It's been a busy week for Miss Em. For a couple of weeks now, I've been thinking about posting a development update, in keeping with the "baby book" aspect of this blog. But really, she hadn't been up to much. But then this last week was an explosion of tiny developments.
First--the thumb. On Friday, I noticed a peculiar sucking sound coming from the vicinity of Emma. I looked over, and she was going to town on her thumb. I know this doesn't sound like much, but up until now, Emma has been a whole-hand chewer. The dexterity to separate out the thumb and position it for optimum suckage is new. It's cut down on pacifier time substantially, and she always seems so pleased when she finds it. I've been too slow with the camera to catch it yet, but the funny part is the visual. She doesn't know what to do with the rest of her fingers, so she alternatingly waves them around or grabs her nose with them.
In addition to her tasty thumb, Emma has also found that, with a little more effort, her toes can fill in as a tasty treat. At first, she would catch her toes in her field of view, and track them, like Walter the cat tracking a toy mouse... but she didn't quite have the know-how to get the toes to go where she wanted. Now when she catches a glimpse of them, you can watch her little machine of a brain work to remember how she makes the toe thingies work again, and slowly she moves her legs close enough for her hands to grab her feet. It's precious. I'll admit, I was feeling a little worried that she hadn't noticed them yet. I know a friend of mine's slightly older son found his toes at four months. And while I've been good at repeating the good mama mantra of "all children develop at a different pace" I couldn't help but compare.
The third snack Emma learned to enjoy this week was bananas. Since she was about 4 months, I've been checking in once a week to see if she has any interest in solids. Until this weekend, the answer had been a resounding no. And then we tried bananas in that mesh feeder thing. And she loves them! She's been eating about an inch of banana for breakfast and usually dinner too for four days now. It's adorable. She's so engaged in it, and happy and sticky and proud of herself while she's rubbing banana goo all over the the high chair and herself. After a lot of reading about introducing solids, I've been leaning toward the baby led weaning camp. And after watching Emma's reaction to being in control of the banana, I think I'm sold.
And then sleep. I had planned to post this yesterday after it happened to record the fresh excitement. Night before last, Emma only woke up one time. At 3:30. For five minutes. I don't know if it was the tummy full of bananas, or a brain quiet after the turmoil of working through so many new developments, but it was lovely. Especially because it was a cool, humid (for Colorado) night--great sleeping weather as my dad would say--and I was able to enjoy the relative peace of being unneeded for a stretch of nighttime hours. Last night, she woke up at 10:30 and I just brought her to bed with us, so I don't know for sure how sleeping would have gone if she were on her own.
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