My kid loves Dora the Explorer

Oliver woke up in a better mood this morning, thank God! He still seemed a bit uncomfortable but was smiling and kicking as I changed his diaper.

Smiling, but looks kinda pale, no?

I put him in the saucer and he seemed very excited to play with his toys. I wanted to make myself a good breakfast for myself since I don't seem to have a ton of time for other meals with a sick baby. I flipped on the TV to keep him company, thinking he would ignore it like he usually does. Sometimes when we're watching, the magical moving pictures catch his eye but not for long. This time I thought, Hey maybe I'll try some cartoons. The only thing on was Dora the Explorer (which I find totally annoying, but whatever). Immediately Oliver stopped what he was doing, and was GLUED to the TV.

He sat there in his saucer, hands on the apple, in awe of this magical Spanish-speaking cartoon character. My first thought was, "Oh, shit." My kid likes TV! This can't be good for him, right?? First of all, look how close he is! So I moved him back a few feet. While I moved him, his eyes remained on Dora. So there you have it. He likes cartoons, and I let him watch them. I felt like a bad mommy for about .02 seconds. It's probably not GREAT for a 6 month old to watch TV, but if it allows me to make scrambled eggs interrupted then why not? I don't plan to do this all day every day. And look how happy he is! After the crappy days he's had, why not let him veg out and watch some Dora? At least it's not Barney or Hannah Montana... Ugh.

(Password is: Zogas)

Oliver loves Dora from Lindsay Zogas on Vimeo.

Oh, teething. I hate you.

I jinxed myself this morning. Oliver woke up around 6:30am, smiling and happy as could be. I picked him up from his crib and said, "There's the Oliver I know! I'm so glad you're feeling better!" I went on to tell John, my parents, a few friends, the world, that Oliver was back to his old self. He still seemed a bit pale, but I hadn't seen him smile like that since the other day, so I figured (well, HOPED) the worst was over. Whatever this was– a cold, or teething pain, he seemed to be much better.

A couple hours later after another nap, he woke up crying. He looked exhausted and was whimpering a lot. We played with a few toys, hung out with a girlfriend of mine who came by, and he went down for another nap. This time he was out for 2 hours, and my parent's came over after he woke up. Again, he whimpered a lot and just couldn't settle down, but still seemed better than yesterday. One more nap later (after it took an hour to get him to calm down and fall asleep), Oliver woke up SCREAMING. Like the scream he gives when he's hurt. I rocked him, distracted him with videos of Yo Gabba Gabba online (so annoying but he loves the bright colors), gave him every teething toy we had, and nothing soothed him. John came home, and there was more crying. Not just Oliver, but me! It was so incredibly hard to see my normally happy baby in so much pain, as I watched helplessly. I burst into tears and cried along with him as I tried to rock him to sleep. After that didn't work, I gave him a bath and he finally calmed down. He happily kicked the water and sucked on a washcloth, and seemed ok. I pulled him out of the water and the second he felt the towel, he started freaking out. Huge tears, big screams, the works! He calmed down a little bit for a bottle and book with John, and is now currently in his room with Daddy crying harder than I have ever heard. My heart is breaking... What the HELL do you do when you've tried E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G?! I feel like I did when we first brought Oliver home. Trying everything and anything to soothe him, having no idea what will work, just hoping something will end the crying for HIS sake. I'm fine and don't feel frustrated like I thought I would– I just feel BAD. I can deal with this and do everything over and over again until he's calm, but I realllllly hope these stupid teeth break through soon!

Oliver's first fever

Oliver woke up around 7:30 this morning, and seemed happy. I fed him, changed his diaper, and put him in the saucer. He was very smiley and in a good mood, although he was quieter than usual. And his head felt warm, but I took his temp and it was 99. Nothing to freak out over, right?


