Countdown to Baby Harrison!: Six months old!

Can it be? Can half a year really have gone by already? Month five began with the same challenges of month four - crummy sleeping, fussiness, etc., but ended much, much better. We now have a bit of a routine figured out and it has made such a tremendous difference! Mairi now goes to bed between 7:15 and 7:45 pm. It seems really early to us but her cues told us she was tired and she goes to sleep quite easily then. Some nights she stirs a bit in the first part of the evening but it's usually fairly easy to sooth her back to sleep. She is sleeping good, long stretches now - sometimes as long as 13 hours in a row. She sometimes has one feed after sleeping for 7 hours or so, then goes back to sleep for another 5 or so. I know how fleeting good sleep is and how easily it can be thrown off so I will say that she is sleeping well for now. Tonight could be another story! She generally has two naps a day. Depending on whether our activity for the day is in the morning or afternoon, one of those naps is a pretty long one - yesterday's was almost three hours long! I have been very diligent about always putting her down in the same way, whether it's nap or bedtime. Lights dimmed, nursing her in her bedroom, white noise on. She is now successfully unswaddled! That was a difficult one but it's good because now she will often sooth herself back to sleep by sucking her thumb.

The other big development is that she has started eating solid foods. As per her doctor's advice, we gave her beef first. She ate it and swallowed but made some pretty funny faces and gagged a bit. We did the first feeding on Family Day so that Jeff could feed her the first meal. It was a nice family activity! She seems to like the social interaction of feeding. I let her have the spoon and she also sips a bit of water from a sippy cup. She can already hold it and drink on her own. She loves that part! I gave her rice cereal today. She was not as keen on it as the beef but I think that, mostly, she was just tired and not that into eating in general. We are using a booster seat we got from Eldon, who I used to work with. Works great and it was free! We also bought a Lobster

Phil and Ted's Lobster portable high chair

on kijij that was new. Haven't tried it out yet but I think it will be really handy for trips and going to grandparents' houses. We will try some veggies next - I'm excited to try lots of pureed concoctions as she tries new foods!

She is interacting with everyone so much now. Raising her arms to be picked up, laughing when she thinks she's done something funny, putting out a pouty lip when she's sad. She is just the cutest! At last check on Tuesday she weighed 16 lbs, 4 oz. Last doctor's appointment she was about 26.5 inches long. She continues to be well in the 90th percentile for height and she's between 50th and 75th percentile for weight, depending on the chart (different at doctor's and public health). Her physio continues to go well and she's making good progress with the mobility of her neck but she finds it nearly impossible to roll toward the right as it's so uncomfortable for her. Speaking of rolling, she is great at rolling to the left, surprise, surprise! When she doesn't want to do tummy time anymore, she just rolls right over and laughs at me. Shortly after she turned five months she learned how to roll over onto her stomach from her back. She doesn't like to do it as often though. Her sitting is kind of amazing - just today her physiotherapist says she is so straight up that she is sitting more at the level of a seven month old. I felt really happy to hear that. She will reach for things while on her tummy and is awesome at maneuvering objects from hand to hand, picking them up off the ground, taking her soother out of her mouth then putting it back it. All in all she is amazing and we love her so, so much!