Wyatt is an incredibly happy kid and I love being around him. Over the past month and a half his personality has blossomed even more. Weight-wise Wyatt was at the 50th percentile at his 9 month checkup, which is an increase in percentile, so he is growing well. He is on the super short side of things though, coming in between the 3rd and 5th percentile. I hope he will hit a growth spurt soon. He is so much smaller in weight and height than logan at this age and yet so much more physically capable. It has made this whole thing a very different experience (though I am guessing no two are ever alike).
Wyattisms: Wyatt loves to crawl to his people (mommy, daddy, Julia). If any of us walks in the room he will immediately crawl over (panting with excitement) to us and crawl up us and greet us (even if he was playing with another of his favorite people). At the same time as showing affection for his “people” he is also recognizing strangers and although not afraid, will prefer us (and usually make it happen). He knows how to physically get what he wants and almost nothing can stop him. He will lunge out of our arms or crawl over us or push past to get what he wants. He is determined, strong, and quick! He also loves to pull up on EVERYTHING and I think a room with a bunch of different level surfaces would be his dream. He will find a raised surface in any room and pull up to standing. It is a little predictable in that in logan’s room his first task is to pull up on the chair, so you have a few seconds before he tries to eat the sound machine cord (cords are still high in his list of favs). He also sees things that are up higher (couches and tables) and knows he can get it. We used to be able to throw a forbidden toy on the couch or on a table and now he will just go get it! He is happy and will self-entertain for a long time, playing anywhere. After Logan being a harder-to-entertain kid it has been fun to see how self-sufficient Wyatt is and how well he will take care of himself.
Movement: Wyatt has mastered cross crawling. He is fast and he never crawls on his tummy anymore. He is much more interested in crawling and pulling up than cruising. Logan developed so different physically. Logan slithered for a long time and then took a while to master pulling up but liked when we would stand him up and would cruise back and forth on the couch (of course all when he was older and much bigger). Wyatt is agile and small and that probably helps his physical development. He is much less interested in cruising. He uses a combination of pulling up (which he does quickly and easily) and crawling (same) to get to anything he wants. He will cruise if there is something else that he wants nearby, but he won’t cruise just for the heck of it like Logan seemed to. Wyatt also is stubborn (hmmm wonder where that came from) and will always do what he wants. If you think it would be fun to walk across the room holding his hands (with him walking to) he’ll do it for a few steps until he decides there is a toy he would rather play with it. Then he will sit down and crawl off. He doesn’t seem to be developing the balance to stand on his own yet which surprises me given his other strength and development, but I think it will come. He has certainly been developing better balance and will pull up and shoot up fast and then catch himself. He also doesn’t seem to mind if he loses balance and falls down so I think he will pick up this skill soon. Then I think walking will come quickly. I would be shocked, given where he is now, if he wasn’t walking by 1 year, but I’m in no hurry. I always liked that logan got language before walking because it made things easier.
Food: To say that Wyatt loves food would be an understatement. Unfortunately I think this makes it easy to overfeed him. If we are all sitting at table he will keep demanding (shrieking for – we are working on it) food and so I’ll keep giving it but we are having issues with more spit ups (but also tied to his schedule change, see below). He especially loves finger foods (chicken, chicken hot dogs, carrot, peas, blueberries, grapes, banana, peach, bread, cherrios), but also loves purees. Our freezer is well stocked from the summer and we probably won’t make too many more before he is on all solids (corn, nectarine, carrot, pluot, cauliflower, green bean, sweet potato, red pepper, and avocado). He is certainly less interested in eating the veggies in either form, but combinations like green bean and sweet potato work well, so we’ll keep doing.