Fast forward one hour and one nap later, Oliver woke up crying. This is never a good sign. He always wakes up happy, unless something is wrong. I changed his diaper, and he quietly laid on the changing pad. He usually grabs the toys on the mobile above his head, or scratches the walls with his hands (he LOVES that sound!), but he did nothing. I took his temp again, this time it was 100. We laid down on the couch, and for 2 hours he looked like this:


In and out of sleep, and just cuddly as can be. It breaks my heart seeing him like this! He is obviously in pain– it's either a cold, or he's teething. I gave him some Tylenol (the Target-brand, since the real stuff is still out of stock due to that horrible recall) so hopefully that helps break the fever (which just read 101– but then it was 100 again a minute later... I think I need an old-fashioned thermometer, these digital ones are confusing). I feel so helpless but know all I can do is just snuggle him and watch his temp. Does this happen EVERY time a new tooth comes in?! Man...

Rice cereal!

I REALLLLY wanted to wait until Oliver was exactly 6 months old before introducing any kind of food. Dr. B told us to start with rice cereal around 5 1/2 months, and at our 6 month check up we'd talk about other foods. Even with his orders, I still wanted to wait. What's another 2 weeks, right? Oliver doesn't NEED solid food so I figured holding out would be just fine.

Well, I have changed my mind and today I made my first batch of homemade rice cereal. Why, you ask? The past 2 nights Oliver has woken up every 2-3 hours. It is slowly killing me. We've stuck to our bath-book-bottle-bed routine for weeks now, and even moved our start time to 7:30 which is usually when he starts to meltdown in the evening. Several people and websites have said a solid routine is the key to a good night's sleep. HA! Obviously my child marches the beat of his own drum, because he does not care what a routine should do for him. Before these last 2 awful nights, he was still waking up once or twice, so it's been going on for awhile. Like 2 months... Mama's had enough.

So today is day 1 of solid food. We'll just start with tastes of it and see how it goes, and hopefully in the next couple of weeks we'll all get some good sleep around here.

Not sure about this...

Why are you trying to kill me?

Rice Cereal from Lindsay Zogas on Vimeo.

Baby sign language class

A couple weeks ago, a friend of ours from childbirth class sent me information on a baby sign language class she had signed up for. I've seen friends sign with their babies and have always been interested in it, so John and I decided to take the class. Yesterday was the first session, and we were both very impressed! Our teacher, Shannon, is very sweet and has lots of experience working with both deaf and hearing babies and kids. We learned a few songs and about 20 signs (what, where, mom, dad, bubbles, bear, more, all done, silly...) Here's a picture of my boys enjoying the Bear song!

Baby talk!

Bath time!

This little butt makes me smile.

Practicing...

Oliver has been "chomping" like this a ton lately. I think he's practicing eating and/or talking!

Practicing from Lindsay Zogas on Vimeo.

Rolling from back to belly... while swaddled?!

Oliver has now mastered the art of rolling from his back to his belly. I am so proud! However... He now practices in his crib. While swaddled. Which means he gets stuck on his belly! At first I thought he was turning in order to get a better look at his stuffed animals:


So I took them out. A few minutes later (after putting him down re-swaddled and half asleep), I heard squawking from the other room. Not the usual "I'm awake, come get me!" squawk... The, "I'm stuck!!!!!" cry for help. This time he got one of his arms free and was happily chomping on his pacifier.


Perhaps it's time to get rid of the swaddle blanket??

Standing! Well, kind of.

I love this video for so many reasons. Oliver's crazy hair (yes, this is how it looks on a daily basis!), John's baby talk, how proud and determined he is to help Oliver to "stand"... So cute.

Standing with support from Lindsay Zogas on Vimeo.

