Eloise at Six Months

HAPPY HALF BIRTHDAY, BABY GIRL!!

WEIGHT: 14 pounds (13th percentile)
HEIGHT: 25.25 inches (24th percentile)
CLOTHES SIZE: 0-3 Months and 3-6 months (only a few things in the bigger size)
DIAPER SIZE: One

LIKES:
 - Her daddy, for simply existing--stares at him nearly nonstop when he is around, and he gets the biggest smiles
 - Being tickled on her ribs and chest
 - My hair--grabbing it, eating it, playing with it, having it tickle her, etc.
 - Splashing in the bath
 - Peek-a-boo and people jumping out to scare her (though if you surprise her too much, she cries)
 - Bottles
 - Sticking her hand in my mouth
 - Screeching and talking (she loves her own voice)
 - Loud singing and exaggerated dancing from people
 - Licking and chewing on everything, though cloth seems to be her favorite
 - Sneezing and other people sneezing
 - Baby gym with hanging toys
 - Bouncers
 - Her mini spatulas

DISLIKES:
 - Cold water (like getting her feet dipped in a creek...)
 - Skipping naps
 - Not being fed very soon/immediately after waking from a nap
 - Getting her nose wiped
 - Extended lengths of tummy time (better than previous months though!)
 - Extra stimulating situations with lots of people

FIRSTS/MILESTONES:
 - Walks her feet when standing on the ground (holding onto our fingers) (21 weeks)
 - Rolled over from back to front (22 weeks)
 - Transitioned out of all swaddles for sleeping (22 weeks)
 - Shows strong interest in real people food--stares at us if we eat anything around her (23 weeks)
 - Rolled over and slept on her tummy for nap time (23 weeks)
 - On a swing! (24 weeks)
 - Spins in circles while on her tummy and back (24 weeks)
 - Plays with my hair and face while nursing (24 weeks)
 - Scratches (open and closes her hand quickly) everything (24 weeks)

RANDOM NOTES:
 - Freely gives huge, eye-crinkling smiles, but rarely (as in only a couple times a week, if that) giggles for us
 - Currently sleeps about 10 hours straight at night, takes 4 naps, nurses/takes a bottle 5 times, and eats solids once at dinner time
 - Never woke us up in the middle of the night this month (she's an angel)
 - Very wild sleeper in her crib, we often find her in a completely different orientation from when she started her nap/bedtime
 - Constantly is scratching and grabbing everything, but especially her hair
 - Met a second set of great-grandparents, the Krauses
 - Sleeps on her side 90% of the time, and sleeping more deeply than ever YAY
 - Thin hair these days, but looks like it is growing in again and is a little lighter compared to at birth. It is also long enough on top that it sometimes flops over!
 - Her big beautiful eyes are still dark blue!
 - Nicknames: Lou, Lou Bug, Lou Babe, Lou Girl, LouLou, Honey Bunches, Booga Babe, Lou Cakes, Lou-der Bug

This month Eloise suddenly got way more wiggly and energetic! It seems like she is always on the move, wanting to stand and bounce and grab at things and of course gnaw on everything that touches her mouth. She is such a happy girl in general and gives lots of smiles, and not just to us. She does better with strangers than she did last month, which is nice. Lou doesn't giggle too often, and instead prefers to shriek and smile big when she is extra happy and excited. But when she does giggle, it is SO CUTE. One of the most wonderful sounds ever!

These last couple months of breastfeeding have been a bit rough. If you read my previous blog posts on Eloise, you might know that I was spending a lot of time trying to bring back my milk supply with little success (I tried pumping after every nursing session, drinking so much water I felt sick, taking Fenugreek, getting more sleep, making lactation cookies, drinking Gatorade, etc.). This month was no different. My supply dropped so much that many times Eloise would refuse to even try nursing, and would end up crying in frustration and hunger. This would leave both of us upset, and I became extra stressed about how I would get Lou the calories she needed to be healthy and gaining weight. It was hard to admit that breastfeeding simply wasn't going to work for me. I had always thought that breastfeeding or formula feeding was a simply a choice, and hadn't really ever considered that my body wouldn't be actually able to get Eloise all the food she needed. I was bummed.

