Happy birthday little guy!!!! You have so changed my life this year…
I went from workaholic to stay at home mom in a blink. I discovered how unconditional and limitless love can really be. How much of myself I can really give. But best of all, I discovered YOU, this wonderful little person revealing himself day by day. How wonderful life is, how proud I am to be your mama. Happy birthday sprout! I love you!
And what a happy sprout! I can’t believe this litle guy is almost a year old! When did this happen? 
He’s completely recovered from his illness. And then I caught it. And now we’re all better, so happy ending to it all!
So, what’s new with Alex. Let’s see… teeth… um, no! Not one yet! Is he walking? Well, sort of… has taken some steps alone, but… does being really proficient at walking (and running!) holding on with one hand count? No? Well… then I guess he’s not. Talking… not really. hehe… not much news you may say! Well, not with the typical milestones I guess. But he did pet a dog for the first time. And a cat. (sad I know, but we’re not aquanted with many pet owning families… I guess because we know mostly frequent flyer expats?). And he played in the mud (thank goodness it’s much warmer! – i.e. not negative temperatures).
He loves going to the park, going outside for walks, no matter the weather! This week has been rough for him since we were indoors so much.
He’s quite a joy to be around… I find it amazing how he progresses every month, development of memory, fine motor skills, sociability…
Oh, I hear him calling… gotta run!
Oh my, time does fly!!! And I can’t believe I haven’t even posted sprouts 10th monthiversary!!!
It’s getting harder and harder to take the monthly picture as you can see here:
Alex is so adorable at the moment. He’s becoming quite the social creature and loves to show off all his new talents . He’s been cruising and walking holding on to one hand, but he’s very cautious letting go. He has already taken a couple of steps here and there and once he even took 5 all by himself (he usually does this when he wants to reach something he’s not allowed to… say, the camera 
). I actually prefer it this way. At least it seems although he is VERY active, he won’t be completely reckless. He’s also started crawling properly recently and almost abandoned the combat style… unless of course he needs speed (to reach something he’s not supposed to).
Only problem we’re having at the moment is with his sleep. He still won’t nap in his bed for longer than 20 minutes even though he’s clearly sleepy. He’s to heavy for me to let him sleep in the sling, so I’ve been letting him finish his naps on my lap in his room. Not very practical, but I’m at a loss on what to do. I can’t get much done like that but I don’t want to let him cry it out so… Hopefully I’ll have a solution soon.
Hello again… I thought I would have more blogging time, but I was wrong!!! I’ve been sooo busy and was away on holiday in Portugal for 3 weeks over Christmas.
8 months
9 months
Alex is now 9 months old and he’s wearing us out . All he wants to do is practice walking now and he always wants to hitch a ride with us. It’s so good to be at home full-time with him. I’m so certain this was the right decision. He’s such a happy boy! I’ve been busy out and about, with him and I’ve gotten around to sewing again! I’ll try to do another post later on with my projects.
Sprout is still happily being breastfed and BLWed. He cracks up laughing with peekaboo and hide and go seek. And he still HATES naps (there’s just too much going on to waste time sleeping).
Traveling with him (airplane and train) was fairly easy and he made friends wherever he went. He would just chat with everyone around him… too cute. It was great going to Portugal for the holidays. So many people I hadn’t seen in ages. he finally met my dad, his cousins and the extened family. My sister flew over with the kids for few days between Christmas and New Year and it was great. Everyone was so generous with gifts to the little guy, I was touched. It was also nice to see him playing with (read: alongside) Claudia’s (not so) little girl. We had a wonderful time!
Life has been so busy, I haven’t had time to post a thing, not even for when he turned 5, 6 or 7 months old! How negligent. But, now we’re back and I hope to be able to post more often. At least now I’ll have the time (I hope).
