Monday, May 29, 2006

Becca update - expanding the palate, teething continues and rolling into corners

It's been a few weeks since the last post. Here's what's new:
Becca continues to eat solids. She doesn't seem to have reacted badly to the rice cereal, but seems to have lost interest in it recently. It might be because of the teething. It's gotten worse lately. Sometimes, even if she's obviously quite hungry, the pain in her gums will make her stop eating. There has been quite a bit of drool and gnawing lately, and today was the grumpiest day so far. I am trying cuddle therapy, frozen cloths and teething rings. I hope a tooth shows up soon. After all, it's been almost 6 weeks of teething now, and nothing has appeared. I am fully aware that it is a lengthy process, but it seems unfair for Rebecca to endure the pain and have nothing to show for it.
Rebecca is now eating breakfast in her new high chair. Every part of it is washable! This is a good thing considering that feeding cereal to Rebecca is truly messy. For starters, the cereal that Becca eats must have a fairly liquid texture, and it must also journey to her snapping turtle maw on a very tiny, shallow spoon. I'm sure you can imagine what transpires. Her flailing arms knocks the contents everywhere. Actually, one of the biggest challenges of feeding Becca is the battle of wills to see who will control the spoon. She likes to grab it and jam it deep into her mouth. Once, I had to pull so hard to maintain my grip of it that the high chair rolled forward. With all the teething, Rebecca always has her fingers in her mouth. She doesn't understand the perils of this and more than once has activated her own gag reflex.
At any rate, today's adventure was trying out barley cereal for the first time. I will try barley exclusively for this week, so I can judge her reaction to it. The barley is an unappealing grey colour, and is not as tasty as the rice (yes, I taste them - why not?). Next will be oats.
Rebecca now rolls over on a daily basis. She can sit fairly well with assistance, and sometimes without assistance, but can not sit up on her own from a prone position. What is especially interesting is that she now rolls with a purpose. If there is a toy on the edge of the blanket that she wants, she will rolls to get it. She also pulls herself forward on her belly, or rotates on her belly, to point herself where she wants to go.
A new trick is rolling into the corner of her crib so that her head is in the corner, and she is on her belly. Then, she cries until I come and flip her over. She never stays put in the crib anymore. In fact, she clearly prefers to sleep on her belly. I debated flipping her back to her back when I first discovered this, but frankly, she just goes back to her preferred position, and now that her upper body strength and control is substantial, I am not as concerned about SIDS.
We are in the process of shifting Becca's bedtime. Her wakeup time is now approximately 8am, and bedtime is supposed to be 8:30PM. It is difficult to make this work because she seems to be a night owl, however, 11PM just isn't a great bedtime. 8:30PM at least, seemed to correspond to a time when she naturally would be sleepy and (previously) in need of a nap. It is working out so-so... the big problem is that the teething is throwing off her feeding and sleeping, so often, things are messed up on a grand scale. However, I feel confident that sticking to a routine will ultimately be more of a help than a hindrance for our daughter.

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