We had already been supplementing a bit of formula or breastmilk after each feeding already while I was trying to build up my supply (which likely didn't help, but Lou needed the extra food immediately so no real choice there...). Trying to breastfeed full time was honestly just making both Eloise and I upset, though I really wanted to be able to for her. So I took a step back from trying to get Eloise to nurse so much, and it has made both of us much happier! If Eloise refuses to nurse, I don't worry about it. Once my supply completely runs out, we will switch over to exclusively bottle feeding our girl formula. Formula is a wonderful thing, and I'm so happy it exists! This month, I went from nursing Eloise five times a day, and now nurse only three times a day. She still needs a couple extra ounces of formula after nursing. The other two feedings, Eloise gets just formula. Soon, I'll probably need to drop another nursing session, and that's okay. I'll do it as long as I can, but won't let it cause my anxiety anymore. And Lou is much happier now that she gets a full belly at every feeding :)

We are ending this month on the same schedule that Eloise has been on for about a month and a half now. It still has been working so well. Though the way we feed Eloise has changed a bit and she now stays awake for around two hours at a time, though the overall timing of everything has remained about the same. Here it is:
7:30 am - Wake Eloise up, nurse and bottle supplement, play, nap
11:00 am - Bottle, play, nap
2:30 pm - Nurse and bottle supplement, play, nap
6:00 pm - Bottle, play, dinner (usually purees or mashed fruit with baby cereal), shorter nap
9:00 pm - Nurse and bottle supplement, bath, lotion massage, down for the night

During play time throughout the day, we usually cycle through activities like independent play (usually she lays on a blanket with some toys or her hanging gym), tummy time and rolling over, practicing sitting up, lots of up and down standing/jumping, reaching for toys, singing songs, reading a book (when will she start liking books?!), and going on walks to the park or just being outside.

It does seem like Eloise is ready to be sleeping a bit longer at night and take longer naps with longer awake times in between naps. We have to wake her up nearly every morning and from every nap. Because of this, we plan on moving her schedule around a bit so that she only takes three naps a day and has about an extra hour at night. We'll move toward that in the next week. More on that next month!

She looks so proud of herself YUCK

Eloise has really started to hit some big milestones this month. She has gotten a lot better at grasping objecting and bringing them to her mouth to chew on them. But when we're playing with her, she likes to get lazy and expects us to just put them in her mouth for her... Lou Babe rolls over all the time, but really only one direction going back to front. She hasn't mastered the other three ways yet, haha. But most times you set her on her back, she'll immediately roll over onto her tummy. Which then makes her mad, because she hasn't quite figured out how to get back yet. Eloise loves to stand and walk around while holding on to our fingers for balance. She doesn't sit up yet, but she is definitely making progress and can sometimes last a couple seconds without falling over. She is doing so well!

Short Life Update

Hi blog readers! I recognize that this blog is nearly solely for our personal journaling and the very few people read it, but we thought it was about time to post a short update on what has been going on in our lives and what our plans are for the near future that don't directly concern Eloise.

Dustan is still attending BYU, working on his master's degree in Robotics. As of this last winter semester though, he has officially finished all his classes! Yay, done with college classes forever! He finished with an impressive cumulative GPA of 3.9 for his undergrad and graduate classes. Now, he is just working every day to finish his maser's research and writing his thesis, which he hopes to finish and defend by late August.

Dustan is officially an employee of Raytheon Missile Systems, but it on an educational leave of absence until he finishes his master's degree. Once he is finished, we will be moving to Tucson, Arizona! We are very excited and ready to start the next phase. We are hoping to be settled in Tucson by Labor Day, though the date is very flexible and depends on Dustan's master's degree.

Dustan is very passionate about mountain biking. And by passionate, I mean obsessed, haha. He goes mountain biking every chance he can, usually at least four days a week but ideally more. He signed up to do a few downhill mountain biking enduro races this summer, that he'll hopefully get to do still even with a recent bad crash that caused some injuries (5 stictches on his chin and a rotator cuff tear that we'll find out more about at an upcoming doctor appointment).

I (Ellen) quit working as soon as I had Eloise, and now have the happy and full-time job as a stay at home mom! It is wonderful, hard, and very rewarding, in many ways I didn't expect. I am ready to get down to Tucson and start building a life down there--ideally before the heat kills us ;) I recently finished a watercolor art class through the city of Provo and really enjoyed that, and hope to get into painting more. Dustan also has purchased me a mountain bike in the hopes that I can join him for some rides as I get better. That is a work in progress!

Since we possibly only have a few months left in August, we have a few things we are looking forward to and hope to do. We are looking forward to lots of friends and family visiting throughout the summer, and the upcoming Nielson family reunion in Oregon. We want to take Lou camping and get her a little more out of her comfort zone (and us, for that matter, haha). We also plan to revamp and kind of restart our photography business. It got put on hold while I was so sick being pregnant then after Eloise was born. But we want to get back into and get some great shoots this summer! Let us know if you need some pictures taken ;) There are some great places in Utah that somehow we have never visited that we want to get to for some weekend getaways. Those include Bear Lake, Goblin Valley, Grand Escalante, and more. We were hoping to do more last summer (our first ever summer in Utah), but I ended up being so sick while pregnant that we didn't do a whole lot. Hopefully a baby won't slow us down this summer!

Basically, life is good and we have a lot to look forward to in the coming months :)