small town taylor: 5 months and counting!

At 5 months Rory:

-Loves to chew/drool all over everything. Blankets, toys, her fists... everything goes in her mouth these days. And she's so aggressive! She shakes her head back and forth while she has things in her mouth like she's attacking them and we can't help but laugh at her.

-Still loves Boo, and is totally unfazed by her overexcitement when I let puppy come close and play with her. And luckily Boo doesn't seem to mind when Rory pulls her fur. We will pray that continues.

-Rolled over for the first time last night from her tummy to her back! I kept thinking she would never roll over because she hates tummy time after the first minute or so (and often just gives up and lays her head down. haha) and loves being on her back so much that she never really tries to hard to roll over. Sometimes she would roll from her back to her side, but never further than that. But I've really been trying to do a lot of tummy time (despite her distaste for it) and I guess it paid off.

-Is sleeping pretty well still. Bedtime is a hard and fast thing. There's a 30 minute window between 5:45-6:15pm where she just can't handle her life anymore and passes out. We've tried stretching it a little later, but she's not on board with that plan. Stupid daylight savings. Mornings are a little more varied. She wakes up anywhere between 4:45-6:00am to nurse, then sleeps again until 7:30-8:30. Most mornings I get up earlier than her and have some time to myself to read scriptures, do a little tidying up, eat breakfast, etc. and my days are always better when I do.

-Is still so so bald, and I love it. All the hats for winter time! Her eyes are also still pretty green, and the cheeks just keep getting better all the time.

-Takes two pretty consistent naps per day, and sometimes a third. The first nap lasts about an hour, the second anywhere from 1.5-2.5 hours and the third is a total mystery. We never know.

-Loves her dad, and smiles so big every time she sees him. I have this feeling he will always be the fun parent.

-Doesn't seem to mind the cold, although her tender little skin hates it. It has been so cold and windy and her cheeks have gotten dry and red again in this last cold snap.

-Still nurses a solid 6 times per day, refuses to take a bottle, and we haven't started solids yet. She takes a bottle about every 1 in 8 times we try, so it's just not a good enough ratio to leave her with a babysitter. So we only go on dates after she's asleep, and if an event starts before 6:30 we're out of luck. My pediatrician said we could start solids at 4 months, but that a lot of nursing moms wait until 6 months. On that note, I am thinking we will start trying solids here and there just to see how she does. On the occasion when I let her lick my apple or breadcrusts, she can't seem to get enough so I'm excited to see her try things for real.

-Still sleeps swaddled, and we're just going to keep on going for now. The girl can get out of basically any swaddle, but wakes herself up every time she gets her arms out. I thought for a while it was time to transition to letting her sleep with a partial swaddle, but when we tried it didn't go well. She was up like 10 times in the night, and went right back to sleep when I went upstairs and swaddled her. So we bought her a sleepsack that has the option of swaddling her with her arms out, but for now we are still full swaddle until she rolls over in her sleep and we absolutely can't anymore.

-She's still pretty stone-faced, but the smiles and giggles we get we can never get enough of. She is fun and talkative and squeals at the top of her lungs on a regular basis (and we can almost always get giggles when we read her favorite book, the little blue truck!). Jay and I love her so much, and I praise my lucky stars every day that I get to be this girls mama.