baby girl: 6 months

Six months.  Already?!

I’m in denial that my baby girl is already half a year old.  I seriously feel like I just got out of the hospital last week (except much better than I did then), not that I’ve already been a mom for half a year.  But, the past 6 months have by far been the best (and most challenging) of my life!

Milestones + Accomplishments

MacKenna is still enjoying discovering new things every day.  We have such a fun time watching her get so entranced at all her new toys, although she does have her favorites.  She enjoys “talking” to her pacifier and absolutely loves pulling her singing birdie that is hooked to the side of her crib.  As soon as we lay her down in her crib, her hand goes directly to either her pacifier or her birdie.  I actually found her sound asleep, holding onto her birdie last week when I went to wake her up in the morning.

She still has not rolled over from her back to her tummy on her own.  We’ve been working on this now for a good 2 months.  However, we are closer than ever now.  We have been rolling her onto her side and she will finally put her head down and roll the rest of the way, but she shows no interest in doing it on her own.  She’s such a nosy little girl that I think she just loves being able to see everything on her back.  She hasn’t realized yet that this is her way to be mobile.  I guess all I had to do was write this paragraph because guess what?!  Baby girl rolled over all on her own last night – TWICE!  It’s just too bad that Matt had a track meet and missed it!

As for tummy time, she is really starting to push up on her arms well.  She also tries to scoot/worm her way to her toys, but again, not really with any purpose.  She hasn’t figured out how to coordinate her arms and legs to actually be mobile.  She’ll push up, but then go all the way back down on her tummy and kick her legs.  She just not quite strong enough yet hold herself up.

She is also still learning how to sit on her own.  We practice every evening.  She will sit but is still completely supported by her hands and tends to either fall over to the side or fold in half and faceplant on the ground. 

I’m starting to wonder if her small size is putting her behind developmentally.  Again, I tend to play the comparison game and seeing Emmie and Cullen sitting and practically crawling on their own makes me wonder why my baby isn’t doing the same thing.  I also wonder if it’s because I’m not at home with her to work on this stuff with her constantly.  She made huge strides the week I was on spring break because we spent a lot of time playing on the floor and practicing sitting – I don’t think she gets quite as much time doing that stuff while at the babysitter’s.  I know she’ll get there eventually, but I hate thinking that she’s behind at her age.

What We’re Working On

I will go into this more extensively in another post, but we started MacKenna on solids this week!  After talking to Maddie and reading about it on Brittany’s blog, I decided to look into Baby Led Weaning.  It’s a totally new concept that I hadn’t even heard about until about a month ago, but it just seemed to make sense to me.  So, I borrowed the book from the library and decided to try it out.

M had her first “bite” of real food last week in the form of a banana, and this week she is getting some sweet potato every night.  So far, she’s only swallowed about 2 bites each night, but it’s a start, even if it’s a little slow.  Her face is pretty priceless when it’s in her mouth.  I’m still freaked out about her choking, but I’m trying to be calm about it (and have infant CPR pulled up on my phone 24/7 just in case).

Mama’s Miles

Half marathon – check!  I’ve accomplished my goal and am now looking into what’s next.  BUT, you will just have to wait until my Body After Bump update on Friday for all of that.

As for this month, I ran a total of 105 miles (average 26.25 miles/week), my longest run being the half marathon and my fastest was my 5-mile race at a 7:10/mile pace.  Too bad I couldn’t have averaged that pace with the half marathon as well!

Random Tidbits

• Number of doctor’s visits this month:  2 spontaneous – one to the pediatrician and then one to urgent care.  She’s been doing much better!
• Current weight:  At both doctor’s visits, she was weighing in right around 12.5 pounds.  Her weight gain has slowed down a lot, but she’s still eating really well.
• Clothing size:  We’re still in 0-3 and have been since January!  I’m washing her 3-6 month clothes this week because we need some warmer weather outfits, even if they are too big for her!
• Breastfeeding:  I made it to my goal of 6 months, but plan on continuing until a year or until she isn’t interested anymore.  She still gets 1 bottle of formula when she’s at the babysitter, which has really helped me keep up with our breastmilk stash.  I am still pumping 3 times a day during the week and getting about 10 ounces each day (I just don’t produce a lot of milk).  The pumping is the only reason I would quit breastfeeding right now.
• New discoveries:  Faces and tags.  She loves touching everyone’s face – including my friend’s little boy’s face.  And if a toy has a tag on it, she will find it and chew on it all day long.  She loves her taggie blanket her Aunt Angie made for her!