La Buena Vida: 5 Months

Eleanor Christine turned 5 months on the 15^th. That day was undoubtedly the busiest of my whole summer (see previous post!), so I didn’t get a 5 month post written till now.

Skills: Eleanor has been able to sit up unassisted for a couple weeks now, so as far as that goes she’s pretty much on the same timeline as her sister. She also rolls and rolls all over the place! She loves rolling around. She’s almost able to scoot forward on her tummy, and I wonder if we’ll have definite forward motion in the next month! She tries to scoot but usually just ends up rolling over. She loves grabbing toys and hitting anything in front of her. One new skill that I’m not happy about is screaming. She has learned that loud, screeching squeal and uses it frequently. One funny thing to note is, Lia still uses both hands pretty regularly, and is just barely showing a slight preference for the right hand. Eleanor, however, is definitely showing a right-hand preference. She reaches for things and hits them more often with her right. (Out of curiosity—when did your child start showing a hand preference? Please comment below!)

Practicing her sitting skills

Firsts: Eleanor had her first taste of oatmeal baby cereal and loved it! She loves shoving EVERYTHING in her mouth, so I’m not surprised she likes to eat solids. She’s also had a banana and liked it. She’s also started babbling “da-da-ga-ba-ba-mmmma-ma” and things like that. It’s pretty cute!

Mmmm, cereal!!

Likes: Eleanor likes baths now that she can sit up. It makes it harder to bathe her because she slips around, but she loves sitting and splashing in the water with Lia. She loves mommy! She would be held all day long if she had her way. She likes sucking on things, especially her fingers and pacifiers. She likes her sister and laughs at Lia more than anything else. I don’t really get why she is so fond of Lia since Lia’s favorite thing to do is push her over when she’s sitting, but I guess it’s a good thing. Ellie likes being outside, and she thinks grass is fascinating. She likes grabbing faces and burying her face in your shoulder, which is so darling. All my shirts have snot and drool marks on the shoulders, but I actually don’t mind much.


First visit with Great- Grandma and Grandpa

Dislikes: She hates being left alone, even for a couple minutes while I’m cleaning or using the bathroom! It is so hard to get things done because she just screams and screams until I pick her up. I know it wont hurt her to just let her cry, but her screams are so piercing that I can’t even think, so I always end up holding her before long. She doesn’t like getting dressed or getting her bum changed. She is so big and roly-poly that it is hard to wrestle her clothes and diaper on her. She does not like getting her nose wiped, which is unfortunate because she has a runny nose right now. She also apparently doesn’t like sleeping, because we’re still doing a feeding every 3-4 hours each night. It is very tiring and frustrating. I’ve figured out how to get her to sleep during naptime and bedtime: give her a pacifier and a shirt that smells like me to cuddle with, and she’ll drift off to sleep on her own. At night, though, she absolutely WILL NOT go back to sleep without nursing. I’ve tried everything I can think of. So for now, I’ll continue to nurse her 2-4 times a night I guess.

How sweet is she!

Eleanor is so fun. She babbles and talks and sucks her lips in, which makes her face look silly and I love it. She hums and drools all day and pats my cheeks and grabs my hair and gives me super wet kisses. Love this little girl!