First 6 Months of Fun and Milestones

First 6 Months of Fun & Milestones

It’s hard to believe how fast time goes by when you’re having fun! Here are some highlights from CJ’s first 6 months of life. Enjoy!

A couple days after Baby CJ was born, he had his first informative doctor’s appointment. Doctor told us he had lost a few ounces, but the reason for that is really neat; Babies have more water in them for the time while breastfeeding starts to produce enough for them. After a few days, that water leaves making babies lose weight.

As you may remember from my previous post, Birth Day, baby CJ was a little jaundiced at birth. This too has a cool reason behind it; according to his pediatrician, Jaundice is caused by the number of red blood cells they have to help transport oxygen while in the womb. After birth, they have too many red blood cells and some die off–too many for the liver to process so jaundice sets in making their skin yellowish.

The following week, he had a follow-up appointment. Baby CJ had gained 11 ounces which brought him up to a little over 8 pounds. His jaundice was almost gone as well! He got a blood screening which we discussed at his 1-month appointment. Baby CJ was perfectly healthy!

Babies don’t do much, other than eat, sleep and poop for most of the time so the first two weeks consisted of sponge baths every 3rd day. We were very careful not to get the belly button stump wet per the doctor’s orders. His first full-on submerge bath was at almost 3 weeks. We waited a couple days after his belly button stump fell off, just to be safe.

Baby CJ was not a big a fan of tummy time in the beginning. We would prop him up on the nursing pillow, which is one of the ways he would even want to be on his tummy. Another way in which he preferred having tummy time, was being on either mommy’s or daddy’s tummy. By being persistent with tummy time, he developed strong neck muscles which led to him managing to roll over on his own by the time he was 2 months old!

Before I was even on my third trimester, I had read a lot of other mom’s experiences with nighttime sleep and how to set up a sleeping routine for the little one and what age it was best to start practicing these. I was ready to try them all as soon as the time came, but luckily, I didn’t have to worry about that at all! Baby CJ was a good sleeper from the beginning. For the first month, I would wake him to feed once or twice during the night. During his second month I decided it was best to let him tell me when he was hungry so I wouldn’t disturb his sleep. He would wake up twice every once in awhile, but for the most part he would just wake up once. At about 3 months, baby CJ was not waking up at night at all, sleeping up to 8 hours during the night!

Sometime between 3 and 4 months old, baby CJ seemed a little too drooly as if he were teething. We asked his pediatrician if there was anything we could do to soothe. She suggested cool teething rings and infant Tylenol. She provided us with a chart of Tylenol doses to give baby based on his weight. Those two definitely made baby CJ feel more at ease and not so stressed. Those teething symptoms went on and off for about a month or two, but no teeth were in sight.

At 3 1/2 months, we introduced baby CJ to some mushy food. These consisted of fruits and vegetables. He was not a picky eater and loved everything new he tried. The very first solid mush he ate was bananas! That is still his favorite, but we try not to feed him that too often as it gets him a little constipated.

Another thing we introduced him to was the bouncer. On baby CJ’s 4 month follow up, his pediatrician informed us that putting him in a bouncer would relieve him from being laying down most of the time and prevent his head from getting flat. His neck muscles were strong enough to hold his head up and be able to do so while jumping up and down. It was too adorable! He was a little jumping bean, he liked that thing too much.

After a month or so of enjoying plenty of bouncing time, he wanted to explore more. How did we know? Whenever we would place him inside the bouncer, he would be entertained for 10-15 minutes then he would start getting fussy. He did that half crawl where he would push with his feet while dragging on his chest. He liked doing that for a short period of time until he would get bored and fuss again. Baby CJ was about 5 months when we decided to get a walker. The first time he was in it was the best day ever! He quickly lunged forward and started running. At first, all he did in the walker was go forward and couldn’t turn around at all. He later proceeded to walk backward. In time, he learned that if he combined the two, he could make turns.

Sometime back in July, husband and I decided to take a road trip up to Flagstaff to escape the 100-degree heat. We opted to spend the night so we could enjoy some time downtown and the cool night that place had to offer. My sister tagged along and we’re glad she did! Baby CJ wasn’t a fan of being in the car seat for 2 hours straight while driving to Flagstaff. She kept him entertained while he was awake and even fed him mid-drive. It was a bit of a challenge because of the pumping schedule, but we made it work. We had requested a pack and play the hotel offered because we thought the extra space would suit him better, but ended up tossing it aside mid-night because it was not comfy for baby at all! Fortunately, I had packed his rocking sleeper and he was much happier in there. Being baby CJ’s first road trip, it was lots of fun and even though he slept almost the whole time, we have lots of pictures to show him in the future!

Another first we were dying for baby CJ to experience was solid foods. The mesh feeder is a great tool to introduce mashable solids to baby. The very first thing he mashed on his own was strawberries at the 6-month mark. HE LOVES STRAWBERRIES! Of course, we waited 3 days after to look out for allergies and then he was good to go for more rounds of strawberry. This was also the time when we introduced meaty mush food. Baby CJ is such a foodie, he loved both chicken and turkey. Beef not so much, but he will eat it if it has veggies.

The first 6 months were definitely wonderful and full of learning and trying new things. Baby CJ has, and still is surprising us with his ability to learn and adapt quickly.

We will always cherish those 6 months because he will never be that tiny again, but we are also very excited, looking forward to all the things and milestones he will accomplish in the future!