Big Brodie Bear (7 months!!!)

My Brodie is so big already! :) He turned 7 months old today and I had to take him to the pediatrician for a weight check since he "wasn't thriving" last month. I'm happy to report that today he weighed in at 14lbs 6oz. That is a 1lb 5oz gain in a month! The doctor was VERY HAPPY about this and FINALLY told me he was thriving.

This means I don't have to freak out so much anymore, and that I don't have to go back til his 9 month well baby check up. They are going to give him a TB test and a hemoglobin test as well next time.

Until then, the pediatrician just told me to keep doing what I'm doing, and that I can up the amount of solids I'm giving him to 3x a day now. The amount of solids I give him at each meal can be as much as he wants, and his only suggestion was to incorporate more baby cereal into his diet to up the amount of iron he gets. So far he has had avocados (loved it), bananas (loved it), squash (tolerated it), sweet potato (loved it), Gerber turkey/gravy (hated it/gagged), green beans (hated them/threw them up), apples (loved it), mango (loved it), and zucchini (tolerated it). Next up is yams, pears, and carrots! I am LOVING making all his food and the fun colors in my freezer!


I'm proud of him for gaining so much weight, and even though he is still a skinny mini (still not quite at the 2nd% line on the weight chart) he is growing at his own pace.

In terms of development, Brodie is growing by leaps and bounds. He is:

*babbling
*sitting up unassisted

*eating 6oz of solids a day
*pushing himself up on his arms a lot (while flailing his legs like he's swimming)
*crossing the mid-line while reaching for things
*when grabbing items his grasp is more precise (It's almost to the point of using a pincer grasp, but not quite)
*rolling over both ways with ease now (Today he actually rolled multiple times in the same direction to get to a notebook he wanted on Grandma's floor!)
*drinking out of a sippy cup (can do 1-2 sips of water at a time, and holds it like a champ)
*has a very keen attention span, scanning and observing every situation intently.
*has figured out the pull mechanism on his ducky toy and makes it vibrate repeatedly in the car. *obsessed with himself in the mirror, and will carry on conversations with himself or anyone around him any chance that he gets.
*LOVES his Johnny jumper thing. He bounces for a good 15-20 minutes before getting worn out in it, smiling the entire time. :)
*loves anything electronic or technical (gets that from his dad) and wants to be a part of whatever we are doing.
*I think we are going to have a crawler here shortly, and then we are going to be in trouble! :P
*Brodie is a pretty amazing sleeper as well. He goes to be pretty close to 8pm every night (give or take 30 min) and will sleep until 6:30-7am. Sometimes he wakes up 1x to eat between 3-5am, sometimes he doesn't. I don't mind, since that is still a great amount of sleep for the both of us!

I'm sure there is more but I can't remember it off the top of my head. :) We are LOVING this time with Brodie and seeing all the progress he is making. We aren't hurrying him along, but rather letting him be a baby as long as he needs. He has his whole life to walk and be an adult. So, we are cherishing this immobile time :P



Sorry I suck at blogging, hopefully I'll post more stuff here now that I'm a full time SAHM!
~Heather

Half a year old already! WOW! (6 months old)

My handsome Brodie Cole is 6 months old today! I can't believe how fast this time has gone and know it's going to continue to speed by if I'm not careful. I am trying my hardest to savor and remember every moment with my family.

Brodie is definitely growing up more and more. He now makes the "ba" sound combined with "da", "goo", screetches, and raspberries. It's getting louder in this house the last couple of weeks hehe.

Brodie is also sitting up unassisted for short periods of time. If you even keep one hand on him he can sit there forever and today he sat down in the corner for probably 30-60 seconds happily without face planting.

In terms of rolling over, he does it with more ease but not every time I put him on his playmat. He likes cuddling with me and hanging out in his rocker chair so maybe I'm not giving

him enough opportunities to roll over. Hopefully it doesn't impend his development. :(

Brodie is making tons of facial expressions in the last couple of months too! He has a scrunchy face he does when he's super happy, a funny lip type thing, and a very wide mouthed smile when he screeches. This is in addition to a pouty face that reminds me of Joshua so much its freaky and a smile that melts my heart every morning.

He is still sleeping through the night (he has since Feb 18th) and his "schedule" is to go to bed between 8-9pm and he wakes up betwe

en 6:20-7am. This is LOVELY for my sanity in terms of how rested I feel but has also resulted in him eating less times per day because he is up less hours a day. He now eats between 5-6 times a day instead of 8-10 times a day. I think he eats more efficiently now though and can suck more milk out faster than he did before.

Brodie grabs on to anything and everything

with his hands, crossing the midline ALL THE TIME and getting my hair in his grasp constantly. I think I'm going to be switching back to contacts soon because of the sheer number of fingerprints that get on my glasses every day and the amount of cleanings I have to do. When he does get something in his mouth he nom noms on it and makes biting motions with his gums. I think he may be teething because this is associated with drool.

