Conrad’s blog

We’ve all been suffering colds – well, me the least and Ian the most – and both Conrad and Jessica have had runny noses and been sneezing, and coughing a bit too. Last weekend I noticed a bit of green gunk coming out of Conrad’s left ear, which made us a bit concerned. But he had no temperature and seemed perfectly happy otherwise, chatting and giggling, and both eating and sleeping as usual (whatever usual is when you’ve only been on the planet for 4 1/2 months…!). Ian phoned NHS Direct to see if there were any concerns that would warrant a trip to the A&E, but the questions they asked to assess the situation put us at ease – Conrad was absolutely fine, apart from the discharge from his ear. So instead on the Monday morning (27th October) I got an appointment for Conrad at our local surgery.

Conrad kept chatting and smiling at the medical student and then doctor, who assessed him, and the verdict was reassuring: there was an infection somewhere in Conrad’s ear, but as he was happy and had no temperature, he appeared to be fighting it off successfully himself. So no need for antibiotics (something we’d rather avoid for as long as possible anyway). I was advised to make a new appointment in a week’s time to have Conrad looked at again. Only a couple of days after the doctor saw Conrad, it looked as if the green discharge had pretty much cleared and I haven’t seen any of it since then. Hopefully that means all is well. Another concern of mine and Ian’s was whether the infection could have affected Conrad’s hearing – hopefully they can check that for us if I make another appointment.

With regards to the weaning, I guess we haven’t got very far, but then it’s not been long since we started. I’ve given Conrad a little bit of pureed carrot for a few days and then parsnip, after he’s had about 2/3 of his mid-morning bottle (there are no regular times for these yet, as his day naps vary a lot still, both in length and when he has them). Not much has stayed in – his little tongue automatically pushes against both spoon and food – but he seems very interested, which always is a good start. The (vague) plan at the moment is to try a few new flavours, and then introduce a little baby rice part-way through his first bottle of the day. Don’t want to rush things – there’s no need to.

Gabriella

Last night, as you might have guessed from the headline, Conrad slept an amazing 9.5 hours, from 7.30pm after his bed-time feed when he nodded off in my arms until 5am this morning. (That’s summer time still, as we didn’t bother changing the clocks during the night – as Ian pointed out it’d only be depressing to see that the time was 4.30/5am when we got woken up by the kids rather than 5.30/6am…) I wasn’t even wearing the one earplug I sometimes do to not get disturbed by Conrad’s little murmurs and snuffles, and didn’t hear a peep from him all night!

At 5am I gave Conrad a feed and put him back in his cot, and as has been the case lately, at this time, he didn’t mind being back in his cot but started chatting and mumbling to himself, in a very happy way. Some mornings he can be quite loud (in an excited and happy way), and although I didn’t think he was as loud this time, unfortunately I could hear his sister stir in her room next door. After about 20 minutes, Conrad drifted back off to sleep.

As the clocks were going back, Ian and I had decided to try to nudge the kids’ bedtime a bit at the time, starting with giving them their last feed before bed-time at 7.15pm rather than 7pm last night. Unfortunately, Conrad managed to stir his sister enough this morning so that she got up more or less at her usual time. As Ian’s the one on ‘Jessica duty’ at the moment, though, I lingered in bed for a while longer while Conrad snoozed. We will see if we can gradually persuade Conrad and his sister to shunt their sleep a little – and hopefully Conrad will be less noisy at (what is now) 4am in the morning…

Conrad is such a happy little boy! He’s giggled lots in the past from me doing so anyway, but yesterday when I kissed his cheeks Conrad laughed and laughed and it was a proper laugh – amazingly similar to his sister’s and just as infectious: it made Ian and me laugh too and I just couldn’t stop kissing him (until I started to fear Conrad getting worn out).

We paid Tilgate Park a short visit again yesterday, as the weather was lovely and it’s not very far. When we arrived, Conrad was awake and very soon got bored in his back seat in the push chair, so I lifted him out and carried him around for a while, which cheered him up straight away. Anything and everything grabs his attention: he was equally – or perhaps actually even more, it seemed – interested in fences, bins and benches as he was in the animals. I had to put Conrad back in the push chair for the walk uphill to the café where we were planning to have lunch and he wasn’t too happy with that at first, but when we sat down around a table outside he was already asleep. He didn’t stir until he was put back in the car and then was watching the world go by all the way home. You can certainly tell he’s more awake and alert nowadays, finds interest in and absorbs what goes on around him.

Gabriella

Conrad is happy sitting in his ‘play nest’ (the inflated ring) for longer periods of time now. I saw him grasping toys with both hands for the first time today (Wednesday), turning them over and studying them intently. You can tell that he’s not quite got the hand-eye coordination yet: a couple of times he was intensely looking at something straight ahead but only managed to grab something further over to the side and, seemingly frustrated, kept droping it and trying again.

