The Baylor Family Blog

Only in Colorado can you wake up to this outside…

…and the high is still in the 50’s today!

Eli and I just returned from his one year check up at the pediatrician. He is up to 18.5 pounds and 27.5 inches talls. He is barely on the charts in both measurements, but still remains on the same curves and the doctor is pleased! Matt and I are anxious for him to reach 20 pounds so we can turn his car seat around to face forward, but until that point, we decided to continue to be law-abiding citizens and keep his car seat facing backwards! Eli got two more shots today, but after a scream during the shot, he recovered immediately and was back to playing!

I become more and more convinced that we found the right pediatrician for our family with each visit with the doctor. We talked about all the tests and things we’ve been through in these last few months, and she shared in both the frustrations and victories. I was concerned about Eli getting enough iron since he’s not eating a lot in the solid food realm. She agreed, and we are going to start Eli on a multivitamin with iron. This also takes some of the pressure off Matt and I when Eli is struggling with eating. She shared some concern on Eli’s lack of interest in holding his bottle, drinking from a sippy cup, feeding himself, wanting what daddy and mommy are eating, etc. I’ve given Eli a lot of grace with anything food related because of all he’s been through. However, it is likely Eli has some degree of an oral aversion. The doctor encouraged us to continue making eating as positive of an experience as possible. Because Eli has only been eating solid foods consistently for a little over a month now, we are going to see if he starts doing some of these things in the next month or two. If not, we’ll consider some speech/occupational therapy. My gut tells me that Eli will do these things when he’s ready (with encouragement, of course)…so time indeed will tell.

Today Eli is almost one. Tomorrow he will be one year old. So much has happened in these last twelve months, and Eli has overcome some pretty big hurdles! As he’s now down for his morning nap now, I can remember thinking not that long ago that this boy will never be on a schedule. And sure enough, it finally did happen only when he was ready, not when I was ready! And Matt and I wondered if we’d have to give him Elecare on his birthday instead of birthday cake. Thankfully, I think we’ll be able to go the birthday cake route. A year ago, it felt like we’d never get him out of the NICU (though, who am I to speak as he was in there less than a week), and even more so, I wondered how on earth I could teach my newborn baby how to suck well enough to get a good feed. With lots of patience, perseverance, and therapy (for mom and baby), he figured it out. And eventually, he did sleep through the night. Despite my doubts, so many things did indeed work itself out in its own time, but of course, not my timing.

The other day, I heard Matt call Eli “baby”. Though I still do it, too, it occur ed to me that Eli is growing out of baby-dom and into little boy-dom. In fact, when I shop for his clothes, I not have to go to the toddler section instead of the baby section. It feels so weird and so right at the same time! Earlier this week, I brought him out to buy his first hard bottomed shoes. The first few days he seemed to clunk around with these massive, heavy additions to his feet (compared to his soft-bottomed shoes), but he has now caught on and gets around just fine in them. He has even mastered the art of taking of his fancy velcro shoes and throwing them for his own personal entertainment.

I knew it would happen, but still am amazed as I watch our son copying his daddy and mommy’s actions. He routinely takes his diapers out of a hanging basket off his changing table. But what caught me surprise one day when I walked in his room was when he took the diapers and placed them in his diaper pail. Where did he learn such a thing? And now he likes to put the cap back on his bottle after seeing his daddy and mommy do it 1001 times. Its amazing and humbling as I think that my son is aware of what I’m doing and what I’m saying.

We’ve had lots of laughs and good times around here. Eli is learning things like crazy. What fun!

Its hard to imagine now as we’ve had two light snows since, but…on Saturday, God gave us a taste of spring in the form of 72 degree weather! In celebration of the beautiful day, we packed Eli up in his new backpack and went for a hike at a new State Park on the southwest side of town. We ended up hiking around five miles, and the three of us thoroughly enjoyed our day!! To our delight, Eli loves being in his new pack. He even was comfortable enough he took a nap during the hike! We are looking forward to many more hikes as the weather improves…

We let Eli crawl around on a break during the hike. He really likes pine cones and nature in general. Its so fun watching him explore outdoors now that he is mobile!

We even let Eli crawl around on the playground equipment at the trail head. I was so proud of him for stopping at the top of slide, just like he stops at the top of the stairs at home! We all had lots of laughs as he went down the slide into daddy’s arms a couple times! Oh, I’m so excited for beautiful spring weather!

So we think Eli had a bug, as he is now back on solid foods and not throwing up…yeah! In fact he gets so excited when he sees me getting his food ready he can hardly stand it. This is a good sign, at least a welcome sign to us, that food is an enjoyable experience to our little guy!

In the midst of some of his feeding troubles last week, he came down with a very severe case of separation anxiety in which he had to be somehow physically attached to mommy, or better yet in mommy’s arms, or he was screaming. That made for some rather miserable days for the both of us. Because he seems to always need me to cope, Matt and I decided to try a little harder to get Eli to bond to a security object. Despite the fact he has slept with a number of stuffed animals in his crib, Eli hasn’t really bonded to any of them. But, I have caught him clinging to his blue blankie with ribbon around the edges a number of times in his crib. So over the last several days, this “blue blankie” has been with Eli a lot. Whenever he cries, he gets his blue blankie. And when he goes to sleep, he gets his blue blankie. And many times when he takes his bottle, he has his blue blankie. Though future posts may deal with issues of separation anxiety with his blue blankie, it has to be a little easier than being physically attached to me…at least, that’s my thinking at the moment!

So as his separation anxiety has improved somewhat with me (thanks to the blue blankie), we decided to start Eli on whole milk with carnation instant breakfast per the doctor’s orders. Though we are always anxious whenever we change anything related to Eli’s eating habits, he seems to be adjusting seamlessly to this change! In fact, I think he really likes the french vanilla taste! Two things I am working with Eli related to feeding are holding his own bottle and putting cheerios in his mouth. The sippy cup thing is not going over well with him, and we are backing off on it at the moment…though we will try again in the future!

He is so very close to walking. He can take a few steps on his own, but he usually falls at his destination if there isn’t something stable to hold on to. But he’s close…and its so fun to watch him get around!