Baby Nathanial at 3.5 Months

I LOVE babies at this age, especially mine. I have to admit, though some would scold me for it, newborns are hard for me. Of course I loved my own through that stage, but I will be honest and say that I'm glad it's over. I'm glad we aren't waking up 3 times a night for feedings, that sort of thing. What I'm even MORE excited about is all of the fun new things Nathanial is doing. He can now:

1. Hold his head up fairly well both when he is sitting up supported and during tummy time.
   


2. He tries SO hard to sit up. He hates lying down. He arches his neck up and tries so hard to get to as sitting up position.
   


3. He's cooing like crazy. Last night at 4 in the morning, he woke us up just talking to himself. It turned into hunger cries, but, it was very sweet at the time.
   


4. He smiles and is very close to laughing out loud. It turns into more of a sucking in, squealing sound, but it's so cute!
   


5. He is very close to rolling over!
   


6. He's starting to swat at things and hold things in his hands. He's getting to where he likes and appreciates toys!
   

He's in size 6 month and 6-9 month clothing. SOME 3-6 month things still fit him, but not many. Last time he was weighed in, he was 15 lbs 6 oz and was 25.5 inches long! Needless to say, weight gain and growth is not an issue.

So, since he was about six weeks old, my mother and my mother-in-law have been nagging me to put him on rice cereal. OK, maybe "nagging" is a harsh word, but they suggested frequently that it wouldn't be a bad thing. So, normally doctors these days are recommending that you give rice cereal at 4 months. Well, at 3.5 months and with this most recent 4 am wake up, we decided to give it a shot. We used Gerber and mixed 1 tbsp of cereal with 4 tbsp of formula. Now, we made the mistake of trying to do this when he was, well, starving. Nathanial goes from happy baby to incredibly hungry in about, hmmm, 45 seconds. So, the initial attempt did not go well. So, we gave him a bit of formula, bathed him, which always calms him down, and tried again.

Well, he took about 15 spoonfuls and then got frustrated. But, I was excited that he at least swallowed it! I think he was definitely hungry and didn't mind it too badly. He was an absolute mess after we were finished! He had cereal all over his mouth, on his chest, everywhere. Since he got frustrated, we finished with the bottle, but he at least got a bit in his system. We'll see how he adjusts.

We're going to try to be consistent and have it in the evenings before bath time over the next few weeks. We'll see what happens. We've been giving him about 0.5 ounces of pear or white grape juice mixed with a touch of water for constipation and that will have to continue as we put him on more cereal.