He also spotted his feet for the first time (as far as I am aware) today and grabbed them – not by reaching them himself but when I lifted his bottom off the nappy changing mat by grabbing his legs by the ankles, so his feet were bove his face. No doubt, as he gets more agile, he’ll grab them plenty of times again.

I have kept forgetting to mention it, but although his eyes are still blue – a dark, lmost grey shade – Conrad’s left eye seems to have a very small, rusty-coloured patch in the iris just bove the pupil. At times I’ve not been sure if it’s not just been my hair or something else reflecting in his eye, a trick of the light, but I will keep looking.

Gabriella

First of all a couple of photos from a few days ago that didn’t make it as far as the blog before. Conrad hasn’t rolled over himself yet, though does arch his back and seem to get fairly close now and then – unfortunately mainly on the nappy changing mat, which has raised sides to prevent exactly that sort of thing… I have rolled him over on his tummy a few times: not too often as he’s tended to get sick when resting on his tummy. But the last 4-5 days, it seems Conrad hasn’t thrown up quite as much quite as often. Maybe that is just coincidental – we’ll just have to wait and see.

Yesterday mid-morning, about an hour after Conrad had had a bottle, I mixed together some baby rice and Ian brought downstairs and unfolded the highchair we’d got for Conrad (we’ve got a booster cushion for his sister Jessica to save space in anticipation of Conrad starting to use a highchair, but are getting rid of Jessica’s highchair as the seat cushion has started to come apart a bit). Conrad just beamed his big smile at us when put in the highchair.

Ian started feeding Conrad his first ever porridge, but it was tricky to work out what Conrad made of it. He opened his mouth for every spoonful, but kept staring at me and the camera (although I was trying to be discreet with it), rather than looking at the food or the bowl. Most of the baby rice came straight out again, of course – it’s an acquired skill to swallow solids. So – time to start steaming and pureeing carrots, parsnips, etc. The next big stage of Conrad’s first year begins!

Conrad has stuck his tongue out at me quite a bit today, by the way. Don’t know what to make of that. It’s very cute, though.

Gabriella

On Wednesday (15th October) I took Conrad to the health visitor clinic down the road to have him weighed, as a visit there hadn’t fitted in with his sister’s nap the previous Wednesday (which really had been the Wednesday nearest to his 4 month day). Conrad now weighs 8.4 kilos (18lb 8oz), which seems especially big when you consider that his now almost 20 months old sister wears size 4 nappies, with the weight range starting at 9 kilos… Very soon they’ll be wearing the same size nappies! (Which will make it easier for us shopping.) But then Conrad is tall too: I started putting him in size 74 (or 6 to 9 months) clothing recently – when Ian and I measured Conrad at home the other day he was 69 cm.

The health visitor, who weighed Conrad. was surprised he is getting by on formula only and no solids as yet. To help him sleep through the night, she suggested starting to wean him already – I had planned to wait until Conrad was 20 weeks old, which would have meant another two weeks to go.

‘Other people will advise you to wait until he’s 6 months old’, she said. ‘But to help you get some sleep and considering his size, you might just as well start now.’ She smiled conspiratorially: ‘If I put in his red book that it’s to help with his reflux, that should be a good enough official reason!’

I had already bought some organic baby rice in preparation, and we’ve now decided to give Conrad his first taster this weekend, as one’s supposed to start weaning mid-morning to noon-time and our whole family would be there then to give Conrad a bit of moral support… I’m feeling quite excited about Conrad trying his first bi of non-milk food – can’t believe we’re there already…! Will be very interesting to see his reaction.

In the morning, Conrad had had his third lot of jabs, which now were only top ups (boosters) of the ones he had had already. As the previous two times, he cried when the needles were stuck in his thighs and a while after, but I was quick to cuddle him, and not 5 minutes later he was all smiles again, and fell asleep in the pram on our walk back home. He showed no other symptoms of anything: no temperature or grizzliness.

By the way, for four out of the five last nights – after having had his last feed at 7pm before bed – Conrad has now only had one night feed (when has varied: 11.30pm, 1.30am or 2.30am) and then lasted nicely until 7am. In general, his nights of less feeds have gradually increased the last few weeks. So I’m keeping my fingers crossed that we are heading in the right direction!

Gabriella

Last Thursday (9th October), we went on a family excursion to Bockett’s Farm. The idea was, I guess, to mainly amuse Conrad’s sister, not knowing how much time of the visit Conrad would be spending awake anyway. But after having started off with a feed, he quickly got bored with the push chair (well, all he can see from his reclining position there is the back of Jessica’s seat, really, so fair enough), so I carried him around the pens with sheep, goats and llamas, while he sported his most common expression of wide-eyed, open-mouthed bafflement (terribly cute, I must add).

