With Conrad’s first tooth coming through, we had a few nights when he’d wake up at 4am and not manage to go back to sleep. I tried baby paracetamol and teething gel, rocking him and singing to him and changing his nappy, but nothing helped, and at about 6am – his normal breakfast time – I’d give him his mid-morning bottle (basically swapping the meals around, so I could feed him in the bedroom and try him in the cot again afterwards, as he certainly would need more sleep after having been awake since 4am) in case he was getting hungry. After his bottle he’d cheer up and become quite active, but be happy enough to lie in his cot giggling and kicking his legs. And after about another half hour he’d go back to sleep.
This happened four mornings in a row. The fifth morning I tried singing him to sleep (‘När trollmor…’ seems to work well for Conrad) kneeling by the side of his cot, holding my right hand against his left cheek and stroking his temple with my thumb. After a few minutes of crying and tossing and turning, he started calming down and then quietly fell asleep. And slept for another hour. The following night he woke and stirred at 4am, then 5am, resettling himself in-between. I reckoned then, that if it had been teething the first few nights, his tooth probably wasn’t causing him discomfort anymore. As it happens, though, today I felt the rough edge of Conrad’s second tooth coming through – right next to his first one, at the front right at his bottom jaw – so we’ll see what the next few nights are like. Daytime he’s not complained at all, only seemed to chew on things a bit harder than normal.
Conrad’s steadier on his feet now, standing by the sofa, the sofa table or the trampoline to play. He’s still so chuffed when he gets to walk about – or rather run, as he can get up to a fair amount of speed, at times almost lying horizontally with his head first as his feet don’t always seem to keep up with him… A few evenings ago, Conrad and Jessica were chasing each other through the kitchen/hallway/living room (Conrad holding on to Daddy’s hands) and it was really fun!
Last Thursday (5th February), Conrad woke up again after we had been at the Thursday morning toddler group for only about half an hour. He was so excited about everything going on around him that both he and I forgot that he was due his milk at 10am. (I remembered about 45 minutes later and he was very happy to have it when offered.) Afterwards he threw up a fair bit, mainly over my jeans and the floor. He hasn’t actually been sick much at all for a very long while, but the last week it’s been a bit bad again, though mainly after milk feeds. I have been wondering whether it can be linked to the teething (Conrad’s sister Jessica can still be sick every so often if she’s tired or unwell), but so many people want to blame everything on teething – from sore bottoms to heartburn to runny noses, when the real reasons to my mind most likely probably are tummy upsets, acidic food and colds – that I’m not sure I should look to make that connection. Not that it matters; it’s just a case of wiping stuff clean and doing a bit of extra washing, and I’m sure it’ll improve as he gets older.
Conrad had another bath in the tub today and was splashing so vigorously he gradually slid backwards until he had his back at the other end, right by the shower. I held a towel in front of me to try to protect myself from the worst, but it’s great to see him having such fun and not minding water splashed in his face. He also doesn’t mind at all when I pour water over his head to wash his hair. At one point he suddenly sat completely still and reached his hand out to touch the water, as if he was trying to grab it between his fingers. Then he spotted a bright blue mug in the corner of his eye, reached to grab it and the splashing started again! It would be so nice to take him to ‘water confidence’ classes (‘swim’ classes for babies) and see what he makes of it, though my problem would be what to do with his sister meanwhile (I haven’t found any baby swim classes on a Wednesday).
Every day there’s a moment when the two siblings have a giggle together. Yesterday there were two. In the morning I was hanging up some washing (in the living room as unfortunately winter time we have no other space to hang it). Jessica loves to help and Conrad usually watches us sitting on the floor. In the last few days Jessica’s also started to place things on top of her own or a toy’s head saying ‘hatt’ (‘hat’ in Swedish). When she was grabbing Conrad’s bibs out of the pile of damp laundry, this time she started putting them on Conrad’s head, proudly declaring each one a “hatt”. Conrad started to giggle, then Jessica started to giggle too, and the game continued for a while – Conrad was sitting quite still, closely watching Jessica with a big smile on his face, but every so often he’d move just a little bit and one of the bibs would slide off so Jessica had to hurry to put it back on top.
In the afternoon, Jessica played ‘Where’s Conrad?’ putting a muslin over his head and every time he tore it off or it slid off to reveal his smiling face peering out underneath it (unbelievably cute…!). They were giggling so much I thought they’d fall over.
Gabriella