Blank Canvas: May

Well, I’ve procrastinated my way through half the month of June before finally writing my review for May! Hopefully, I can remember some of what happened…

Scott finished building his playset for Atom this month with some help from his parents and Kelly and Travis who came to visit us a couple times in May. It looks great and Atom loves playing in it!

I was able to pick a lot of blueberries this month at a new local blueberry farm very close to my parents’ house. I ventured over there several times and I now have many bags of frozen blueberries, enough for pies and pancakes for the rest of the year! Thanks Mama and Papa for inviting me to pick with you and for helping me watch Atom and Trillian so I could do that. I still love picking fruit!

Crazy hours for Scott unfortunately have become more frequent again these days. He has been working on Despicable Me and trying to meet deadlines in the lead up to the grand opening. I hope things slow down again and normalize soon.

Atom has been really into singing this month! I’ve been exposing him to songs from some of the many musical soundtracks I have, like the Sound of Music, Oliver, Mary Poppins, while Scott is thrilled to hear him randomly singing lyrics from bands he loves, like They Might Be Giants. We also have a collection of songs that my Mom wrote and sung for my siblings and me when we were little, some of which I’m now singing to Atom.

Trillian and Mommy

Trillian is changing a lot! She started sitting up right around her five-month birthday (just like Atom!) and she knows how to roll over both ways now also. By the end of the month she has also finally settled into a schedule of 3 naps a day and eating every 4 hours. I struggled with getting on a schedule this month mainly because of breastfeeding, which has been getting more and more frustrating for me. Trillian had become extremely fussy while nursing and would not stay on more than 5 minutes at a time. I tried lengthening the time between feedings, from 2 to 3 to 4 hours but it didn’t help and I just ended up with a fussier baby. Also, when we would try giving her a bottle instead of nursing, she wouldn’t drink more than a couple oz at a time, which was concerning to me. So, we finally just gradually started shifting her over to more and more formula until she was almost entirely being formula fed by the end of the month. We were able to gradually up the number of oz she drinks at a time too and now she often takes as much as 4-5 oz at once. This switch to formula seems to have been very positive in terms of getting her on a better schedule. Her naps have started to get longer; sometimes as much as 1 ½ -2 hrs! Her night sleeping has started to improve also, but it’s still inconsistent and I never know if we’re going to have a good night or a bad night. She is currently still nursing once in the middle of the night, but I’m trying to stop that soon too. In addition to the formula, I started introducing solid foods around 5 months. She has tried several different fruits, veggies and baby cereals now and she seems much more into pureed food than Atom was at this age! Another change that happened over the course of this month was Trillian’s switch from sucking on pacifiers to sucking on her fingers. This was a result of sleep training I think, but she just started doing it all on her own, and doesn’t seem very interested in the pacifiers any more. I think this has helped a lot with her ability to soothe herself to sleep. She is very good about going right to sleep most of the time when we put her in her crib.

Although I still felt awfully tired this month, I do feel like better sleep is just around the corner. I feel determined this time around to get this sleep under control as soon as possible for my own sanity. One thing that helped me feel more confident in this goal was reading the book “Bringing Up Bébé” this month. I found a lot of the parenting techniques in that book very inspiring and helpful and I’ll definitely try to implement some of them. Thank you again Mama and Papa for getting that book for me!

Scott and Atom measure and cut wood for the playhouse

Finished playhouse! Just needs paint.

Ira and Kelly help paint during a visit this month

Chilling with Grandpa

Atom helps paint the steps

Such a fun place to play!

As Trillian starts to sit up and become more interested in toys, Atom has been great about sharing and playing with her and she loves watching and being around him!