Piper had her 4 month check up last week (a few weeks late!) In addition to the dreaded shots (one in each leg, she handled it with a few good cries, then some grace), she smiled endlessly at the nurse and doctor, weighed 15 lbs 13 oz, and is 25 1/4 inches long. She seems really big to me...but the weight and height put her in the 75-90%, so nothing off the charts of anything!
4 months old is so much different than a newborn. She's so strong...really wants to be sitting up or standing up. Doesn't tolerate the reclined angle of a bouncy seat or car seat very well, primarily because she is working her abs the whole time to get more upright.
And she wants to be upright because she wants to engage. That's the fun part. She smiles so easily, talks and coos a lot, laughs out loud (mostly at Rowan). She tracks what's going on in the room, who's going where, and all of this is just easier to do when you're sitting up.
She reaches and grabs for toys and makes a fast panting noise when her favorites come into view.
When she is awake, she is generally happy. I've recently gotten brave enough to take both girls to the grocery store. Not for a long trip, but definitely not and in-an-out trip, either. Piper actually stayed in her car seat the whole time (a revelation!)...happily gazing at the lights and ceiling fans, the whirring groceries as we passed. This may seem like a normal occurrence for a baby at the store, but for me, after Rowan's baby-hood, this is a minor miracle. To go to the store with my hands free, with no crying. A miracle.
And the car trips, too, are much improved. She will cry if she is tired, but that seems to be the only time she cries in the car nowadays.
I've been putting Piper's hair in two ponytails. I had to do something, it's getting so long. My friend Jill (thank you very much for doing this without asking, for helping a hairstyle deficient momma out) put her hair in one ponytail on top of her head a few weeks ago...and I realized it was possible. And sort of cute. It just makes her look so old. If old is 7 or 8 months, at least :)
Sleep has been our only frustrating category. For about a month now she's been back on her schedule of waking every 3-4 hours. Usually happy, sometimes hungry. But way too frequently for an almost-16 pound 4 month old. She isn't waking up in discomfort, as far as we can tell....she's just waking. Maybe out of habit. Who knows. Last week we decided to let her cry for graduated periods of time. The first night, she cried an hour and a half, then later in the night for 45 minutes, then later for 30. We thought we were on the right track. The next night, she cried from 4:00 AM until after 6:30 AM...it was quiet about 20 minutes (did she even go to sleep, or was she just pondering child abandonment?) and cried out again at 7:00...at which point we decided she must really be hungry by now, it was, after all, morning.
Those are the worst times. I think hell might be perpetual waking between the hours of 2:00 AM and 4:30 AM. Time would never advance past those hours...just get to 4:30 and go right back to 2:00 AM, and you're still not sleeping. Or maybe you've just finally fallen asleep, only to be woken again.
Then you just start questioning everything: does this qualify as child abuse? is she really old enough to know that we will be here in the morning, that she is safe? could she be hungry? maybe she is sick. maybe her diaper is full. maybe her foot is caught in the railing. maybe a spider bit her.
But then, at 7:00 AM, after basically 3 hours of crying, she greets me with a huge smile, wants to coo on the changing table. Huh.
So we're still figuring the sleep out. Most people say to go in and check periodically to make sure there is no pressing need...then to let them cry for graduated amounts of time. Seems easy enough. But there are still a million things to question!
She has done this 2-3 hour period of crying more than a few more times...usually in the early early morning hours....and never succeeds in falling asleep. Needless to say, we're tired. From listening and waiting it out. So we're giving it a break for a few weeks to see if she makes any improvement in her sleep naturally. The last several days she's experimented with the very fun possibility of waking, for good, at about 5:00 AM. Good times.
I've uploaded a bunch of photos to Flickr from the past month or so. A few shots from Mother's Day (of the girls with their Nana, a few with me), some more pictures from the actual day Piper was 4 months old, some pictures of Piper's evolving hair-dos, a few pics from an apple orchard, some silly dress-up. You'll also find a random shot of some retro wallpaper we found while doing some demolition at the house, a picture of Rowan working on a mural we're doing in Piper's room, and several pictures from a nice Sunday hike we took when the leaves were just budding. To see this random assortment of photos, click here.
We're just pointing out the resemblance, that's all :)
Joe should really write a post about what he's been up to. In addition to trying to finish our kitchen, he has been really busy doing some side projects for other people, and coaching pole vault a few days a week at a local high school. He has some fun stories to tell!
