Noah is 10 Months!

My baby is growing too fast! I can't believe his birthday is just around the corner. He's now been in this world longer than the amount of time that I carried him for :)

PERSONALITY:
I really see a lot of both of us in Noah but especially myself. He can be so goofy and silly but at other times so moody and cranky. He sure can be funny though. He needs a lot of attention as well. I think he might end up being a little shy, because he still gets quiet and more reserved around other people at first and takes a while to start acting his silly self again. But Noah is a very active, energetic little boy. He's very alert, especially to sounds. He likes to figure out how things work.

{Little muscle man}

{Goofball looking just like Derek in this picture}

{...and whiny mode}

NURSING:
This month was great. A few changes though.  I started giving Noah an extra 2-3 ounces of formula at bedtime AFTER I nurse him. The reason for this was because he was going to bed super early every night. I normally nurse him around 4:30 and then again at 7:00 for bed but we were getting him ready for bed around 6:00 most days this month so between 4:30 and 6:00 I don't think my body made enough in the hour and a half to fill him up for the night so I felt good about the extra formula. This past week however, we were finally able to drop the 4:30 feeding and he seems to be doing well without it. So technically I don't think he'll really need the extra formula at night anymore but he's doing well with it and his body is probably used to those extra calories now; and we have some from the hospital we need to use anyways. With that feeding dropped, this puts us on somewhat of a 4-hour schedule (yay!) with 4 feedings during the day. Oh and we figured out the reason he wasn't taking a bottle last month was because he doesn't like his Tommee Tippee bottles anymore so we use a different kind.

{This was at church one Sunday after he nursed himself to sleep. Now days it's a treat to see him this close while he's sleeping since he rarely sleeps in public or in my arms. I'm going to really miss these moments when I no longer breastfeed. Jessie nicknamed him "Snuffleupagus" (from Sesame Street) when he was a newborn, because of his long, straight eyelashes. Everyone always comments on them. I could stare at this face all day long!}

SOLIDS (BABY LED WEANING):

There was a week where for the first time Noah didn't want to eat very much. He wouldn't eat things he normally loves, and of the things he did eat, he would only take a few bites. At first I worried it was because last month I slacked a bit on giving him lots of healthy food & variety. But then I wondered if perhaps he was teething, causing his appetite to lower. And sure enough, he was teething! Once his teeth broke through, his appetite went back to normal. He has been eating TONS of good stuff this month. I've been cooking a lot more lately so he's been able to try all sorts of different meals. Also, since he's getting older I decided it was definitely time to spice things up a bit. For example, I used to give him toast just plain, now I spread something on it like almond butter or hummus. And I've been giving him exactly what we eat more often, instead of just giving him certain pieces from it, if that makes sense. He tried Indian food this month and loved it! This could be a typical day for Noah...
- Breakfast: Banana slices with greek yogurt and toast sticks with peanut butter
- Lunch: Swiss cheese, avocado chunks, tomato slices, and black beans
- Dinner: Brown rice or quinoa with chicken, and cooked veggies
I don't give him snacks every day but once in a while I will, or if we're at church or doing errands. A snack could consist of pear wedges, a mandarin orange or those little cereal puffs. I need to be more consistent with giving him drinks. He loves water and drinks pretty well from a sippy cup but I don't give him a drink at every meal because he gets distracted by playing with the cup and just bangs it against his high chair and gets everything wet. But I think I'll try giving him a drink after he is done eating so he eats first (at least for now anyways). I also wanted to mention how happy I am that I chose and stuck with baby led weaning. Everyone in our house, including Noah, just loves it!

{My healthy little eater}

{He liked to squish the yogurt between his fingers}

TEETHING:
As I mentioned, he finally got his first tooth! Well, I should say first TEETH, he actually got two right at the exact same time (the bottom two). He was acting clingy all week and his bottom gums seemed swollen to me. Finally, I could see two white lines underneath his gums and they broke through within a few days. I don't think he did too bad, he was just clingy beforehand and had one night where he had a hard time falling back asleep in the middle of the night. His teeth aren't all the way up yet but you can see that they are totally crooked!

{This was one of his teething days}

{I love my baby}

MOBILITY:

He's mastered pulling up and getting back down to where he doesn't fall on his head or get hurt as often as last month. He's starting to cruise along furniture more now. A couple times he has  stood alone momentarily without holding onto anything for a second. But I think it'll still be a couple months before he's walking. He can climb all the way up the stairs. I'm still adjusting into the habit of closing all the doors upstairs because if I don't, in a matter of seconds he could have unrolled the entire toilet paper roll or who knows what! That kid gets into everything!

