Reflections of Weeks 18 - 25

Ok, a lot has happened since my last reflection. I will try to remember as much as I can without writing too much. So, with this in mind, I'll just do some highlights of the last few weeks.

Sleeping
Jack's sleeping has been GREAT! Just before Christmas I dropped the dreamfeed. I did this by reducing the feed time by a couple of minutes each night. When it got to about 5 mins, I stopped the dreamfeed. This worked really well. When I took him off, he would grizzle a bit, but I put him back to bed and he would eventually go back to sleep. Since he's sucking his thumb, I think it's made it much easier dropping this feed. He now sleeps from 7pm to about 6am (some times earlier, sometimes later).

Jack is now only having 3 naps in the day. Over the last week he has stopped sleeping for his last nap. I'd put him to bed, but he would just have a good play in his cot. So, we're down to three naps. His naps are still various lengths. Usually he'll have one two-hour nap at some point in the day.

We're still wrapping Jack. I've decided to keep it going as it's working so well. We wrap the right arm up and leave the left out for thumb-sucking purposes. He settles so well since he's been sucking his thumb.

Wake Time
I've extended his wake time to two hours. This has happened gradually over the last few weeks. He has been handling this really well. In the afternoons, he's awake for much longer than that. It's so nice having him awake for a longer period of time now. I really enjoy going out and doing things with him.

Jack has enjoyed spending time with his cousins. Matthew shared his beloved "trucks" with Jack and showed him how to play with them.


Sophie and Bethany loved playing with Jack. He was given LOTS of hugs and kisses.




Rolling
Well, one of the big events has been that Jack started to roll over. He started doing this just before Christmas. He rolled from back to front first, then from front to back. But, after Christmas, he showed no desire at all to do any rolling. After a while, he started to roll on to his tummy in his cot, which meant that we had to keep going into his room to roll him back on to his back. But, he hasn't really rolled all that much any other time. There has been the odd occasion when he's rolled from his tummy on to his back, but he always looks so shocked afterwards. I don't think he knows what he's just done. I was hoping he'd be rolling around a lot more by now, but he's not. I have to keep reminding myself to be patient and that he'll do it in his own time - it's hard to keep thinking that.

Sitting Up
The second big event has been Jack being able to sit up. On our family holiday Dave, Jack and I were at the beach. Jack was sitting in front of me, between my legs. Jack started to sit by himself. I got pretty excited, so I yelled out to Dave and my sister-in-law, Katie, to look at Jack. Just as I said this, Jack leaned too far forward and did a face-plant in the sand. Poor Jack! His whole face was covered in sand. What a bad mother I am!

After Christmas, Jack was getting pretty good at sitting up for a few seconds by himself. As each day went by, he got better and better. At the moment, he is sitting up really well. He can sit for a while by himself, but he will still fall over every now and then (so we have to make sure we don't get distracted!).

Solids
The other big event has been starting Jack on solids. Jack started really well - AT FIRST. He took the food off the spoon quite eagerly and one time, he ate all of the rice cereal in his bowl. I was pretty excited. But, he really hasn't been liking eating solids for the last couple of days. He definitely doesn't like apple. I've given it to him 4 or 5 times now and he continues to spit it out. When I gave him some solids Yesterday and Today, he was making such a fuss - coughing, whinging, yelling, - that I decided to throw in the towel. It really looked like he was protesting and chucking a tantrum. He closed his mouth and wouldn't open it AT ALL. He was being so loud that I just couldn't put up with the noise anymore.

Dave and my mum both encouraged me to have a break from it and try again in a couple of days. This was good advice. It was pointless trying to force the food into his mouth. That's not what eating should be like. I want him to enjoy it. Jack wasn't getting anything out of it and I certainly wasn't either. So, we'll leave it for now. Every now and then I'll give him some food to try, but I won't worry too much about it.

Routine
Jack is having 5 feeds a day and we're on a three-to-four-hourly routine. So, nothing really has changed.

Bon Voyage

We have, sadly, had to say goodbye to some family. A couple of weeks ago my brother, Mike, and sister-in-law, Katie, together with their children, Harry, Miriam and Harry, left to go to Tanzania to serve there with CMS, at Munguishi Bible College (click here for more information). They will be there for three years, so it will be a while before we see them next.

On top of this, my sister, Rachael, and brother-in-law, Glen, along with their kids, Sophie, Bethany and Matthew, have returned to Vanuatu to continue their work at Talua Ministry Centre in Santo (click here for more information).

This has been a very sad time for me. It's hard having your family leave you and knowing that it will be a long time before you'll see them next. But, I know that they are passionate about building up God's kingdom, and so, they are stepping out in faith to do God's work. Thankfully, we have the internet, which brings us email, Facebook, and Skype. It is so easy to keep in touch now. I'm so glad that my parents and brother are close by, so we still have some family left!

Here's a photo of Jack with all his cousins.

Miriam, Sophie, Sammy, Harry, Matthew, Bethany & Jack.

This photo was taken while we were all away together before Christmas. It was great fun getting all the grandchildren together for this photo.

Swimming Lessons

A friend of mine has done swimming lessons with her little girl, Nina, since she was 3 months. She absolutely loved doing something fun with Nina and she really encouraged me to do the same thing with Jack. So, I did. Today. Jack had his very first swimming lesson today.

Well, unfortunately, Jack was not a big fan of the pool. Our little Jacky boy pretty much cried for the first half of the lesson :( . We played all sorts of games, like, Ring A Ring A Rosy, Hokey Pokey, Humpty Dumpty, but nothing seemed to distract him for long enough and he kept crying. He jumped in and out of the water, kicked, played with toys, and lots of other fun things, but he still cried. He would be OK when I held him, but once we started moving around, he would cry again. It wasn't a big cry, it was his little whimpery cry, the one where his whole face crumples and his bottom lip sticks right out (which is SO cute, but it also breaks my heart!). I think he musn't have liked the cold. Even though we were in an indoor warmed pool, I think he still was cold. In hindsight, I probably should have taken him to the pool before today so that he was more used to it.

Thankfully, he settled down and he seemed a lot more chilled out by the whole thing. He looked pretty happy floating around. I even got a smile out of him by the end of the lesson. So, it wasn't all bad. I'm looking forward to next week and I'm really hoping that he'll start to enjoy it.

Lots To Do...

I am well aware of the fact that I have been VERY SLACK in my posting. As the days go by, more and more posts need to be added, and the more I realise how much I need to do, the less inclined I am to do them!! That's the human mind for you - well, my mind, anyway :)

I will endeavour to get cracking VERY SOON. I just need to get motivated. So, if you see that I haven't done any posting in the next couple of days FEEL FREE TO BUG ME (about that, not about anything else!!! ;) ).

5 Months

Our lovely little boy is 5 months today. What a little treasure he is!

My Musing

I submitted my musing on being a new mother to "This is Not a Baby Manual" (which I mentioned here). Check it out here if you're interested.