First day at daycare

All good things come to an end--even my glorious maternity leave.  Oh sigh.  In prep for heading back to work in a couple weeks, I wanted to ease August into daycare so my first day at work would be less traumatic...for both of us.  So, he did a "trial" for a couple hours last week where he met the teachers and his "classmates"  and went yesterday for most of the day.  I had some concerns because he was not taking a bottle without getting VERY upset.  After the trial day, I asked the lead teacher how it went and she said "I see what you mean about how angry he gets over the bottle.  It looks like we have some work to do." Wa-waaa.  That was a downer, of course; as I had flashbacks of Boden's dislike for the bottle and how he opted for lots of nighttime feeding so he could avoid the bottle at daycare.  When Tuesday rolled around, I thawed out milk and filled bottles and crossed my fingers that August's hunger would beat out his distaste for the bottle.  And, it seems it did!!  It doesn't sound like it was easy, but one of the teachers spent some time with him and figured out the right combination of rocking, holding and singing to him to get him to eat.  (Cue angels singing :-) ).  August was beat when I picked him up but was mostly happy, until some older baby crawled over to his bouncy chair and whacked him on the face :). His teachers said he was so smiley (I'm sure of that) and such a happy guy.  Whew. 

We've got a couple more "test" days left before I go back to work, so hopefully they all go this well or better!  It's stressful to worry the whole day about your little one but if we conquer this bottle aversion (at least at daycare), I'll be much more at ease.

August @ 3 months

August is 3 months old now and very smily and alert. He's not much of a crier (yay) unless he feels he has waited long enough to be fed.  He seems really close to rolling over from back to front but I'm not sure he'll be all that happy when he gets to his front, so no rush. 

I don't think a day has gone by where Todd and I haven't said "can you believe how easy this kid is?!".  Compared to our experience with Boden as an infant, August is very low maintenance.  August has one downfall, though, that he shares with his brother--no interest in taking a bottle.  We started out strong at 4 weeks, but he quickly became intolerant of it and we haven't made much progress since.  I'm hoping things will turn around on that front real soon--for now, we've taken a break from the bottle.  Absence makes the heart grow fonder?

Farmer Brown

Boden and I made our first car trip together to my mom's house.  It's a long drive and he did well--he definitely watched more videos than I would have preferred, but there's only so much construction and farm equipment you can point out on the way. 

As soon as we got out of the car, Boden headed for the barn and the four-wheeler and wondered where Papa Leo was.  Leo held off on feeding the calf until we got there so Boden could help feed her.  He was all into helping to prepare the bottle, but when it came time to feed her, he was happy to just watch. 

He also helped transfer pheasant chicks to their new home in the chicken coop, fed chickens, rode on the four-wheeler, and pestered Sassy the cat.  That was all in the first few hours of arriving :)

Bottle be damned

Boden's newest development this week, though I feel like it has been a habit in the making for a couple weeks, now, is that he's expressing significant disinterest in his bottles. After three consecutive days of refusing nearly all his bottles during the day, I spoke with a lactation consultant. She was understanding and spoke from personal experience, but basically said, "He'll eat when he's hungry enough" to which Todd said "Told ya!".

Boden is apparently at a prime time for "bottle and breast refusal". Right now, he's just taking it out on the bottle and is still welcoming nursing--praise be, because I don't want to pump any more often than I already am.

While he pushes his bottles away with a look of disgust and irritation, he's super excited about drinking from a cup--my desperate attempt to help Grumpa and Grandma pack more milk into him during the day. At this point, excitement doesn't translate into skill--I think he ends up with more on his shirt than in his mouth, but he sure feels like a "big boy" holding onto a cup.

He's 7 months old and I'm already looking for clever ways to outsmart his obstinacy...it's going to be a long and wearing 18 + years with this kid :) I'm starting to think more and more that Todd and I should write extremely long and thoughtful thank you notes to our mothers (Todd's should definitely be longer and more thankful) for being such stubborn kids. They are probably grinning and saying through their teeth "What comes around, goes around". (care to comment, moms?)