Levi: Week 28 Summary

For the most part, Levi had a really great 28th week! He seemed to be over the crazy "wonder week" we had last week and I really was able to see a lot of new developments. I'll cut to the chase, because this is going to be a long post!

FEEDING
Levi pretty consistently nurses for only about 15 minutes now! The only exceptions to that are his first feeding in the early morning, his late afternoon feeding (the one when I don't give him any solids afterwards) and his feeding just before bedtime. But even those have shortened to about 25 minutes, tops. I'm learning to love this new-found freedom of not being tied down to nurse him for 40-45 minutes at a time! He also started extending his feeding intervals this week--woohoo! Brian and I know that he has been ready to do that for a while now, but we think that our camping trip last week really pushed him to start doing it on his own. At the beginning of this week, I stopped forcing him to eat as soon as he woke from his naps if he didn't seem hungry or if he blatantly resisted. By the end of this week, he started taking at least one 2-2.5 hour nap a day, which stretched him to 4 hours between feedings. We still aren't 4 hours solid between every feeding--more of a mixture between 3 and 4 hours right now--but I am still excited to see this progress!

My boy seriously devoured some solid foods this week as well! Here is what he ate (breakfast, lunch, dinner):

06/15- 2 oz rice cereal mixed with 1.5 tsp pureed banana, BLW with 1 piece of watermelon
06/16- No solids today because we were headed home from camping. It's nice that he is still flexible in that way :)
06/17- 2 oz rice cereal mixed with 1 tsp applesauce
06/18- 2 oz rice cereal mixed with 1 tsp applesauce, 2.5 oz pureed sweet potatoes (an entire small jar!)
06/19- 2 oz rice cereal mixed with 1.5 tsp applesauce, 2 oz pureed peas and BLW with 1/4 peach
06/20- 1 oz pureed peas (this ended up being early afternoon lunch), 2.5 oz sweet potatoes and BLW with 1 strawberry
06/21- 2 oz rice cereal mixed with 1.5 tsp pureed peaches, 2.5 oz pureed squash, 1 oz sweet potato at a restaurant

I really stuck to rice cereal in the mornings this week, partly because we were running low on jars of pureed fruit :) We had natural applesauce on hand and I slightly overcooked his peaches for BLW, so I ended up just pureeing the peaches and mixing each with the rice cereal for his breakfast each day. He loved it! Three days for lunch he ate an entire jar of veggies, which is more than he has ever eaten before. And then one night we were at Cracker Barrel for dinner, so I ordered a sweet potato for him and I to split. He sat in a high chair like a big boy and I fed that to him. He couldn't get enough!

I also decided this week to start making some homemade purees for him. We bought 20 jars of Earth's Best baby food a few months ago because we found a great sale...and we are down to 4 jars now, so it's either buy more or make my own! I'm going to see how making my own goes! It seems easy enough and its considerably cheaper (literally $0.05 per ounce as opposed to $0.28).

NAPS
Naps were rough early this week, not gonna lie! Levi dealt with some serious rolling over issues again and that really disrupted his sleep. But, I might have figured out how to get him past that. He seems to roll over most when he has a sleep transition (usually around 45-60 minutes into his nap) and once that happens, he gets so worked up that he can't soothe himself back to sleep (he usually does that by sucking on his thumb). One day early this week, he rolled over and was completely inconsolable to the point where I just had to nurse him for a minute or two to calm him down. I put him right back in his crib and he slept for another 1.5 hours after that! I was amazed! Usually, I don't nurse him for comfort (just for his feedings), but it really helped here because when I cut him off from nursing so quickly, he realizes his need to suck his thumb again to soothe himself back to sleep. I know its not "by the book", but it seems to really work for Levi. From that point on, whenever he would roll over during his sleep transitions, I would nurse him for 2 minutes, tops, and lay him straight back down. If he was still tired, he would fall right back to sleep. Everyday since then, he has taken at least one 2-hour nap per day and has started extending to a 4-hour schedule! I hope he keeps it up!

WAKE TIME
When Levi takes a 1.5 hour nap, his wake time following is at about 1 hour and 20 minutes still. If he takes a 2-2.5 hour nap, his wake time that follows extends to about 1 hour and 45 minutes. His favorite activities still include playing under his floor gym, jumping in his Jumperoo, sitting in his Bumbo with various teethers, and walking to our garden (well, riding along attached to mama).

NIGHTTIME
Levi only slept through the night one time this week and that was last night (day 7 of week 28). I'm contributing it to the busy weekend we had camping and to him learning how to roll over. It usually takes him a good week to "bounce back" into his normal rhythms after we go away. Even so, he only woke once each night, I would feed him for about 5 minutes and he would fall right back to sleep. Not a huge deal.

POST-WONDER WEEK DEVELOPMENTS
In this past week, we have seen huge changes and developments in our little man. So, last week's crying, clinginess, and all-around fussiness seems to have paid off. Levi can officially:

• Roll from back to tummy with ease when awake (a.k.a. not half asleep and in his crib). He's a rolling machine now!
• Blabber tons of new sounds and "words". He seriously sounds like he is talking sometimes!
• Laugh! He's been working on this for a few weeks, but he does it so much more often now.
• Realize when he drops toys, locate where they are, and work so so hard to grab them again (to the point where he has almost thrown himself out of his Bumbo a few times!).
• Sit up on his own while leaning forward onto his hands. 

DIAPERING
It sounds extremely strange, but I LOVE cloth diapering. I'm officially hooked and will never look back. I plan to do another full-length post at some point this week with my experience on this. Levi seems indifferent, which is good, I suppose :)

OUTINGS/EVENTS
We returned from camping at the beginning of this week, so it has taken us all week to recuperate! We didn't really go out too much, besides the usual errands. A noteworthy mention is when we helped some friends move this past Friday. Needless to say, it is very very difficult to be of any help in moving a family with a babe in tow! After we were there for about an hour or so, Levi had a bit of a meltdown. He really needed a nap. I ended up rocking him until he was pretty drowsy and then I just laid him down in a bedroom of their new house, on the carpet (the furniture wasn't in yet). He slept for a good hour--just on the floor with his blankie! I was proud of him. Plus, it allowed me to be of some use to them :)

We had some family pictures done at the seminary this past week as well! A friend wanted to practice some skills she was using in her photography class, so she asked if we wanted some pictures done. Of course, I said yes! I have added them below.

Oh, and I almost forgot--Father's Day was this past Sunday! We were on our way back from the Red River Gorge and stopped at Sonny's BBQ in Lexington for a special Father's Day lunch. Once we arrived home, we just relaxed for the rest of the day. I think Brian enjoyed his day!

Brian's First Father's Day!

Whew! That was a lot this week. Lots of exciting new things happening with our little man.