The bouncing game

Rowan is a very active baby, and especially enjoys physical games.  His particular favourite is being bounced and he will try to encourage you to continue the game by continuously bending his knees.  The bouncing game was perfectly fine when he was smaller.  Now he's nearly one stone in weight it's not quite so easy but it's a brilliant workout!

I apologise for the orientation of the video below.  I need to download some software so I can edit it, but that sounded suspiciously like work so you'll have to content yourself with either tilting your head or laptop.

If you turn on your speakers, you can hear Rowan's squeal of delight!

Weaning

We've started to wean Rowan as he was giving several cues that he was ready for 'real food.'  He was getting angry after finishing a milk feed, suggesting he wasn't getting enough; he went back to demanding feeds every 2 hours and watched us with intense fascination whenever we ate in front of him (he nearly swiped a chicken goujon from Gareth's hand, such was his determination to eat. Although babies grab anything and everything at this age, so not really a testament to his readiness for weaning).

So far he has tried carrot; parsnip; banana; peas; pear; porridge and baby rice and he hasn't refused anything so far.  We seem to have the opposite problem and run out before he's had his fill.  We're not sure if we should stick to the recommended portion size, or just give him more.  He does get topped up with milk, so he's not exactly starving.

It's great fun watching him explore new tastes and textures.  We've learnt to have a damp cloth on standby to mop him down, and to use two spoons so he can hold one to avoid situations like this:

A downside to weaning is that the contents of his nappy are no longer the inoffensive deposits of a breastfed baby.  Hopefully this will calm down once his digestive system has got used to these new foods.  I'm not sure I can cope with 3 years of handling toxic waste that smells like it could be used to strip paint.  Actually, that would be useful considering the amount of decorating we still have to do.

First family meal

Happiness is a pureed carrot

Making sure the spoon doesn't go anywhere but

his face 

Food coma

Mother's Day

A belated post on the Mother's Day gifts I made for my Mum and Mother-in-law this year. I wanted to make a 'gift in a jar' and finally settled on making a cookie mix.  This consists of layering the dry ingredients of a cookie mix in a decorated jar, and including a recipe card for the recipient to complete them. I took inspiration from www.bakerella.com and used her Cowgirl Cookie recipe (which can be found here).  As the recipe was in American cups, I had to convert the butter amount on the recipe card to metric (250 grams, if you were wondering).

Considering I was attempting to make them in the brief times when Rowan was napping, or whilst trying to simultaneously entertain him, I was quite happy with the outcome. Although I would have liked to spend a tad more time on them to make them look professional instead of something I brought home from school (i.e. printing out the recipe/'how to' label instead of handwriting it, and co-ordinating the themes better - I was stashbusting and nothing in my stash quite worked together).  Anyway, for your viewing pleasure, here are the results:

If I did them again I would use chocolate chips as the original recipe suggested, rather than chop up a bar of chocolate. Small bits of chocolate fell through to the layer beneath, so it lost the crisp contrast of layers.
The cookies are delicious, and you can freeze up the cookie balls to bake when you fancy some warm cookie goodness!

Sleep regression

Another long gap between posts!  Rowan has been going through a sleep regression, so I've not really been inclined to blog.  My normally super sleeper (we're talking up to 10 hours here) suddenly started waking up every three hours four weeks ago.  This is normal, apparently, as babies start having more adult sleep cycles when they hit 4 months, so they cycle from deep to light sleep every 50mins or so.  It can take them awhile before they learn to settle themselves after waking from the light sleep.  This is the time when adults would turn over, or adjust their pillow etc. and then go back to sleep.
It's either that or Rowan is gearing himself up for weaning, since he always seems to be hungry too.  He'll have to wait a bit though, as the earliest I've read they can be weaned is 17 weeks.  I think we'll start dipping our fingers in certain foods though and letting him have a taste as a palate preparation!

In other developmental news, Rowan spent two days rolling from front to back, and hasn't done it since! I guess he figures he has nothing to prove now he knows he can do it.

Anyway, since it's been so long between posts, here are some photos from the last few weeks:

Make sure you put the right one in the right bed...

Bizarre frog impression

I believe he was watching the thoroughly

age-appropriate 'Oz' in this one. 

Tummy time Daddy style!

Meeting Aunty Pod 

All the cousins. From left to right:

Emma, Tom, Lily and Rowan 

Meeting Uncle Mark. Rowan was a tad overtired

by this point. 

Looking rather grown-up

Coolness in a babygrow

Hugs with Nanny

Hugs with Grand-dad

 Rowan recliningon my breastfeeding pillow. His

favourite place!

Rockin' the pink Bumbo

Run Tangent, run! Before he becomes

independently mobile 

First drawing 

Butterscotch vanilla muffins

I made a batch of vanilla muffins with a vanilla buttercream and topped with butterscotch pieces recently.  Maternity leave is going to make me very fat!

'Nuff said

Tummy time!

Rowan isn't a huge fan of spending time on his stomach, but babies are supposed to have some time playing on their tummies so they build the muscles and motor skills to help with crawling etc.  He is holding his head up well now, and doesn't face plant the play gym anymore.

Clever baby! 
Holding head up:  Approx 4 weeks

Apologies for the state of my photos lately.  I'm still not quite organised enough to have time to sort them out on Photoshop.  So they remain uncropped and rough.  When Rowan hits three months we can start working on a routine, so hopefully I'll be able to structure my day a bit better.  Currently I'm focusing on getting through the dishes etc. when Rowan randomly sleeps so the house doesn't become a complete state.  Although we are in the middle of decorating, so it'll probably remain a state for a while yet!

Expression of freedom

Gareth fed Rowan for the first time last week.  It was really nice watching them bond over a feed, and I enjoyed not having a baby-sized nipple piercing stuck to me for an evening.
I don't intend to express very often, so I've been hand-expressing rather than buying an expensive machine.  I spent 40 minutes expressing 3oz, and Rowan downed it in about 5 minutes and I had to top him up myself anyway.  Hmm.  Not sure if it's going to give me much free time!  Although I took a look online and have found a few tips on techniques that should help speed things up.

Bottle feeding

 Gareth offered to do a night feed for me, which I was looking forward to!  Unfortunately, Rowan went back to sleep by the time the bottle was warmed, so I had to get up later anyway as the milk couldn't be re-warmed.  Oh well.  Better luck next time!

It's nice knowing that I can have some time to myself when I need it.  I'm hoping to go swimming in the next couple of weeks, or go for a bike ride, without clock-watching too much.