Time Flies

Yeah, time sure does get away from me.

Piper will be 16 weeks old this Friday, I believe.

Nearly 4 months. Wow.

So much changes over the days and weeks. Changes that seem at once both small and large. The way she interacts with objects. The way she turns her head to look at things. The way she seems so mobile in her crib. I'm sure I could find a few dozen things to list.

But let me try to talk about her milestones and things that she is doing.

She is no longer in love with the ceiling fan, and can spare it only passing glances now. Previously, it was the Most Fascinating Thing In The World. Now, she likes watching people's faces, and the cute baby she can see in the mirror, and anything brightly colored or moving - she likes the little orange frog that sits on the green tree on her activity center. Sometimes she watches one of the animals for a moment. She's often completely fascinated by the television.

I'm a little torn on TV right now. She will often lock on to the screen, and it often calms and distracts her. I'm pretty sure that in her stage of development, its just a case of "ooh moving lights and colors and faces", but I worry a little. Parents and People Who Know Things love to debate about TV. We've recently added the Sprout channel to our frequent channels, its got tons of kid friendly stuff. We've also started to try to get into the habit of turning the TV off when we're not watching it. Krissi and I are kinda TV people, even though we like to claim sometimes that we're not. In the past, its often on the in background, even though we may both be engaged with reading or computer. It was background noise. I guess that I think some TV is okay, but I don't want her, or us, to develop a habit of relying on TV for anything.

She's continuing to develop more motor control, her head and neck control is getting really advanced, and she's developed some torso control. She has no problem turning her head to look at things around her or above her. A few weeks ago when we'd put her in her activity center, she didn't have enough torso strength to keep herself quite upright in it. Now, though she's still working on it, she can sit upright pretty much on her own in the activity center. She loves to look at the bright toys around her, attached to the activity center. She flails about some, grabbing or bumping toys. Still seemingly right on the cusp of just reaching out and grabbing them. In fact, as I laid her down in her crib last night, I dangled some plastic rings over her, and she reached up and grabbed them. She's still working on finer motor skills, but she sure is getting there, and its fun to watch her grow and develop that way.

She loves baths. We set her in the baby tub, and she kicks her feet in the water, and smiles and wiggles around.

Rolling over is something that we've got down pat. She rarely is content to lie on her back, and will almost immediately flip over on to her stomach. She can push herself up and look at the world around her. Sometimes when we set her down on her back, especially if she's at an incline, she'll grimace and strain, and I can tell that she is trying to do a sit-up. In fact, in the bathtub the other evening, she'd grabbed onto the lip of the baby bathtub, and was sitting at about a 45 degree incline, and managed to pull herself up into a sitting position. We all applauded h er.

She does some babbling and 'talking'. She's still getting there, and hasn't quite gotten to the point of engaging us in full conversation yet.

Breast feeding is still going well. Krissi is still pumping and storing, and sometimes feeding her milk from the bottle, but also direct breast feeding. Piper has gained weight and bulk. She was 13 pounds at her last cardiologist appointment.

Speaking of which, the doc says that the ventricular defect is still present, that is has gotten smaller, and is not a matter for concern. He says that it is not a risk to her health at this point, and is likely to close on its own.

We've got another baby doctor appointment in about two weeks, after which we'll probably be starting to put a little cereal in her milk. Woo!