Biting Begins

Indigo got bit at daycare the other day, by another baby about his age. I really didn't think this started this young, but I guess they are all almost a year old so... he got bit.

Not actual biter

Apparently all the babies were playing together on the floor when Indigo started crying and hitting this other kid. This being rather out of character for our mellow man, they picked him up and noticed bite marks and a very red leg. Poor guy. He started his day with a mystery bruise on his other leg, and now this. So I got two phone calls from daycare in one day. They went something like this:

"Hi, this is Teacher from DaycareNOTANEMERGECY. But we wanted you to know that..."

I just loved the quick "Not an emergency!" line to calm me down in case I freaked out. Good thinking.

By the second phone call, the one about the bite, all I could do was laugh. And then I felt terrible for laughing that my son got bit. It was more laughing at the cruddy day he was having than at the fact that he got bit. But I'm pretty sure the daycare lady thought I was horrible.

They felt really bad about the whole situation, and iced his leg and gave him some extra cuddles, and wrote it all up in a report I had to sign. I'm assuming the biter's mother got a similar sheet to sign, although I don't know which baby it was. I'm sure they are under careful surveillance, at any rate.

Daycare is closed today for teacher training, so Blue is home with them watching Upside Downton Abbey on Sesame Street and getting far more out of it than they are. If the weather permits, they'll be going on walks and playing on swings and having a grand day while I toil away at work. Boooo!

And next week they start in their new class with their new teacher at daycare. They never ended up getting any "transition time" with her this week, so I really hope it goes smoothly, especially considering how attached Periwinkle is to Miss S. Fingers crossed...

A Letter to Periwinkle at 10 Months

Dear Periwinkle,

You, my little baby girl, are giving us a run for our money. You are now a speed demon at crawling, and before I've walked out of the room you are halfway across it trying to follow me. You crawled over to the liquor cabinet the other day and tried to open it. Time to get some latches on the doors! If we put your bottle on the floor, you give a little cry then crawl over to it at super speed. It's adorable. It's also time for baby gates, as you put your arms up on the bottom step, so I know attempts to climb the stairs can't be far behind.

You're holding steady at two teeth, which you show off with your adorable open-mouth grins. You're using those teeth to tear through chicken, pork, and black beans, which seem to be your new favorite food.

This month you had a lot of firsts. First bath in the big tub. First time in swings at the park. First time in a grocery shopping cart. First eight steps while holding my hands. That's right. You walked a little bit! And quite speedily, at that! You've also pulled up in the crib a few times, although I still haven't seen that.

You also got your first denim skirt and your first pigtails. Completely cute.

 

You seem fascinated with putting things in buckets and taking them out again. I hear this is an important learning game for you babies, so I'm proud of you for working on it so intently. However, you are seemingly terrified of the large orange ball we have. Your brother loves it, but you just start shrieking.

In general, you sleep great. It doesn't seem to matter how you nap during the day, at 6:30pm you are out like a light. And at 6am, sometimes earlier, you are awake and chipper, sitting up and trying to pull up on the crib. You also try to get toys off the shelf next to your crib, so I sometimes find those in your crib with you!

You are my little troublemaker for sure, and I love you for it. I can only imagine what you have in store for us as we get closer to your first birthday!

Love,
Mama

A Letter to Indigo at 10 Months

Dear Indigo,

I have to admit that this one snuck up on me for real. One minute we were in Rhode Island celebrating nine months, and the next we are here, a few days past ten months old. It doesn't help that I was two weeks late with your nine-month letter. Where did August go?

This month you mastered crawling backwards and watched with longing as your sister worked on going forwards. The past few days you have begun moving forwards, albeit slowly and with little control. You've also gotten very good at pulling up to standing while holding our hands, and you've even tried on the couch and in your crib. And you're doing very well in the walker.

You are still giving us trouble at bedtime. Your new favorite thing seems to be falling asleep in Daddy's arms. This is a habit we sadly have to break. I think if we get your naptimes and waketimes right during the day, you will fall asleep more soundly at night. I hope. We just need to get daycare on board! I often walk in to your room to find you sitting up and grinning, simply not ready to fall asleep. Or sometimes, you are sitting up and screaming.

In the morning you and your sister are both sitting up in your cribs, sometimes trying to stand, grinning and chatting away. It's one of the cutest things I've ever seen. There have been days when you are both sitting with your legs through the slats, as if trying to get as close to each other as possible. I love it!

