Jude, Seven Months

Jude is 7 months old!

Weight
I honestly dunno. I'm guessing somewhere around 18 lb. His weight gain has slowed considerably.

Height

Also dunno. We won't get this measurement again until his 9-month appointment. Or until I take out a tape measure and do it myself. Guess which will happen first.

^^that confused look tho.

Sleep

Naps are still great. He usually takes a morning nap around 9 or 10am and then an afternoon nap around 1pm. Typically he needs a third nap around dinner time, but he fights it so hard that we end up just keeping him awake 'til bedtime. Bedtime is around 8pm or 9pm. 

The overnight has gotten considerably better! Praise God! We have spent the last month slowwwwlyyyy weaning him off his night feeding. On the first night, his feeding was at his usual 2:30am. The next night, we made him wait until 3am. Then the next night we held him out 'til 3:30am. And so on and so forth, adding 30 minutes each night, until we successfully pushed his feeding out of the night and up to around 6am. Woohoo! The goal is eventually to get him to around 8am with no feeding. But I'm pleased as punch at how far we've come. We did have some nights where he was MAD that he wasn't getting insta-milk. Those nights involved lots of snuggles and rocking until feeding time arrived. But most nights he was totally fine with the transition. 

So, drumroll please . . .  Jude has now officially slept through the night, from 9pm to 7am with no wake-ups, one time!!! It happened a few nights ago. And hasn't happened again since. BUT! He did it! And he's teething now, so he does wake up for comfort snuggles in the middle of the night at least once or twice. Totally understandable when your mouth is hurtsville. Anywho, we're hoping that once these teeth pop through, he'll be back to sleeping through. WE CAN HOPE, RIGHT GUYZ?

^^casual kiss on the head #4,521

Firsts this month
-SLEEPING THROUGH THE NIGHT ONE TIME!!! (Not excited about this at all, can't you tell? #sarcasmingsohard)
-Babbling "dada" and "mama" and other random consonants.
-Army crawling SO FAST. Especially when he's motivated by a toy or his brother or something he can chew on.
-Pulling to stand on his own! I didn't even witness it because I was in the kitchen working on dinner. But when I peeked into the playroom to check on the boys for a sec and I saw this . . .



. . . insert shocked/happy/teary-eyed mama face here.
-Trying even more table foods.
-Repositioning from sitting position to on his belly with relative ease and basically full control. AKA no more falling over!
-Popping his first tooth! And about to pop a second, I'm pretty sure. Can you see the swollen buds in the pic below?

^^You don't mind if I just crawl all over this neatly folded laundry, right Ma? Here, let my sneakishly charming smile fix this for you.

Nicknames
Cranky Jude Frankie (due to his teething moodiness . . . who can blame him?), Bubs, Jude the Dude

Other things to note
-Jude's current favorite foods are peanut butter, tofu, green beans, and sweet potato.

-Each month, these boys get even more interactive and it's just so flipping cute to watch their friendship blossom. Tonight, they were both giggling in the back of the car so I asked John Paul what was so funny. He says, "I'm grabbing Jude's foot!" And sure enough, he had his little hand wrapped around Jude's bare foot. It was adorable. Then he went on to ask Jude, "Can you hold my hand, Jude?" Jude never obliged, but he's still working on his English. Thankfully, John Paul is sometimes patient.

-Jude slept through his first solar eclipse. He couldn't waste any time being bored by planetary science. Or actually, he was just really sleepy and eclipses don't accommodate for toddler/baby naps as it turns out.

-This baby has the most awesome hair growing ability I think I've ever witnessed. So fluffy, so long, so luscious. You work that 'do, Jude! Also, pretty sure he's gonna need a haircut before he turns one. Who is this baby?

-Nothing makes him more giddy these days than when he pulls to stand on his own and then gets to hang out standing all by himself. Like, biggest grin across his face I've ever seen. . . all because of his independence. I gotta get a pic one of these days. Adorbs.

We love you, Jude Francis! Happy 7 months!

Jude, Six Months

Jude is 6 months old!

Weight

17 lb 8 oz, which means he gained about a pound in the past month and is keeping up with his 50th percentile curve.

Height

28 inches, 95th percentile! 

Sleep
We're still not on a perfect nap schedule, but he's rather predictable, which is great. We get two 2-hour naps and one cat nap per day. And he can usually stay awake for about 2 hours at a time before he starts to get cranky and demand another nap. Overall, naps are still great!

Overnight continues to be a hot mess. He usually wakes up 1-3 times for some comfort (cuddles or butt patting) and 1 time (occasionally 2) for a feeding. The feeding almost always occurs between 2am and 3am. We have plans to wean him off that night feeding in the next month or two, but honestly we've just surrendered to the bad sleep for now, so we'll see if we take action any time soon.