Sleep: WYATT IS SLEEPING THROUGH THE NIGHT!!!!! It is amazing. My step-by-step plan actually worked out exactly as I hoped. After our appt at children’s at 8 months, I stopped his more powerful reflux meds (kept him on the acid neutralizer, zantac). This is a med they don’t want the kids on long term and unlike all the other times I had tried to stop (as recently as after our trip to California), it actually worked this time and there was no noticeable increase in pain and discomfort, especially during eating. The next week we added milk to his small snack in the afternoon (something he hadn’t tolerated well before without lots of discomfort and painful spit up). We gradually increased the amount of milk until he was having 4 oz of milk and puree and finger foods. At this point he was finally getting 4 meals during the day (the goal for crying it out at night). The next big change was to separate food and sleep. Wyatt has always nursed/bottle right before sleep and then we would hold him for 10 minutes upright and put him in crib. This process caused issues with sleep training because often he would fall asleep on us (and we aren’t willing to comfort him anytime he has trouble falling back asleep at night). It also was becoming harder because if he didn’t feel like being held he would try to jump out of our arms. So, we switched his meals to when everyone else eats. Each meal starts with nursing and then high chair time as his 10 minutes upright. In high chair he would have purees and finger foods. Breakfast is at 8, lunch at noon and dinner at 6, with snack when he wakes from nap between 3-4 (cup with frozen thawed milk because my body doesn’t make milk at this time). I was expecting that this change would be really hard. I thought he would cry if he ate at 8 and then we just put him in crib (after a story and a song) at 8:45. But he just went to sleep! We only had one day that he cried for about 5 minutes. Then about a week later he had a night where he woke up around 1:30 for his first night feeding but had his pacifier and was only whining. I decided to just let him whine and after about an hour he fell back asleep and woke at 6:30am and wasn’t hungry. He played happily until 8 when I nursed him. That was the evening of August 22nd, for those of you tracking these things, haha. This proved that he didn’t actually NEED the food (which is what doctors had said, as long as we got that fourth daytime feeding in). So the next few nights were more rough with him losing his pacifier and crying for a while, but I didn’t nurse him and it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. After about 4 bad-ish nights things have been great. He will whine a bit if he loses his pacifier and he definitely wakes up at night and will stand up or sit up for a while, but he puts himself back to sleep and wakes up happy between 7 and 7:30 generally. Logan and wyatt usually wake each other up at this time. I am very pleased with where we are with sleep now. He takes two 1.5-2.5 hour naps (generally about 2 hours) and sleeps about 12 hours at night. The only downside of this whole change is that wyatt pukes/spits up a LOT more than when he slept after eating. It doesn’t seem to be causing him pain and he is still growing so his doctor isn’t concerned but it is gross and messy. I still wouldn’t go back to night nursing though ;).
Talking: Wyatt has phases where he is very verbal and phases where he is silent. He seems to yell at us a lot, especially when food is involved or if we take a toy he wanted, but he will talk too. Today he said “ba” about a billion times. He also seems to very regularly say “mama” only when he is crawling to me or wants something from me. Hard to say if random, but seems he is getting a meaning for that word. I really hope he develops language as early for Logan (but Logan had no words at 9.5 months, so we aren’t behind).
Object permanence/Routines: Wyatt is developing cognitively too (most of these aren’t recent but worth mentioning). He has met his milestones including object permanence. If you put toys he is playing with under a blanket, he will move the blanket to get the toys back. He also has clearly learned routines. When you unbuckle the carseat he will move his arms to get them out of the straps and then lean forward to help you get him out (we have to be ready otherwise he’ll throw himself on the ground). He also has adapted to our new bedtime routine and knows what comes next. He is getting a little bit better about some of the routines like diaper changes, but less tolerant of waiting when it is related to food! He has a great memory and great perception. He knows everything that is usually in our house and will (within seconds) identify a new object and crawl over to get it.
I am realizing writing this blog that he is getting such a different experience with us as parents since we are so much distracted by Logan and routine, but he seems to still be thriving and learning daily. I certainly hope that his language doesn’t suffer from this decreased experience. I am trying to be more aware of talking to him even when the world around us is crazy (like at a store or at dinner). He is so happy that we can ignore him, but he won’t learn as much if we do. Good to be aware and try hard (which we are).
I hate to sound sappy but I feel lucky with how much fun I am having with two young kids right now. It is “relentless” as someone described it, but there is also a tremendous amount of joy. We have largely avoided the terrible twos for the most part and Wyatt has been an easy kid. I can genuinely say that most days I have a wonderful time. I don’t think this will always be true in all phases of this journey (and all phases our kids go through) but it is pretty amazing for now!
