baby rowan: 5 months

little tiny mr. baby is now 5 months (and some change). cue the dramatics because we're just a few weeks away from 6 months. half a year. how?? little baby is growing and changing and it really is so fun to watch all over again. i don't have any stats since we didn't visit the pedi this month, but he certainly looks older than last month to me. he's wearing 3-6, 6, and 9 month clothing comfortably but since we're trying to use finn's old stuff, he's been wearing lots of too big 6-12 month sleepers since finn wasn't that big until winter and closer to 9/10 months.

activity wise, ro is not a big mover. he does not roll either way and rarely participates in tummy time for any amount of time. he can hold his toes, kick and swat at toys and he easily spots, reaches for and often grabs objects he desires. he is just starting to sit up unassisted but can't be unattended as he easily topples. mostly, he is content being held and does enjoy bouncing in his jumperoo and occasionally playing on his play mat. he's pretty much over the swing and bouncer and so far hates the bumbo. 

he's super cute and it's a good thing because he could not be worse at sleeping. while he has gotten slightly better at napping some days (sometimes he will sleep 1-2 hours consecutively and i am SO thankful), he is unable to sleep for very long at night. he has a bed time routine and is usually nursing before sleep around 8:45pm. this is his long stretch of sleep...until midnight. then he is up every 1.5-2 hours all night. i feed him between 4 and 5 times a night every night because not much else calms him or puts him back to sleep. we have tried soothing, patting, rocking, pacifiers. he gets mad if my husband offers him a bottle (though he will eventually take one). occasionally we are all so tired we let him cry. and he just...cries. so, we are tired. his night time sleep is actually worse now than it was 2 months ago.

as for the breastfeeding, he's still doing well at that. unlike finn, rowan is a comfort nurser. if he had his way, he would nurse every hour. i know that works for some people but it doesn't work for me. this leads him to be sort of fussy quite frequently because i deny him what he wants. we're starting solids at 6 months just as we did with finn and i am hoping that other forms of food might interest him enough to let go of the strong desire to nurse. he is really into meal times and reaches for food so i think he'll be excited to try some purees.

and then there's this one, who looks about thirteen here. i know when he's actually thirteen i will look at photos from this age and think he looks so little, like a baby still, but he just seems SO grown up to me.