This month you have tried pulled pork, roasted chicken, mango, and black beans. You've loved it all! You even gave oatmeal another try and seemed okay with it. You seem to be slowly reducing your formula intake, although some days you still drink all 32 ounces. My little big man!

You've been making some hilarious faces lately. Sometimes you just look so surprised or concerned. You've also finally gotten a tooth! I think a second is on its way. I hope you sleep better after that!

You also took your first bath in the big bathtub, with your sister. You really liked it the first week, but the last two times you've cried. Maybe you were just tired. I want happy bathing boy back! You would wiggling and splash and play with the toys. You really loved it. I hope next time you are in a better mood!

Only two months to go until your first birthday. That is so crazy! I keep seeing news about hurricane season and I'm brought back to cuddling you in a powerless house after Hurricane Sandy. How far you have come since then!

Love,
Mama

A Letter to Indigo at Nine Months (pretend I wrote it two weeks ago)

Indigo,

Sorry I'm so late writing this. It's going to be hard going back in time two weeks, because you've accomplished so much since your nine-month birthday, but I will try so I have something to write about in two weeks when you turn ten months old (slow down, will you!?).

This month was a busy one for you. First off, you and your sister got baptized on June 30th. You were completely adorable in your white outfit. You didn't cry when the priest poured water over your head. In fact, you pushed off against Daddy and almost went all the way in!

Baptized babies!

The next day we took you both out to eat for lunch for the first time. You were both very well behaved. You enjoyed little pieces of what we had, and you didn't even throw much onto the floor! You saved that for your toys. I think you've discovered a new game... We enjoyed it so much, we took you out again later that week! It's so nice being able to do that now. It gives us a little bit more freedom and flexibility. We just have to make sure we time it to your naps so you aren't super cranky in the restaurant!

What mashed potatoes?

You also went into the pool for the first time. You weren't sure at first, ever my cautious little man, but you love it now! There's a big orange ball you like to chase around, although one time Daddy may have bounced it off your head a little too vigorously.

During our week on the beach you showed off how well you sit up on your own now. You even started doing a little bouncy dance while you sit. It cracks me up. You just get so excited and can't contain it, so you bounce and make your adorable little excited noises. You do this every time you see one of the cats. Unfortunately it usually scares them off. You'll get to play with them someday, I hope.

Supportive big brother

You've also gotten more steady on your feet, although you don't pull up to standing yet.

When we brought you down by the water you were very, very concerned about the waves. You would cling tightly to us, tapping us on the shoulder and grunting as they came closer, as if warning us to watch out. But by the end of the week your cautious fear had turned to cautious excitement, and you even let us dip your feet. But in general, you preferred the kiddy pool up on the beach.

A wave is coming, Mom!

Fun in the kiddy pool with Grandma!

You were really thrown by the new location and sleeping in the pack n play. You cried. A lot. You took hours to go to bed the first four nights. You woke up your sister. We eventually split you two up, gave you a mattress pad, sang you many songs, told you many stories, and by the end of the week you were sleeping fine. Daddy and I were very grateful that Grandma and Grandpa would take you and your sister in the morning so we could sleep in, to make up for your not letting us go to bed before 11pm the first few nights.

Even with a bad night's sleep, you're adorable (not from vacation, just another rough night)

You're still working on teeth, although I think your bottom two are on the way. I hope they come soon!

It's hard to believe there have been even more changes and achievements since then! I love you, little man!

Love,
Mama

My dapper dude

Food at Daycare

Inevitably, 10pm rolls around and I realize I need to pack food for daycare. I always have a stash of pouches on hand, but I like to use those sparingly, preferring to put together my own menu for them. But in a pinch, pouches rule. I've used Target's Up and Up brand, as well as Ella's Kitchen and Plum Organics.

But seeing as we're trying to do less purees and more textured food, a la Baby Led Weaning, I don't use them often. I've begun encouraging the daycare workers not to mush the food up completely and spoon feed, but rather to just put it in front of the babies and let them try to figure it out. They do really well with Cheerios so I know they can do it, plus I've seen them tear into a banana and a piece of hamburger without issue. Unfortunately I don't think daycare is quite ready to give them big chunks of food, so little chunks or mashed food it is.

Indigo gets upset because he just wants the food in his belly, and can't always grasp it, so they usually end up spoon feeding him in the end. But Periwinkle gets her hands dirty and has fun with it. That's my girl!

