5 Months
1
Posted by Mandy | Posted in baby boy, life as mommy, video | Posted on 30-03-2012
My little baby is all grown-up! I know I say that every month… and every month it’s a little more true. This month, he’s developed a huge personality! His interest in the world is neverending, and he’s starting to be weary of strangers. Not long ago, he’d smile at everyone… but now, he merely tolerates other people and shoots them glares, so as long as they don’t get to close. The relationship between him and us parents is flourishing, meanwhile. He shows us that he loves us all the time and is at his happiest when we pick him up and play with him.
He absolutely loves being naked and being tickled, it makes him giggle like crazy. He also really loves playing with toys – his favorites are a music box, a wheel spinny toy and of course Sophie, the Giraffe teether. He passes toys from hand to hand, chomps on them, stares at them and interacts with them (he’ll spin the wheel and push the button on the music box, though not always). His babbling is also getting a lot more distinct (lalala, mama, gaga are some of the more distinguishable sounds) and he’s discovered how to blow raspberries… and doesn’t stop doing it. Ever.
He’s generally very amiable and happy; bad days are pretty rare. He’s a decent napper and currently gets about 8 hours of sleep at night from 10pm to 6/6:30am, then naps every 2 hours for varying amounts of time. He still drools a lot, but we haven’t had any sign of a toothie, and most of the common teething symptoms such as loss of appetite, low grade fever, crankiness, night wakings, etc have disappeared.
His bedtime is slowly becoming earlier and earlier – a month or two ago we were dealing with an 11pm bedtime, and currently we’re at 9:30pm, though I think I might have to make it 9 considering he’s starting to get tired around 8pm. He also tends to skip his late afternoon nap lately, which, if it keeps up, is definitely an indicator that I need to adjust his bedtime a little. He now gives me clear signs of tiredness – he pulls his ears, rubs his eyes and yawns. It’s awfully cute in a kind of sad way.
He’s not doing as well as some babies as far as physical development goes, but I don’t think I have reason to worry just yet. He’s rolled back to front and front to back, but only a few times each and doesn’t show much interest in being a roly poly. He’s not anywhere near crawling, though he still aces tummy time. Instead of trying to move towards toys, he’ll try to pull them to him if possible. And hey, I’m pretty lazy too, so I totally get it.
Still, he’s pretty close to sitting on his own and he does put weight on his legs when we have him “stand”, so I don’t think I have any reason to worry. Everything is on par (I think!), the pediatrician hasn’t mentioned anything to worry about, so I think he just seems faster with his mental development than he does with the physical stuff.
I think he might be developing some stranger anxiety, as he’s stopped smiling at people he doesn’t know and holds on to me pretty fervently when they get too close. He also doesn’t much like being dropped off so mom & dad can have a date night. However, he hasn’t yet cried when we left him at his grandparents and I keep strangers at a distance anyway.
On the whole, he’s just a lot more interactive and it seems that he understands the world a little better. He’s starting to respond when we say “hi” or his name, and every once in a while he’ll try to mimic the “hi”. It’s pretty cute! That’s about all I can think of for his 5-month update, so I’ll be back with my postpartum one soon!