{Noah likes to look at the wallpaper}

{Sneaky face}

RANDOM THINGS NOAH DOES:
He does so many things that amuse us. He loves to push and pull things. He loves to push and pull chairs back and forth, back and forth. He likes to push a door shut and then swing it back open again. He also likes to hold onto a chair while standing and keep pushing it forward, walking across the whole room (like a walker). One day he discovered the concept of banging his head on something.. now that's his favorite thing to do! Not very hard that he's hurting himself (although sometimes I wonder how it doesn't hurt him) but in a playful way. He will hit his head on anything he can, including mommy & daddy's heads! He also likes to shake his head (like a "no" motion) and thinks it's funny, because we laugh. He brings this into his dance moves. He really loves dancing now, and starts dancing when music comes on. Even to random household sounds that aren't supposed to be music but may just sound like they kind of have a beat. He likes to play -- or should I say bang -- on the piano. The other day we were reading a book and one page said, "kiss, kiss, I love you. " and had a big picture of a baby making a kissy face, when I read it Noah reached his head down and kissed the baby! It took me by surprise and melted my heart!

{I just want to eat those cheeks!!! And toes!}

{How does that string taste, Noah?}

BOOKS & PLAYTIME:
Noah did better at independent playtime this month. There are still days where he needs more attention so it becomes more of a struggle. But I love when he happily plays by himself, it's so cute to hear him talking to himself and to spy on him and see what he's doing. He's never been a HUGE bookworm because he gets bored and doesn't like to sit still but he's liking books more and more. I've noticed that he is way more interested in books that have something that he can touch, or something that moves etc. because he's such a hands on type of baby. He loves turning the pages now.

{Only mother's of tongue-tied babies will understand the joy you feel when your baby sticks out his tongue for the first time. He had never done this before. His tongue is still tied a little but this did make me happy}

{One of his favorite toys - he likes to play DJ}

{Story time!}

COMMUNICATION:
Sometimes it really sounds like he's talking in his own made up language. I love it! And sometimes it really sounds like he's imitating the words I'm saying to him. And other times he really sounds like he's impersonating Donald Duck. But his favorite thing to say is still "dada". I was getting kind of discouraged because he doesn't seem very interested in Baby Sign Language and I was super excited about it. But my friend pointed out to me that even though he isn't signing the "correct signs" he is still signing, just with his own signs. The whole point is to be able to communicate and if I'm understanding what he wants by whatever he's doing then that's part of signing. Like when he is done with his food, he tells me by pushing against his high chair (and grunting) and raising his arms out to me. Even though it's more of an annoying way to let me know (hah), I guess it's better than just crying. He did start doing the sign for milk though but he just copies me occasionally when I do it, while he's already nursing. And I can tell that lately he's trying to sign "more" but needs a lot of work still. But I still think it's really fun and I'm going to keep doing it anyways :) One more thing, he loves pointing to things, which I think is so cute. At first it was with two fingers but he does it with one finger now, hehe.

SLEEP/SCHEDULE:
So much progression this month! First off, he dropped his 3rd nap! He basically just stopped sleeping for it. But this is why we had to implement the early bedtime (in bed by 6:20). I also dropped his dreamfeed finally, because it was disrupting his sleep and he wasn't even hungry for it. It took a couple weeks for him to stop waking up around that time because he was used to it but this week he hasn't so far. In fact he started sleeping through the night again after all these good changes! He slept 12 hours straight several nights this week! Hallelujah! The nights he didn't sleep 12 hours he at least made it 9-10 hours without a feeding, and those were on days he didn't nap well. This just proves how much their day time sleep affects their nighttime sleep. So this month we went from 6-8 feedings in a 24 hr period to 4-5 feedings. This is great, I just hope my supply doesn't suffer. His naps are starting to lengthen out again but I'm still playing around with different wake-time lengths. This week our sleep & feeding schedule has been somewhere along these lines...
7:00 wake up, nurse + breakfast
9:15 nap 1
10:45 wake up
11:00 nurse + lunch
1:30 nap 2
3:00 wake up, nurse
5:30 dinner
6:30 - 7:00 get ready for bed, nurse,
This is on a good day :) I'm so happy that his schedule is finally getting back on track and somewhat predictable. The past several months have been rough as far as sleep so I'm praying things stay this way for a while.

{Bum in the air, don't care!}

And a few more pictures from this month...

{About to take a walk outside}

{Good morning! Lately, there are days where I'll get Derek to bring him into our room in the morning when he wakes up so I can nurse him in our bed and just lay down a little longer. And I get to snuggle with him this way too}

{Big, brown eyes!}

{Getting so big!}

{"Okay, that's enough pictures mom, now give me that camera!"}