So today I sent a little bowl with half a scrambled egg and a cut up strawberry, for each of them. They might need to be fed the strawberries as they are little slippery pieces, but I know they can mash them up just fine with their gums so they should be okay once they get them in their mouths. And the egg was in big enough pieces they should be able to pick them up. I'll see when I pick them up how they did... I was pretty proud of that little breakfast menu so I hope it was a success! I've never sent those items before, so it'd be nice to have this new option available in the future!

I also microwaved a sweet potato (a fairly small one) and mashed it up a bit (but not too much). They each got half a potato. I also sauteed some baby spinach (baby spinach for babies!) in some EVOO. What started out as two cups of spinach got reduced to about 1/4c. sauteed spinach each. I mixed that in with the potatoes, and I'm hoping they just grab it all with their hands and get nice and messy trying to eat it.

A lot of my twin mom friends say their babies are only drinking 24oz. of formula/breastmilk these days. Mine still drink 30-32oz. Fatties? I doubt it. I think they just aren't being forcefed three pureed meals a day so they are still relying on formula for their nutrition, which is as it should be right now. They are trying new foods, learning how to use their hands to feed themselves, and not necessarily filling up on solids. Which is the whole point of BLW. Food is fun until one!

Any other suggestions on fun foods I can send to daycare? Stuff that is easily mashable by little toothless (or nearly toothless) mouths but that they can still feed themselves?

A Letter to Periwinkle at Nine Months

Dear Periwinkle,

You got to celebrate your nine month birthday at the beach, on vacation with us, Grandma and Grandpa, your aunt and uncle and little cousin. Not bad!

With Indigo, Grandpa, and Grandma

 We did a little photo shoot on the beach with Uncle B the day before, with you in your red sun hat. You weren't in the best of moods, but you still looked adorable.

A shot by Grandma during your "photo shoot"

We went to the aquarium in Mystic that week, too. We weren't sure how much you would get out of it, but you seemed very intrigued by the stingrays and the penguins. You weren't quite sure what to make of the sea lions or little fish, and were just done with the whole thing by the time we hit the belugas, but we will definitely take you again sometime as you get older. You were both very well behaved, which was great. Even when a torrential downpour started up just as we went outside!

 

Oooh, penguins!

I feel like most of your achievements this month happened during that one week at the beach. You got ridiculously good at pulling yourself up to standing. It now seems like one of your favorite things to do. You lean over to me and try to grab on to me so you can pull up. So far though you still need to be holding onto someone's hands for you to be successful. When you get to standing you grin, so proud of yourself. Sometimes you even take a half step or two. And sometimes you think you can let go of our hands and end up back on your bum. But you always try again. Keep trying, little lady!

Standing with Grandma

You popped your second tooth that week, too. That's right, you have TWO teeth now! And plenty of drool-covered cloths and empty boxes of tissues to prove it. You had some ornery days (surprise, surprise) but generally came through like a champ. We're lucky it didn't really affect your sleeping at night (thank goodness). Your brother took care of that for you.

A chilly last day at the beach

You're eating a lot of foods, including cut up strawberries, scrambled eggs, toast, Cheerios, pieces of meat from whatever we are eating, and the trusty standbys of sweet potatoes and yogurt. Oh, and broccoli!

Happy little broccoli trees

You got very good at crawling backwards to get where you wanted to go this past month, and now can go forward, but that technically happened after your nine month birthday so we'll save that for next month's letter. Your hair is getting longer and thicker, and possibly lighter, and your eyes are almost totally brown now. I enjoyed your baby blues while they lasted!

A little curl! Brown eyes! So grown up!

You are still chatty and smiley in the morning. It just makes my day to see you grinning at me like that. I keep talking to you and doing some baby sign language and hope that soon you will be able to communicate with us a little bit. You raise your arms up when I go to pick you up, which I love. If you are on your tummy and you know I'm going to pick you up you still lift your arms and raise your chest up high so I can grab you. I'm convinced you will be a rock star at Pilates.

You enjoyed the Fourth of July and managed to sleep through the fireworks, thank goodness. You've gone in the pool several times, in a little orange float we got you. You need to stop kicking your legs because you will propel yourself OUT of the float, and that scares me a little bit. But you definitely enjoy the water. At the beach you seemed to want to jump out of our arms to go into the waves, and you were okay with getting your feet wet. We have a little fish on our hands. I was a little fish too.

On July Fourth

Ready to go in the pool!

I love seeing all the ways you are like me and all the ways you are so different from me. You are such an awesome little girl and I love you beyond words. Happy nine months, baby girl!

Love,
Mama

On the ferry en route to Rhode Island. You weren't quite sure how you felt.