One Month Old

So, here is Henry's one month picture. You just have to check back at Isabel's pictures and you will see how much they really do look alike. Some of the pictures I was looking at I was like, "Hey, it looks like Henry in a dress". Although, I think you can see the subtle differences that make him look more like a boy & her more like a girl.

Let's see -- what has he been up to. He has been smiling a lot lately. He's a pretty happy little boy. He's really been figuring out his hands & arms and sometimes she he is suposed to be falling asleep he is playing with his hands and just seems in awe of them.

Well, unlike his sister we are not swaddling him. He doesn't seem to need it, in fact, hates his arms being compressed. But he does like his blankets and seems to fall asleep faster if we cover him with a blanket. He is not fond of cold, which is different fron his sister who is not fond of it being too warm. I guess we'll see if he gets a heat rash like she does.

He does well taking a bottle & paci amd if he really wants to suck and doesn't have something he will find his thumb. His sister didn't do any of those. She started a paci at 7 mo.

He does have baby acne that he will outgrow in the upcoming months. His sister didn't have this, so it's new to me. Another difference is that he is not allergic to his poop like she was, so with him we have to pay attention to whether or not he pooped because when she did she cried right away & needed to be changed.

One thing they both have/had that is the same is that they have greasy heads. His hair is actually quite blond (I think even more blond than hers might have been initially) but within an hour of a bath his greasy head makes it look darker.

So, at birth he was 21 inches (87th percentile) and now a month later he is 34.5 inches (100th percentile). And his head went from 14.75 inches to 15.5 inches. I will get a weight on him on Thursday when I take him to the Baby Stop Clinic. You don't have to tell me that he's growing - oh! I know! He grew 2.5 inches in a month (his sister grew 1.75 inches in the first month).

Actually, it does not thrill me to say this but we have started to give him 2 oz. of formula at night before he starts his first nighttime sleep. Before he starts nighttime sleep he is up for 1.5-2 hours generally and likes to cluster feed and gets quite angry when he has sucked me dry. So, daddy gets to give him 2 oz. of formula in a bottle (which is all he seems to need additionally). He doesn't cluster feed any other time, just then. But the past few nights that we have had to supplement 2 oz., he started sleeping 3-3.5 hours during that first stretch, unfortunately that is when I am still awake for half or more of it. His second stretch is usually 3 hours, but the next couple stretches have been 2 hours, which kinda sucks because by that point I am exhausted and it is so hard to get up after that first 2 hour stretch. Generally I am up about 20 minutes after each time to nurse him and change him (if needed). We have been lucky where he generally likes to go back to sleep at night and didn't have nights/days reversed.

He is starting to get into a bit of a routine with napping & awake times, but it is still too early to have anything definite. But he does seem to like to have have 3 periods of awake times that are 2 hours long now. So, he isn't sleeping quite as much. His naps are usually 2 hours long and he has three of them.

The last couple days have been good for pooping. He used to poop pretty much everytime he nursed, but the last couple days he is pooping a lot about 3-4 times a day rather than a little bit 10 times a day. So, that will be good and help him with sleeping longer. But he sure does pee a lot. I have heard that from other moms of boys, that they pee a lot more than girls. The amount of pee is why we have wardrobe changes, the diaper just can't hold enough and it doesn't seem to matter which brand we purchase. But I do remember a conversation a couple years ago that moms of boys had about putting diapers on their boys that were a size larger than they needed at that time. So, we are using sz. 2 diapers at bedtime (don't want clothing changes at that time) and we are trying to use the rest of the sz. 1's in the meantime.