, happy, happy!”
“Happy, happy, happy!”
“Blurp.”
“Happy, happy, happy!”
All day.
I never knew what projectile spit-up was until Emma. It has only been twice, but it’s certainly memorable. She’s still happy as a clam, though, so we just try to remember to keep a bib on her and a burp cloth handy at all times.
3. “OMG, where hair?” As you recall, Emma was born with lots more hair than her sister. We were shocked, but I was excited that the girls would be able to wear matching bows sooner than I had thought and I thought the contrast in their hair colors was so interesting. It’s way too late for me to dig through photos for the best view of her hair, but here she is on March 22nd.
It’s not the best picture of her, but you can clearly see her poofy ‘do.
Now, note this picture from March 30th.
It is all coming out, folks. This is the hair I got from just rubbing her head for a minute. Add to that the amount I find all over her crib sheets, her bouncy seat, clothes, etc., and imagine that this has been continuing for the past few days.
Here she is today (April 4th), with a look that clearly says, “Mom, these bunny ears aren’t fooling anyone.”
And here’s a clearer shot:
My poor “Miss Emma dear” (as Lily calls her).
The worst part is the giant bald spot on the back of her head from where she has rubbed all her hair off, that is framed with a mullet fringe on the bottom. Fortunately, none of this matters one iota, but I do have to admit that I was enjoying finally getting to use our baby brush after never getting to use it with Lily. Oh well – at least I can still comb out her glorious baby mullet!
Well, I had better wrap this up. I owe you tons of pictures, as always, readers, but at least some of my thoughts are recorded.
Emma, I know you are getting the short end of the stick as far as blogging goes, but it’s just the nature of having two kids that I have less time to blog now that there are two of you munchkins. I adore you, and couldn’t ask for a sweeter baby. I’m sorry I snuggle you so much, but I’ve learned that I have to get my snuggles in now while you are too defenseless to tell me “no,” or squirm away. I’m sorry I take advantage of your lack of motor control, but at least it’s not winter any more, so your cheeks won’t get chapped from my incessant smooching. I love you to bit and pieces as well, my dear, and promise I will let you marry me, too, if you’re still interested by the time you are a grown-up. You may also live with me forever and you never have to grow up as long as you promise not to throw a hissy fit when we have to buy new shoes because your feet are not on board with our “never growing up” plan. I love that even at 4 months old, though, you have made it clear that you are not just a younger version of your sister. You are unique and wonderful and sweet and joyous, and even more things that we have yet to discover about you. You make me smile…even at 6 in the morning, and that’s saying something. I love you my Emma, dear.
*So that we don’t forget, Emma’s current nicknames are “Miss Emma dear,” Em-ster (and the rest of us have been dubbed the “Lil-ster” the “Mom-ster” and the “Dad-ster”), Juice box, and Em. I realized the other day that based on their first names and middle initials (Lily Grace and Emma Catherine), I COULD call the girls Lil’ G and Em’ C, but we’re not gangsta enough for that.
Love,
The Bogle Family Blog
Still flabbergasted that my spell-check is okay with “gangsta”
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