He started to flag just as the rest of us went for lunch, but kept smiling for a while until it all got too much. When Jessica and I had finished our lunch, we took Conrad for a walkabout in the push chair, leaving Ian to finish his in peace. I had thought I might show Conrad the horses but when we got to the stables he was sound asleep and stayed that way for the last hour of our visit and the journey back home.

Back at home, we put Conrad on Jessica’s lap for the first time and just have to show you how that went down with the both of them:

Conrad seems mainly interested in standing up – so much so I’m starting to wonder whether he actually does bend in the middle… He can be pulled up to standing from lying down on the floor by just grabbing his hands and when one holds his hands and he stands on the floor, he does wobble and his knees sometimes fold a bit on him, but he stands so straight. His neck and back seem so strong (but then he did lift his head on the evening he was born). He’s even stood for a couple of seconds only supported by holding on to the little wooden trolley with bricks that we’ve got (but with Daddy’s hands just nearby and ready to catch…).

Conrad is aware of his milk bottle now: if he’s crying because he’s just woken up and is overdue a feed, and I sit him on my lap and put the bottle in front of him, he stops crying when he sees it. (Though if I’m not quick enough offering it to him, he’ll start again…)

Gabriella

Unfortunately, with two little kids to look after, I very quickly run out of time for things like updating this blog, even if it always feels like there’s so much to tell.

Regarding Conrad’s night-time sleeping, as its fresh in my mind, we had an awful night Friday night (3 October) to Saturday… Conrad was unsettled all night and woke up roughly every 30 minutes from about midnight. He wasn’t crying hysterically or desperately, mostly moaning and crying off and on whenever he was awake. Whatever I could think of to do – check that he wasn’t uncomfortable from having been sick on himself or any of his clothes digging in, cuddle him, change his nappy, feed him – didn’t seem to help.

In the end I seemed to remember Conrad not having had a dirty nappy for a day or so: could it be constipation…? He hadn’t pulled his legs up to his tummy or complained like when he used to have his colicky tummy aches, so I hadn’t thought of that as a possibility. But anything is worth trying when you’re about to fall over from tiredness at 3am in the morning…! By the time I’d boiled and cooled (in the fridge) some water for Conrad to drink, it was morning already. Conrad had about 10-15 ml of water, managed to catch up on some sleep during the morning and was a much happier little boy. Later that day he had a dirty nappy, so maybe the water helped.

I was pretty apprehensive about the following night though, but during the Saturday night to today, Conrad only woke up for one night feed, at 1.30am! Bliss. Whatever was troubling him the previous night was no longer an issue – what a relief!

There’s so much interaction going on between Conrad and Jessica, I just have to show you a few more pictures of this (undoubtedly not the last ones, either…):

Gabriella

Even though little things always change, it feels a bit like we’re into a daily routine now – in so far as I’ve got more used to being responsible for two little kiddies… We still do our walk to and around the park in the mornings and Conrad falls asleep and has a morning nap then, though more often recently, that nap has only lasted for an hour to an hour and a half, and when we get back home, Conrad is wide awake and nearing his next feed. Jessica likes staying nearby when I feed Conrad on the sofa, enjoys watching him, pointing out his nose, eyes (she’s more careful with these now, tends to point at a bit of a distance…) and ears, and being tickled by his feet when he kicks. There’s definitely more mutual interest than big sister jealousy going on nowadays.

Was just going to say that Conrad generally has no problems going to sleep for his day naps, but we’ve just had a tricky afternoon, when Conrad’s not wanted to settle for a nap until 3pm, with some crying in-between… He cheered up when I put him on the nappy changing mat, so I took the opportunity to give him a bath and change his nappy and clothes. After a while tiredness took over again and he started to cry, so I carried him through to the carry cot in the living room and tucked him in. He didn’t really like that, so I disappeared out in the garden for a couple of minutes, to give him time to settle – sometimes letting him settle by himself means up to five minutes worth of crying, and it’s hard for me to listen to it without wanting to comfort him, but otherwise he’d never get used to settling on his own. It took him less than 5 minutes to fall asleep.

Speaking of settling, Conrad’s still having night-time feeds and I don’t know whether that’s normal or not. Last night, he was still awake after his going-to-bed feed, so – a bit apprehensively, not knowing whether he’d kick around a lot and end up throwing up on himself and all over the bedlinen – I put him to bed wide awake. It took him over an hour to fall asleep, but he didn’t crank or cry, just made little noises in the dark, and I went to check on him a couple of times so he’d know he hadn’t been abandoned. I was really relieved when he managed to fall asleep by himself in the cot. Once during the night he stirred and cried briefly, but then drifted off to sleep not to wake up again until two hours later. His first feed when waking in the night was after 5 hours; the following one after 4 hours. So at least it’s not every 2-3 hours…! I’m guessing I need to let him settle for the night on his own, to give him practice in not needing a feed to drop off, but I dread having to change soaked bedlinen at 7 or 8pm…

Gabriella