We had Brodie's 6 month pediatrician appointment yesterday and it went ok. Vital stats:

Weight: 13lb 1oz (only up 3oz from his FIVE month weight of 12lb 14oz)

Length: 25.5 inches (up .25 inches from his FOUR month length of 12.25 in)

Head: 42.5cm circumference (up 1.5cm from his FOUR month circ. of 41cm)

The pediatrician is getting pretty concerned about his weight because he is still not even on th

e percentile chart and he only gained 3oz in a month

(which is pretty much his morning breakfast feeding amount, if not less than a feeding amount). He was very happy when I told him I was going to start solids with Brodie this weekend. He said "he isn't thriving right now" and that solids would "help him bulk up with the extra calories they provide." He's probably right, and either way I'm not freaking out about it. He's happy and healthy! :)

The ped also said to continue with the reflux meds but not up the dose with an increase in weight because he wants to phase it out since it only helps with the barfing about 1/2 the days.

Brodie got the 3rd round of shots and the rotavirus oral vaccination. He received 2 out of the 3 standard ones...whatever those are (can't remember the abbreviations). The one he didn't get was HepB since we opted out of that one. The doc wants to give it to him at his 9 month but I told him that I want to wait until much later in life to give it to him...like right before Brodie goes into junior high. I also declined the flu shot for this year. I got a long lecture on the importance of both of the shots I declined and you would think that I was killing my kid by not giving him these shots. Well, I questioned the doctor after the lecture on HepB and he finally admitted that Brodie wasn't at risk until he engaged in sex or drugs with someone who was contaminated with HepB virus. In terms of the flu virus, we are going to research it more and possibly give it to him next flu season (since the season's almost over I didn't want to bother with it this year).

Anyway, back to baby food.... We are going to make our own baby food because it is healthier, fresher, and cheaper. Tomorrow we are starting our first meal meal of solids besides the cereal he had for the 4th month of life. And, what is that meal you may ask? AVOCADO! :) I'm excited and am looking forward to the messy pictures and video that will come from it.

I leave you with a few 6 month photoshoot pictures I took of Brodie this afternoon. He was being an absolute HAM! :)

~Heather

I LOVE this little boy with all my heart! (Photo bomb!)

I love my little man!

Belated 5 month post

Brodie turned 5 months on the 2nd and it seems like he is becoming more like a "baby" and less like an "infant" with each passing day. This past week has consisted of Brodie discovering some new things with his voice, including how to screech and how to blow raspberries. While very cute and very fun, the screeching sometimes causes my ears to bleed and makes my head feel like it's going to explode! :P I love our little man and am so impressed by how strong and smart he is :)

Here are the videos of his "screech" and raspberries.

Hope you enjoyed!
~Heather

Weight Check (2 days shy of 5 months)

Yesterday was Brodie's weight check-up to see if the oatmeal had helped him gain a bit of weight (since he was so little at his 4 month check up). Right after we checked in, I sat down with him while waiting to be called back and he spit up all over his bib, my pants, and left a nice puddle on the floor. I asked for something to clean it up with and did so. He had already spit up 3-4 big times at home from his 9:45-10:25 feeding and it was now 11:30 so I didn't think much of it. Then, our name was called and as we were walking down the hallway we saw the doctor coming towards us from the opposite direction. Before we passed her Brodie proceeded to projectile vomit onto the floor and all over himself again. She saw the spit up and us as well as every nurse heard the splatting of it against the floor. The nurses said they would clean it up and told me to just get him undressed for the weight check in the room. As soon as I laid him down on the bench he barfed again, all over the bench/paper stuff. I got him undressed (nekkid cause cloth diapers are heavy) and we weighed him. He weighed... drum roll please....

12lbs 14oz!!!

The doctor was really happy with that number, because it was 1lb 1oz weight gain in only 25 days. He still is not even in the 2 percentile on the growth charts but she said he is following his own curve and that is good.

Then, I asked her how they check for acid reflux in babies. She said the studies were invasive. She saw him barf so much in the hallway and knew that was associated with more barfing (I told her about all the other times associated with the previous feeding alone) and that he makes a face when he barfs sometimes like, "Ewww that tasted nasty!" So, she said she was going to put him on baby reflux medication. She wrote us a prescription for baby Zantac and told me to give him 1ml in the morning and 1ml at night. FINALLY!!! I have been thinking we needed reflux medication since 2-3 months old and they finally prescribed it!

We have an appointment on March 21st to see how he is doing weight wise again and to see how the Zantac is working for him. Then, we have the 6 month check up a few weeks after that. :)

I gave Brodie the first dose of medicine today at about 9:30am and about 5 minutes ago was the first time he spit up! I'm praying the medicine works great and in turn he gains a good amount of weight. We are supposed to continue the baby oatmeal 1x a day with him since he doesn't throw that up and go from there.

YAY for encouraging news!!!!

~Heather