Spear Summary of Month 6

This is a summary of Spear’s 6th month of life (the entire month of May). He was 5 months old during this month.

Eating: At this stage in parenting Spear I’m really sad about not nursing him. I know it was the best choice for everyone involved and I can’t fathom actually breastfeeding him. Especially during those tender days in the hospital! But life is easier now with him. He’s on a smooth schedule. He eats well. He’s happy and content. This is the sweet spot of nursing a baby and it’s when I’m really missing it. I still love the snuggles with him while feeding but it’s simply not the same as nursing!

He is taking 2 6 oz bottles a day (the first two of the day) then I offer between 6-8 oz of breastmilk at his 3:00 feeding and give 8 oz for his nighttime bottle.

He went through a period this week where he was fussier with his bedtimes and was fussy right after feeding so I bumped his 6 oz bottles up to 8 oz for a few days and it must have been a growth spurt because it all adjusted him back to sleeping well and then after those few days he stopped drinking the full 8 oz so I went back down to 6!

I’m still using room temperature nursery water for his bottles and Enfamil Gentlease for his formula. I’m curious for those of you who bottle feed…at what point do you switch to regular water? And when do you switch to store brand formula? I feel like once he’s eating solids it may be fine to switch?

He is much more alert and awake now for feedings but will still have the occasion where he’s sleepy…which is so sweet!

He also will “fight” me for the chance to get to hold the bottle himself and is very protective of it ha!

One of THE biggest benefits of bottle feeding are the bonds it creates with his siblings. They adore a chance to help feed him (you can read all my benefits of bottle vs breastfeeding here). I love how unsure Spear looks about Britt feeding him haha!

I love when he does his pop-eye drinking face 😉

Sleep: Spear is much more active and therefore has many more spurts of not sleeping. However, he’s always super happy in the crib. There are rarely any moments of crying or issues. It’s so rare for him to be upset that when he is upset I almost always go in and check on him and typically it’s because he’s stuck in the corner of the crib and can’t roll his way out! He loves to play with his friend and kick the sides of the crib (here’s a video!)

We are still using a Halo Sleep Sack which works great and he still has his breathable friend as well as typically sucks his thumb. Most often I find him on his belly when I go into his room so I for sure think he’s a tummy sleeper. I still follow safe sleep practices and always lay him down on his back but I don’t worry about him rolling.

We also stopped using any sort of breathing monitor this month. It was so frustrating with Spear that my Snuza didn’t work. We used an Angel Care monitor instead and it just isn’t very reliable once a baby is rolling all over the place. Spear is so active and is moving constantly in his crib that the alarm was going off frequently because he’d move too far away from the monitor.

He also still very regularly falls asleep in the car! I try not to stress it as it hasn’t affected his sleep in other areas.

As he’s getting more and more active, the snuggle time is less and less but I try to soak it up when he lets me!

Schedule:

Spear continues on the 4 hour schedule. He is also still sticking to a FULL nap for his third nap and hasn’t shown any signs of starting to cut it down to more of a true “cat nap” yet.

6:45-7:15: Up for the day, 6 oz bottle

8:45-9:00: Down for nap

10:45-11:15: Up. 6 oz bottle

12:45ish: Down for nap

3:00-3:15: up and 8 oz breastmilk

4:45-5:00: Down for nap

7:15ish: Up from nap, bath, bedtime bottle (8 oz) then immediately back to bed for night!

More About Spear this Month:

SUCH a big month of many milestones for Spear!

My first Mother’s Day as his mama!

The finalization of his adoption

( I think I failed to share this video on his finalization morning!)

And the party celebrating the finalization!

Even though the adoption is finalized, we will always be mindful of Mama E. She will always be important to our family and will always be part of our family unit, as will her other babies too. Our agreement is to send a monthly letter with photos for the first 12 months, then at 18 months and 24 months then yearly from then on until Spear is 18. Mama E says she looks very forward to these letters and photos and actually asked for more showing Spear with us and his siblings and doing things as a family as it makes her heart so happy to see how loved he is by us all. You know I had PLENTY to send 😉

I’m all about keeping Spear easy going and well adjusted. I remember Britt having a hard time with grass and not liking to touch it so when we went to the park this month I was like BAM here’s the grass haha. He didn’t mind it one bit!

Lindsay was such a wonderful friend for me through our entire adoption process and she and I both prayed so hard for each other in our paths for our sons. It’s been SO awesome to see God at work in both of our lives and it was so fun getting to have a little playdate with Spear and her son, Wake!

Wake isn’t too sure about me ha!

Instant buddies!

So thankful for these gifts from the Lord and for our friendship!

Mrs. Charlotte got this book for Spear when he was born and I LOVE IT! I love sitting with both Tessie and Spear in my lap and reading books together especially ones as meaningful as this 🙂

I have always loved having my babies on my knees and playing “bouncy baby” Spear cracks me up because his hair just flops and flops!!!

Here’s a video of that floppy hair in action 😉

The bald days are numbered! Whoop whoop! Getting that new hair fuzz coming in!!!

Spear is just SO HAPPY! He ALWAYS greets me with a HUGE grin when I go into his room!

Pretty sure we’re gonna have a tooth here soon because Spear was fussier than usual this month and just had that painful cry that teething brings. Ugh. Teething is THE WORST. It was hard to soothe him but he’s a higher sleep needs baby (which Britt was too) so I tend to just put him to bed super early when he’s fussy and typically he is just really wanting that extra sleep.

I thought it was the perfect time to bust out this appropriate onesie 😉

Way, way, WAY back in Sept of 2008 we went and bought our baby crib that we still use for all of our babies. That same day Mrs. Charlotte was with us and offered to buy the baby’s first outfit. Zach picked out a boy outfit and I picked a girl one. I still have them both and Spear wore the outfit Zach had picked out way back then this month 🙂

I love looking back at the beginning of my blogging days…we were SO excited to be parents. Go back and see the post where we bought the outfit here 🙂 So cool to see it all come full circle and now have that first outfit being worn by our last baby!

We were supposed to have a try 2 this month on Spear’s first beach visit to go to Cocoa Beach but it was BAD weather so I dressed him for the beach at home anyway 🙂

Sibling Time:

Seeing the kids with Spear makes me excited for summer when we’ll all get to be together all day every day! Now that he’s getting more active and more interested in the world around him it’s more fun having him involved in their lives…but it’s about to get interesting as he’s also starting to notice the stuff they have and is wanting it for himself too 😉

Gotta get ’em loving games young!

Surprise Slides is Tess’s favorite 🙂

Starting to go after stuff she’s playing with…so far she’s patient…so far

Britt announced she wanted to play with Spear…as she stood as far away from him as she could ha!

Honestly though, the older he’s getting the more and more interest she’s showing! I think she loves seeing his little personality blossom!

And he loves watching everything she does!

Kye is HILARIOUS because he’s convinced that Spear is ready and able to crawl. He sets up toys a good distance from Spear and then waits for him to crawl and get the toy. When Spear gets frustrated Kye says it’s a positive thing because once he gets mad enough then he’ll crawl and get it haha. Guess he’s gonna be a tough love kinda parent 😉

Crawling “attempt” video 1

Crawling “attempt” video 2

Many things that babies do are just things that babies do. They are milestones and parts of the natural development of babies. I remember feeling disappointment when I realized that so many of the adorable things I thought were special to Kye were all things that Britt did too haha.

However, every baby is different and they do each have their own special “things” about them. For Spear the thing we’ll ALWAYS remember is how much he LOVES to kiss. And I’m talking legit kiss. He is ALL about it and I LOVE IT. Here’s a video! And another b/c I’m obsessed 🙂