Bedtime routine

For the first couple months of Oliver's life, he slept beautifully. People would joke with us, "Is anyone getting any sleep?!" and smile, expecting to hear us tell them all about the crazy nights we've experienced. Instead we'd smile back and proudly say, "Actually, yes. Oliver sleeps through the night." Well... Those days are long gone, and have been for over a month now. I think part of it is that Oliver is so aware of his surroundings, so if something catches his attention (the pattern of his bedding, the nightlight, the toys on the shelves) he can't settle down and fall back asleep. I see him staring at these things when the lights are on so it doesn't surprise me. The other part of it I'm sure is hunger. We still feed him 5 ounces every 2.5-3 hours, but as he's growing I'm sure he needs more. Most people start solid foods around this age, and give rice cereal before bed to fill them up. But we're very serious about waiting to start ANY kind of food until 6 months (google "open gut" and read the KellyMom.com article). So we decided to try an experiment and see if a little nighttime routine will help. We naturally fell into a routine for awhile– we fed him his last bottle sometime between 9 and 10pm, swaddled him, then put him to sleep. Some nights we'd read a book or sing songs, and John and I would trade off doing this at night. We know kids need a predictable schedule and routine, and figured it couldn't hurt establishing one for Oliver.

Around 8pm every night, I give Oliver a bath. I wash his hair, play with the rubber ducky, let him "swim" on his tummy, and he splashes around like crazy.

Bath time! from Lindsay Zogas on Vimeo.

After we're done, I bring him into the room (that is dimly lit) and give him a little baby massage and put on his jammies. John takes over from here– he first reads a story, then feeds him his bottle (which we now fill to 8 ounces), swaddles, rocks and then puts him in his crib.


The first night we did this, Oliver slept from 8:45pm until 4:30am. I was SO excited– it worked!! Our routine worked!! I know, 4:30am doesn't seem like anything to celebrate but after a month of 1am feedings, this was amazing. I was so excited the next night, and after the same routine... No such luck. Oliver was wide awake at 1:30am "singing" in his crib, patiently waiting for mommy to feed him. It's now been over a week of our new routine, and Oliver continues to wake up between 1 and 3am. Oh well! It's just how it is. Some babies sleep through the night, others wake up multiple times. Oliver ALWAYS greets me with a smile, no matter what time it is, so it's hard to complain. I'm hoping a little rice cereal before bed time at 6 months will help... I guess we'll see!

Oliver at 5 Months

At 5 months, Oliver:

-has got to be close to 17 pounds. He is HEAVY!! I swear any day now he'll be too heavy for his infant car seat.
-is wearing Gerber size 12 months, and growing out of every 6 month piece of clothing we own.
-is in size 3 diapers.
-goes to bed around 8:30pm after his (new) routine: bath by mommy, then a book, bottle (we feed him 8 ounces of breast milk at bed time) & bed by daddy.
-has rolled over from his back to front a couple times. He must not enjoy it because he doesn't do it often!
-loves sitting in the Bumbo while watching mommy make breakfast. He doesn't sit on his own yet but gets great practice in his cute little chair.
-has thunder thighs! His legs are very strong and he loves to stand in his exersaucer. If you hold him up, he'll take steps. It's adorable.
-has the best laugh but seems to save it for special occasions.
-still puts everything in his mouth and seems especially fond of the corners of pillows.
-is VERY interested in watching people eat. We are holding out until his 6 month birthday to offer his first solid food and feel confident he'll be ready!
-loves his feet and tries to put them in his mouth.
-loves the sound of his voice. He squeals, squawks and "coughs" when he wants our attention.
-is our obsession. John and I look at each other multiple times a day and say how lucky we are. Our baby is so loving and sweet, and we don't know where we'd be without him!

Happy to see Dada!

I love watching Oliver's reaction when John comes home from work. He stops whatever he's doing, his face lights up and he gives him the biggest smile and coos. Sometimes he kicks his legs or spits, which happens when he's overly excited. I'll have to get it on video sometime because it's just so sweet to see the love between these two. Here's a few pics from last night:

EVERYTHING goes in the mouth these days

This past week

Here are some pictures of the little one enjoying his last days as a 4-month old... Can you believe he will be FIVE months on Friday?!

Exhausted in his exersaucer

Smiles for Dada!

Waiting so patiently for his breakfast... This kid is an angel.

Not happy with Mr. Giraffe

Look Ma, no hands!

Crazy hair!

Goo!

Swingin'