Nora - 4 months

We just had Nora's 4 month appointment and she weighed 17lbs, 5oz making her the biggest (only by a couple of ounces) of the kids. I think it is pretty crazy that all 3 have been within a few ounces at all of their appointments despite ranging from 7.11 to 8.9lbs at birth.  She was also 26" long. Her stats put her in the 94% for weight and 96% for length. She also got 3 shots and an oral vaccine (which she mostly spit out). It was noted that we can start solids when she is ready, but it is quite clear that she is getting plenty to eat at this time. She's wearing clothes of all sizes but 3-6 month things are pretty snug.  She has been rocking my homemade baby legs at home most days as pants over her cloth diapers can be challenging.

 

Little Missy/chunky monkey/princess (as Levi calls her) has had a busy month hitting all kinds of milestones.  She laughs, talks, blows bubbles, makes all sorts of other noises and sleeps through the night sometimes :)

The first time she had a deep belly laugh was one day when we were eating lunch. Charlie yelled "boo" and she about jumped out of my lap and then busted up laughing. She loves getting scared I guess because every time Charlie does she will jump and then laugh.  Levi can make her laugh sometimes but he is still a little too in her face.  She is constantly blowing bubbles and making other funny noises with her mouth. Several nights I have woke up to her loudly smacking her lips while sleeping.  She likes to suck on her knuckles and sometimes she sucks on her 2 fingers too. Like Levi, she drools a lot. He got his first tooth before 5 months (Charlie was almost 1 before he got any teeth) but I don't see anything in her mouth yet, just lots of drool.  

I like to divide sleep in to 2 categories: before Rock n' play & After rock n' play.  Right at 3 months I tried putting her to bed in her crib. Getting her to stay asleep was the biggest battle. I think the first night she stayed up there for 4 hours or so and then the second night was just a couple of hours. After that, it was just constant trips up and down the stairs fighting her to stay sleeping. I abandoned the crib idea pretty quickly. She also wasn't sleeping good in the bassinet anymore. Basically the first half of the month was wakeups every couple of hours (or MORE than she had been getting up since birth).  I finally asked my boss if we could borrow her rock n' play sleeper just to try it because she swore by it. Well that night Nora slept 10 hours, so I guess I'm a believer. She has slept through the night many many nights since then. However, she is consistently inconsistent. Some nights she will sleep for 10-12 hours, other nights she will wake up once at varying hours. I can't even keep track of her wacky wake up times because they're always different.

She is still a night owl (compared to the boys at least) going to bed around 9:30-10pm at night. She cluster feeds from 8pm-she passes out and then like I said her wake up time will vary greatly in the morning. I have been terrible about establishing any sort of naptime routine. She takes a nap whenever she is tired. I am ready for her to take 2 longer naps & a shorter nap but I haven't worked on that so her naps vary in frequency and duration every day.  She has gotten good at putting herself to sleep in the swing. 100% of her naps take place in my arms, the swing, or the carseat.  The carseat is still a favorite place for her to take extended snoozes.  The Moby and/or Ergo makes an almost daily appearance as well.

Nora loves bath time. She splashes a lot. I have found that the empty baby bathtub is also a great place for her to hang out while the boys are taking a bath. I can even fold clothes while they're taking a bath. She just loves watching them be naughty! I don't think I will ever be able to give all 3 of them a bath at the same time.  She also is pretty content being on the floor, on her tummy or back. She hasn't rolled over at all but it wouldn't surprise me if she goes back-front first because she gets way up on her side. Some day that big old noggin is going to flop her body over and catch her off guard. Whenever we change her diaper she kicks her legs like crazy. I'm more willing to give her a few minutes of diaper-free time than I ever was with the boys for obvious reasons. 

She continues to adore Charlie and tolerates Levi most of the time. Levi is good with her - he just has no respect for her bubble :)  He is constantly 1" from her face, trying to climb on whatever she is sitting in, or just touching her. He loves helping take care of her by helping change diapers, picking out diapers and clothes. I think if he could feed her a bottle it would make his day, but I don't think that will happen anytime soon since she thinks bottles are a waste of time.  He has never been mean or aggressive towards her in the slightest, he just needs lots of reminders to be gentle.  Charlie makes her laugh and smile all of the time and will sit and hold her for a long time. She loves watching him and he can still make her stop crying with some singing.  

Edit: Of course after I published this I thought of a couple of things I forgot to add!!

1.) Nora is starting to attach to her a+a swaddle blankets. She loves having them up by her face when she is sleeping and almost always has one clutched in her hands. Since we have a 4-pack hopefully she won't become too picky on which one she has (or that she won't want all of them, lol). Charlie & Levi are still very much attached to their blankets.

2.)  Just a note to remember a current issue - the measles outbreaks. I will admit I am a little paranoid about the fact that Nora is too young to have the MMR vaccine. I know there are families that attend school (and are just in any public area, obviously) that are not vaccinated and it just makes me nervous. I guess we can't/shouldn't just be hermits and I try not to freak out too much about it. But if there was a case in our district...I don't know....I just don't know...so hopefully it won't happen.