Six Months Old

Last night, we were playing cards at my mother's house. Phaedra got a little too into the game. I tried to tell her that if you're going to cheat, you put the card up your sleeve. Apparently, she thought she had a better method. She waited until this morning to play the yellow 14.



I tried to get a picture of her curls she gets right after a bath. They're so fleeting because they quickly get flattened by hats or something else. And look, my finger/arm/something is making a cameo. Oops.

Six months old, and she still has those baby blues! Do you think they'll stay?

I can't believe my baby is half a year old already! She's been in such a hurry to get mobile. She started out the month with her little inchworm move. Now, she's quite efficient at an army crawl. She finally learned to roll onto her back after getting good at moving forward. The first several times, it was as if she pushed herself forward too hard with her foot and accidentally flipped onto her back. I really couldn't tell if the action was purposeful or not. Later, it was a more coordinated motion. During the past week, she's been getting up on all fours and rocking. I'm sure a full fledged crawl will be soon coming. She's just so driven. She wants in on the action when Eleanor and Daddy play. She wants to get into trouble, and is quite successful. Grant and I have been amazed at how quickly she can find paper, shoes or electrical cords when we think we've moved all out of her reach.

She's a great little eater. She loves rice cereal, usually finishing off every last bite I offer her (about 2-3 Tbs). She was slow starting with fruits and veggies. She seemed to prefer foods that were blander, such as squash. She has made a face at every fruit I have let her try, but now she's starting to like them. She is so much easier to spoon feed than Eleanor was! I remember coaxing all the way, trying to get one more bite just to have her (maybe) finish off a quarter of a jar of food. Phaedra on the other hand, as long as she isn't way too tired, will open her mouth fairly easily for each bite until she is done. When she is done, she is done. There is no way to coax her mouth open without really getting tricky or making her cry. So I don't have to wonder if I'm over feeding her. But she'll usually finish off almost a whole jar of food or more.

Unfortunately, sleep is a different story. She was a great sleeper until about four months of age when she got her second cold, started solids, and started moving around more. I don't know which one of these things did it (or maybe the combo), but our star sleeper fell from the sky. She'll sometimes let me put her to bed at the beginning of the night, only to wake again within the hour. She'll sometimes soothe back to sleep; sometimes she decides to be wide awake for an hour or more no matter how much we try to convince her otherwise. Once she goes to sleep after that, the rest of the night is a toss up. Some nights (which have become rare), she only wakes every few hours to nurse and go back to bed. Most nights, she refuses to be put back in her bed, forcing Grant (my hero) to walk with her or rock her in the chair while she sleeps. (And, yes, we know that really just perpetuates the problem, but when you're exhausted, you go for the quick fix in order to survive. If you have any other helpful suggestions, we're all ears.) We're hoping Phae will be healthy spring break so we can figure out a plan to sleep train her. I have never been good at handling crying it out, but Phaedra seems to self-soothe a little better than Eleanor did, so maybe we can come up with a plan that's a happy medium. Wish us luck.

Besides sleep issues, Phaedra is such a great baby. She's happy and easy to take places. Well, not all places. For some reason, she must have decided a while back that the best time and place to seriously poop her pants and have a huge blow-out was in the car on the way to visit Daddy at work. Luckily, now that she's been on solids for a while, we haven't had that problem as much.

But she really is a pleasant baby with plenty of personality. I put her in the middle of our bed one time to wash my hands real quick. When I came back, she had rolled onto her tummy, and as soon as I talked to her and came closer, she squealed and started inching away from me, looking back to smile as she went. I couldn't believe it. She was already playing cat and mouse with me, egging me on to play with her at a time in the evening when I usually do.

She is enthralled with Eleanor and is giddy with any hint of attention she can get from her oblivious sister. I think that's half the reason she is so driven to be mobile. She's trying to keep up with Eleanor and insist on being included in the fun.

We call her "The Maw" because she's just like a character on a game we got (an alien that eats everything in its path). There is no limit to what she can find and try to eat. But, when it comes to nicknames, Eleanor has called her "bug" or "my bug" so often when in her Wall-E roll playing, that Grant and I call her bug without even thinking anymore.

About a week ago, Phaedra started a really Mommy-clingy phase. She doesn't like me to be out of sight. She fights Daddy going to bed and calms right down for me (sometimes). I can hand her to Grant and go out of the room, and she'll whimper, watching after me. When I return, her whole face (and body) light up with elation as if she hasn't seen me in years. It can get old when I want to hand her off, but it's nice to feel like a superstar, if only in her eyes.

Eleanor at six months old. This was the first time she ever sat up on her own. Phaedra can sit up on her own for very brief periods of time before tipping over. That's probably all Eleanor could do at this time, too, we just were really excited about it.