8 weeks of curly haired joy

2 weeks

4 weeks

8 weeks

[stef]

My newborn stopped being a newborn. Although I can't pinpoint the exact moment it happened, I started getting little clues as to the change that was underway. Clues like:

He started smiling. And not just before a toot. Like actually looking at his mommy and giving her a big grin, especially if she was in the middle of giving him a lecture on not peeing in her lap. Now he regularly smiles at me and Ty, sometimes even in the middle of a wail. And it makes me happy every time, even at 4:00a.m. And then again at 5:00a.m. And once again at 5:45a.m. He's also getting to be very aware of what's going on around him. The other day, from the couch, he watched me go all the way to the kitchen, and when I turned around to make sure he was ok, he was just staring and smiling at me.

He started talking. Well...sort of. This began in BC when my mom would plunk him on her lap in the morning and engage him in what seemed like sometimes hour long "conversations", where Hudson would stare back at her and squinch his eyes half closed and grin and make happy little baby sounds in response. Once I told him to say hi to daddy, and he turned to Ty and smiled and made a very "hi"-like sound. That's my boy!

He started playing. Seriously, I put this kid down on his play mat or in his bouncer and all I hear are little happy excited baby noises as he swats around the toys for a good 20 minutes while I scurry to do the things I can't when I'm strapped to the couch feeding him (brushing my teeth, etc..). We keep saying he's going to be a handful of energy and mischief when he's older, and nothing he's doing now is proving otherwise.

He grew out of his newborn clothes. I was in denial about this for a little while, and insisted on scrunching him into sleepers that didn't even allow for full stretching of the leg. Poor guy. But, as sad as I was about this at first, I  realize how positive it is to see my baby grow and chub up a little.

He's becoming more mobile. He can roll from his tummy to his back now! His head control is amazing, and his legs are super strong. Tonight at bathtime he locked his legs against the side of the bath in resistance (picture a cat that's about to get dunked), even though he loves his baths - but it was just amazing to see how much more solid and less tiny and breakable he's getting. I'm happy to say that his legs are still very elastic-y, especially when he's upset. I discovered how much I loved this when he was just a few days old, and I hope it lasts for awhile yet.

He discovered his lungs. No more patient whimpering when he's hungry or wet or just plain annoyed. Okay, he definitely has his whimpers and high pitched squeaks, but for the most part when he wants attention, he gets it!

What he's not doing?

You guessed it - sleeping. Unless he's being rocked or patted for a loooong time, he will not sleep really at all during the day. A few snatches of 20-30 minutes at a time has been typical for the past week. Once in a while, after being in the car, he'll go for a good couple of hours, but for the most part, he just doesn't seem to want to nap. I have to say, he is a very happy baby though. It's not like he's awake all day and screaming, unless he has some painful tummy issues (usually those are temporary and disappear with ALOT of burping and sometimes colic tablets). We're trying to work out some oversupply issues right now, which might be the cause of alot of things that are going on right now. Oversupply leads to too much sugary foremilk which a) is quickly digested and means very very frequent nursing and b) ferments in the baby's digestive tract and leads to tummy issues. Also, when I get my letdown reflex, it's too much for him to take at once, so he ends up taking in alot more air, which further makes him very uncomfortable. So - tell me if YOU would sleep when your tummy hurts and yet you're hungry all the time? At night, he doesn't do too badly - Ty usually rocks him to sleep for a good hour or so, and then he spends a couple hours in his co-sleeper. Then when he wants to nurse after that, I do it while lying down, and both of us usually fall asleep this way, and after he's out, I will sometimes move him to a chiropractic pillow that's next to me. This is something I thought I wouldn't do (co-sleeping), but it is a temporary solution that gives all of us a little more rest, plus it's teaching him that nighttime  is for sleeping (achieved by not turning on lights, tv, etc., which I had been doing previously).

All in all, Hudson is a delightful little infant and even at eight weeks old, is teaching me more than I ever could have imagined!