This past month, Jude basically outgrew his bassinet, so we had to steal our crib from John Paul to give Jude a more roomy sleep situation. John Paul has adjusted well to sleeping in the pack n' play (we tried to transition him into a big boy twin-sized bed, but that has failed, so pack n' play will suffice for now), and Jude is loving the extra room to roll around in his crib. We typically put him down to sleep on his side now and he either rolls to his belly or his back OR just stays on his side. Belly and side tend to be the fave positions though.
 

Firsts this month
-Getting up on his hands and knees and rocking back and forth like he's about to launch into crawling! (See GIF below for ref.)
-A weird form of army crawling, where he lifts himself to crawling position and then uses his legs to jettison himself toward an object he wants, landing flat on his belly, and then repeat repeat repeat until he gets what he's after. Basically, he doesn't know how to use his arms yet.
-Rolling across the floor at lightning speed.
- Sitting up unassisted . . . but we stay within catching distance for those few times he loses his balance.
-Riding in the front of the stroller with big brother!
-Yipping and screeching to get our attention.
-Lots of babbling sounds. His fave is dadadadadada.
-Eating solid foods! We're doing baby-led weaning again.

Nicknames
Jude the Dude, Cranky Jude Franky (when he's tired), Chicken Nugget
 

Other things to note
-We started Jude on solid foods the day he turned 6 months. We're about a week into it now and so far his favorite foods are peanut butter, green beans, banana, beef, blueberries, carrot sticks, and apricot. He's also tried egg yolk, beef broth, avocado, potato, chia seed pudding, apple, and zucchini. He really isn't getting much, but he's able to grab the food, bring it to his mouth, and lick it or gum it around in his mouth a bit, which is really the goal right now. First he learns to chew, then to swallow. This kid has been trying to eat food off our plates for like two months now, so I think he's just thrilled that he's finally getting to join us. We're keeping it plain and simple for now and avoiding acidic foods, dairy (since he has a cow's milk protein allergy), wheat, and grain to be sure nothing is too rough on his tummy. Actually, this is my new favorite resource on baby-led weaning, so that's what we're basically following for now. Overall, I'm loving the process all over again! Mess and all!

-Jude got his own high chair! We wanted the Ikea cheapy one, but since the closest Ikea is like 3 hours away, we opted to get the Babies R Us knock off version. My fave part about it is it's super easy to clean since there's no fabric. 



 -This baby LOVES to smile. He will smile all day every day at everybody. It warms my mama heart. Childlike joy is something special.

-Still no teeth, btw. This baby is officially teething foreverrrrrr. I wonder if he's just going to pop like 8 at one time.

-We've found some things that make Jude SO SAD. In addition to being sad from overtiredness or getting stuck in his car seat for too long (I feel like those are just normal baby woes), he appears to be VVV afraid of dogs and the food processor. Like instant scream cry whenever he sees/hears them. Poor bud.

-Ok, so related to food processors, I have a funny story. I had to run the food processor to finish making dinner one night and Jude was not having it. I put him in the playroom off the kitchen, hoping the wall between us would filter out some of the sound. But he was still very upset when I turned the loud food-chopping beast on. So I asked John Paul to go into the playroom and comfort his brother while I finished up. 5 minutes later, I go in to check on them and John Paul is comforting Jude by putting his toes in Jude's mouth! Eep! Jude was just going along with it and sorta licking John Paul's toes. And John Paul gave me a look like, "I was just trying to help, Mom!" It was the most hilarious/awkward/genuinely sweet thing ever. Bahahahaha. Brothers, man.

-Since I've eliminated diary from my diet, Jude no longer has blood in his stool. Woop woop! Problem solved. And now that I've adjusted, it's relatively easy to avoid all the yummy dairy. I definitely miss it (queso :'( whyyyyyyy?), but I've found substitutes for pretty much everything, so I can probs keep up with it for several more months if I have to.

-My post-partum anxiety/depression is mostly in check now that I have progesterone shots on board. I still have my moments, but it's much much mucchhhhh better. Thanks for the prayers!

-And finally, I know I say this every month, but these boys are turning out to be best friends, no doubt. The way John Paul kisses his brother at least 10 times a day. The way Jude finds interest in anything John Paul is doing. The way John Paul wants to show Jude everything he's playing with or read books to him. The way John Paul comes running over any time I'm taking a picture of Jude and wants to join in. The way John Paul pulls Jude's high chair as close to his as possible so they can sit together. I have a feeling once Jude is more mobile, these two are going to be inseparable and thick as thieves.