Not a Baby Anymore

Reading a funny text from Joshua, Johnny, or Owen

This post was composed in November 2015.  I forgot to proofread it and post it.  Whoops!

Well, it's official (not really); Cecilia is not a baby.  Each day she is more and more like a big girl - a toddler.  She is super crazy and silly.  She is starting to do things to purposely make us laugh (pick food up off the table and look at us with food half hanging out of her mouth).  Cecilia has 2 bottom teeth and 3 top teeth with the 4th one almost through the gums (though I've been saying that for weeks now!).  Genevieve had 8 teeth by this time and wasn't as bothered by the process.

Cecilia gives her baby dolls hugs and kisses and pats their backs, but it is rare that she gives us kisses.
Cecilia is my snuggler and will come over at random times during the day to give me a hug or to sit on my lap.  She will run up to J and hug him and want to be picked up when he gets home from work or being gone for awhile.  She has started showing some jealousy and will push Genevieve away from me or come over and sit on my lap if she sees that I'm playing with Genevieve.  She also wants what everyone else has or wants to do what everyone else is doing, especially her big sister.  Cecilia really wants to use utensils while eating and has been working very hard to get the food onto her spoon and fork.  She can't always get the food to her mouth before it falls in her lap.  

Cecilia's language is developing nicely too.  She "woofs" when she sees or hears a dog and would love nothing more than to pet every dog she sees; she has been known to chase them down at parks.  Cecilia makes a meowing sound for a kitty and knocks on the pantry/laundry room door and meows when she wants to go in and pet Pawncho.  Surprisingly, Pawncho tolerates her fairly well.  Cecilia says a variation of "uh oh", usually when she drops something.  She says Mama and Dada and can sign milk, please, more, eat, all done, and diaper.  Music makes her happy.  She tries to say EIEIO when Old MacDonald comes on, and she seems to love The Wheels on the Bus.  If she is fussy in the car, I will put on some nursery rhymes.

A HUGE change with sleep has happened recently.  Cecilia is becoming easier to get to sleep, but the amount of time she will stay asleep is pretty unpredictable.  Sometimes, she only briefly nurses before nap and bedtime rather than nursing to sleep.  Other times, she guzzles down the milk and will NOT let go until she is practically asleep.  She frequently nurses for a bit and then sits up and points at her crib.  When I ask her if she wants to go "night night" in her bed, she nods her head yes.  I put her in her crib, and she immediately lies down on her belly where I indulge in patting her back for a few minutes.  She will either peacefully drift all of the way off to sleep, or protest when I leave.  If she protests, she cries for about 30 seconds before falling asleep on her own.  This is HUGE people!!  One night I was frustrated with her constant waking; she had woken 3 times between 8:30 and midnight.  She wouldn't fall back asleep via nursing, rocking, or lying in bed with me.  I put her in her crib and left.  She cried, but it was much more brief than I expected.  I layed myself down on the couch and waited for the screaming to begin, but there was only silence.  I fell asleep and woke a couple of hours later to silence.  Again I slept and woke two hours later to silence.  After six hours of no child waking me up, I should have been elated, but since she had never slept longer than 5 hours in a row, I was worried that she was dead.  I was imagining her wrapped up in the cord from her white noise speaker, or perhaps she had fallen out of bed and had a traumatic brain injury.  Of course I really knew she was fine, but I couldn't talk myself out of checking on her.  The door squeaked as I went in and saw she was sleeping on her belly with her little tush in the air.  As soon as I was next to her crib, Cecilia popped up and made the milk sign at me. I nursed her in the rocking chair where she was back asleep in 30 minutes. She slept another few hours after this, and I finally felt hopeful.  Two nights ago, she slept 7 hours straight (9-4) and then woke a couple of times after this.  Last night I got about 4 hours of sleep because she woke frequently and took a minimum of one hour to get back to sleep.  I knew the issue, but there was nothing I could do.  See below.

I am pretty certain that Cecilia feels the urge to poop in the night but will not just try to poop.  The poor girl has terrible constipation issues and sometimes needs help going.  When she eats about 3.5 oz of pureed pears a day, this issue is not as bad but is still a concern.  With teething, she has refused to eat much, and this isn’t helping the constipation.  She is also, dare I say it, pickier than Genevieve. She will not drink juice (I’m secretly happy about this), and for about a month would not eat fruits other than banana, which again, isn’t helping things.  I decided to try a small dose of MiraLax for her to see if it will help keep things soft making her less afraid of having a bowel movement.  She gets about 3/4 of a teaspoon mixed into her water each day, though I may bump it to a full teaspoon.  When Genevieve's GI doctor prescribed it for her issues around the same age, he had me give her half a capful, which I believe was just about half a tablespoon or slightly more.  This was not good!  She ended up having zero control of her bowels.  I knew to start much smaller this time around.  So far, so good!

There is so much more to say, but since Cecilia is turning 14 months tomorrow, I will write the rest for next month.  If you got this far, bless you for reading my wordiness.  I always think I'll just write a few things down, but then my fingers get to flying.  Before I know it, I have a whole chapter written!