Levi: Week 14 Summary

14 weeks!

This week was so great in the life of sweet Levi! We couldn't believe how cheerful he was all week long. He stayed awake longer amounts of time and played so well independently. He also had a fun visitor all week--his Auntie Bri (Briana). Goodness, he loved her!

NURSING
Levi ate well all week at a 2.5-3 hour schedule. I can tell he is started to get a bit more distracted while he is eating because every once in a while, instead of eating, he'll just look up at me and smile ear to ear. It melts my heart! He also did really well this week with his occasional bottle while we were out and about. This is the first week that he didn't give his daddy a hard time eating from his bottle while I was at class on Thursday night! Brian was very happy about that!

WAKE TIME
Levi's time awake this week was such a joy! He really began enjoying his floor gym and would lay there for an hour or so at a time, playing with the toys hanging in front of him and smiling at himself in the mirror. He was also very content just sitting on the lap of Brian, Briana or I and watching us talk to him. I can tell he is getting more and more inquisitive.

NAPS
His naps this week were a bit more sporadic then usual, with having a visitor here, but he did take them! He was in his swing more than I usually put him in it for naps, just so I knew he would sleep well and as much as possible. When I put him down in his crib, it was unlikely that he would sleep more than 45 minutes. I'm hoping he'll soon learn to get through that 45 min sleep transition, but he just can't seem to soothe himself back to sleep just yet.

NIGHTTIME
Not much has changed this week as far as nighttime sleeping. He is still waking two times per night--usually at 2:30 AM to the minute and another time a few hours later. He did start waking at 6:30 AM instead of 5:30 AM, which is small, but good progress. It seems that no matter what time I feed him for the last time--whether 9:30 or 10:30 PM--he always wakes at 2:30. One thing that has improved this week is his ability to sleep through Brian getting ready for work in the morning. Brian had 3 opening shifts this week, where he was getting ready at 4:30 AM, and I was sure Levi was going to wake during that time, but he didn't! I'm still just doing "half-feedings" throughout the night as well, to slowly wean him from those.

There were several mornings this week when Levi woke up happy--he would just lay in his crib and "talk". When I would go in to get him, he would just look up and smile! That was pleasant to wake up to! This week I did start swaddling him with his arms out and he seems to like it. It prevents him from breaking his swaddle in the middle of the night, which makes him cold and wakes him. On very cold nights, I just put mittens on his hands :)

OUR SCHEDULE
Our schedule was actually fairly consistent this week. The time changed on Sunday, so he started waking between 8 and 8:30 AM--which is what I had been planning on! Yay! Here's a rough estimate:

8:00 AM- feed
9:30 or 9:45 AM- nap
11:00 AM- feed
12:30 PM- nap
2:00 PM- feed
3:15 or 3:30 PM- nap
5:00 PM- feed
6:00 or 7:00 PM- nap (this varies a lot depending on our plans for the evening and how fussy he is; usually it's just a short nap, regardless)
8:00 PM- feed
8:30 PM- bedtime
10:00 PM- dreamfeed

OUTINGS/EVENTS
We had a pretty chill week with Briana here! We stayed in most mornings so that I could work and we usually had short outings in the afternoons (ie. mall, Babies R' Us, coffee shops, walks). Levi did well through it all, like he usually does! I'm appreciative of how flexible he is!