The Week of the 4 Month Shots

Lucien is now 19 weeks old and it is time for another doctor's appointment.  This time I had company with me and Lynn came along.  Dr. Rojas is a good doctor but the office visit is a treacherous ordeal because waiting time is never less than an hour and a half.  Lucien weighed in at a whooping 15 lbs 5 oz.  and grew to 25 inches tall.  He took his shot like a man (or a really pudgy baby) and had only a slight flinch thanks to his "turkey legs".

The Week of Hairy Tales

Lucien is 18 weeks old and is showing signs of development every day.  His hair growth has been pretty stunted until now.  It is long enough now that you can just barely make out a part.  In the back it is really long at the nape of his neck which causes a dark patch of hair on the back of his head - it's his baby mullet.  Pretty soon his hair will grow out on top and we won't be able to make out his spirals at the top of his head.  When Lucien was born Pau-Pau was interested in his spirals and told us that Lucien may be a naughty kid because he has 2 spirals in his hair.  Luckily it wasn't 3 spirals.  This week, Grandma Jean came over the other day and remarked on how much hair has grown in on his eyebrows.  She said "babies do not have eyebrows".  Is this true?  Well, Lucien must be getting his Conway eyebrows in early.

Lucien is still turning over a lot.  He is starting to turn back the other way so he doesn't stuck like he was the previous week.  He plays with his hands a lot more and loves checking all his little toys.  We think he has s

tarted teething or has some gum irritation because he keeps rubbing his mouth.  Lucien still eats his cereal once a day but now he takes rice cereal or the mixed grain cereal.  His digestion has become much better and his system is regular again.  The colic/reflux is pretty much non-existent these days.  

Now that Lucien isn't in pain anymore in the evening we started a night time routine to get him to fall asleep on his own.  He's getting too heavy to rock sleep each night.  His routine consists of a change into PJs, a feeding, being placed in the crib, a bedtime story, a kiss on the 

forehead, and a soothing CD to fall asleep to.  It also consists of his favorite thing to snuggle with - his little bear blankie buddy.  The first 2 nights he cried himself to sleep for about 10 minutes but since he drifts of to sleep without a peep.      

The Week of the Roll Over

Lucien is 17 weeks old and is super active.  He has really started rolling over but he cannot roll himself back.  This has caused him to continue waking in the night.  

The Week of Changing Times and Time Changes

Lucien is 16 weeks old.  He is starting to really like eating the rice cereal and we can't scoop it into his mouth fast enough.  Grandma and Grandpa came down from New York for a visit and Lucien was so excited that he forgot to take care of his "business".  Maybe it was the rice cereal, but Lucien went from Friday morning until Monday evening without a BM.  We got concerned on day 2 and then read in Dr. Spock's manual that once babies are about 4 months old it could be a few days in between bowel movements.  That is shocking for us because Lucien used to have 3-4 per day.  Saturday evening, daylight savings kicked in and come Sunday Lucien was in rare form.  He didn't feel too well that day and was cranky and crying for most of the night.  There is a silver lining though, Lucien slept through the night on that Sunday evening - a total of 7 hours straight.    

The Week of Rice Cereal 101

Lucien is now into Week 15.  He is almost four months old and we couldn't wait any longer.  It's time to introduce the rice cereal to get him on his way to eating solid foods and hopefully sleeping better.  Lucien has still been waking up through the night 1-2 times or about every 3 hours.  We started by mixing some rice cereal into his milk and then we tried spoon feeding him about 1 tbsp of rice cereal mixed with his milk.  He used his tongue thrusting technique to eat which caused him to wear most of his first rice cereal meal.  But all in all it was a success!  The sleeping hasn't changed though.  I guess I have to wait until he's eating the prime rib before he's sleeping through the night again.

The Week of High Kickin'

Lucien is now 14 weeks old and boy is he getting active.  He is playing with his toys more and more each day.  We have a ton of toys for him so it's fun introducing a new toy to him to see if he's interested.  His new trick this week is kicking up his legs and turning over on his side.  He loves falling over to his side but he still can't make a full roll.  

We received a great gift certificate to www.RentAToy.com from Aunt T.  I went in and selected a bunch of toys that may spark Lucien's interest.  The delivery came this week and the box was filled with a lot of fun toys including a new mobile to go over his crib.  He loves his mobiles!

The Week That Mom Goes Back To Work

Lucien has just turned 13 weeks old.  Now that he is 3 months old he is developing so fast and now Mom has to go back to work.  Lucien was doing well sleeping through the night during week 12 but this week was another story.  He must have reached his 3 month growth spurt because he was back to being up twice through the night.  He was eating a lot through the week and by week end he was back to sleeping through the night again for a full 7 hour stretch.  Now that I am at the office all day I am pumping 2-3 times in the office - a very difficult job when surrounded by work and stress.  We'll see just how long the milk flows.  

Lucien has started discovering his hands.  They aren't balled up in fists as much.  He hasn't started gazing at his fingers yet, he just likes to stick his fi

sts and fingers in his mouth and munch on them.  Lucien is also starting to grasp at objects and play with his toys.  His favorite toys right now are his cloth blocks and his Ducky.  He enjoys talking to Ducky so much that he's starting to look like him...