5 months
6 months
7 months
There have been some big developments. First, I returned to work part-time in July, which has made it very hard to have any computer time for posting. Then I went back to work full-time at the office in the beginning of November. And then… I quit my job and decided to be a stay-at-home-mom for the time being . Yay!! I’m so happy with my decision, although I’m still working from home until the end of the month.This was NOT an easy decision, and it’s definitely not one I’d ever imagine making until little sprout came along, but it so feels like the right thing. I was feeling iffy about leaving him at daycare the last few days before I went back, but I really did want to go back to the office as well… so Alex decided to help me with my decision by not eating anything while at daycare! He wouldn’t take a bottle, or a sippy cup and would mostly reject his solids. So, I decided that was a clear enough sign that I should be with my precious little one while he’s still so little and in need of mommy Of course I’m lucky this is a decision we could make. R always said it was entirely up to me and he would stand behind me whatever I decided to do. Plus he’s happy he gets to sleep later now… We won’t be living large, but the most important thing is we’ll be living happy. Unfortunately, the week he did go to crèche he lost some weight which he is now recovering. He’s a very (very) active/agitated slight boy of 7kg330 and 68cm tall.He’s also been reaching some incredible milestones! It’s amazing watching him grow. His colic came to a total stop at 41/2 months (i’m still not sure if it was partly due to lack of sleep – he had a hard time napping in the day – maybe I’ll write about that at a later point) and he now sits up unassisted, combat crawls, babbles, smiles and laughs and can even walk when holding on to my hands. He has also started solids – puréed veggies at first because he was going to daycare and I wanted him to eat SOMETHING since he wasn’t taking a bottle (haha – ended up not eating anyway), but now we’re doing baby-led weaning (more on that later – it’s great!!!). We have also been meeting up with buddies from the BCT pre-natal class, mostly to go to the pool on Fridays. That has been lots of fun. We’ve been going to the Etterbeek pool – Espadon – but we’ve also tried the Evere one since it’s so close. I don’t recommend Evere for little babies though. Too much chlorine, too cool and not really a baby pool. The one in Etterbeek is fabulous! Really warm, low chlorine: I want to try Poseidon in Woluwe St Lambert as well, since it’s closer and I recall their baby pool being really nice when I went to aquanatal there.
So, that’s it for now. Hopefully I’ll post on a more regular basis again, at least from December since that’s when I’ll be free!
This month’s picture is a bit different from the others
Poor little sprout spent his 4-monthiversary (really, the word should exist!) in the hospital! He was a great sport about it though… so brave the little guy.
It all started last Tuesday when Alex was particularly upset and crying at bedtime. He just wouldn’t settle, not even in our arms, he’d just scream and scream. This wasn’t unusual… it happened most days, at any given hour and even though I’ve mentioned it to various doctors they’ve always told me it was colic and would pass (except for one time at the ONE when they witnessed the screaming and said it was not normal – and suggested it could be reflux). We always told them he seemed in pain, but they just took it as worried first-time parents. The strange thing this time was that at 10pm he still wouldn’t settle. He is usually out like a light at 10pm, no matter how much fussing he was doing before. There didn’t seem like there was much we could do… We thought maybe his reflux was getting worse because he would calm down a bit in an upright position and was possetting quite a lot. He ended up falling in and out of sleep sitting froggy style against my chest at around 1am, but would wake up and spit up every now and then even though he hadn’t eaten since around 7.30pm, which in itself was strange considering he has never gone for more than 4hrs. At around 3.30am he seemed fast asleep so I put him in his crib and went to change my pj’s when I heard him trowing up. When cleaning him up, we noticed brown spots so decided to take him to the ER at St. Luc. After exams, x-rays and sonograms, they discovered his intestines were obstructed due to his inguinal hernia getting stuck. They managed to reduce it (put it back in) and scheduled emergency surgery for Friday. We already knew about the hernia, but there were no visible signs it was stuck… poor little guy!
And so he was operated and it now seems we have a new baby!!! No inconsolable screaming fits and more smiles. He’s also a lot less tense, although still has issues with pooing. The poor little mite must have been really hurting!
Everything went beautifully, the personnel at St. Luc were excellent and by Saturday we were home. He is healing wonderfully!
Apparently he doesn’t have reflux, it was the food coming up because it had a hard time passing the intestines, so we have stopped the Gaviscon which was making him constipated and he cries MUCH less now!!! If only we knew earlier!!!
Here is a pic taken today
Our little man woke up in a good mood today I’m amazed at how time flies… 3mos! he is oficially not considered a newborn any more!
So much has happened in these 3 months and our lives have greatly changed. It’s amazing to see Alex grow day by day and all the new things he can do. And how much the three of us learn!
I’m still breastfeeding exclusively and Alex still eats just about every 2hours, except the 4 hour stint at night. He hates napping during the day and gets himself really tired before he goes down, but at least we’ve managed to establish his bedtime at around 8:30pm!!! Goes out like a light and although he (sort of) wakes for his night feeds, they’re really easy because he’s so fast now and he easily resettles either in his crib or our bed (if I let myself fall asleep while breastfeeding mostly). He still has issues with his digestive system, so still colicky, but so much better. he graces us with smiles more often, seems like he wants to giggle, coos and is a pro at balancing his head on his neck
Wow! Alex was 2 months old on Saturday! I can’t believe time has gone by so fast and he’s grown so much already! He is now 5kg200 and 56cm… quite a way since his 2kg70 (lowest weight) and 49,5cm!
He seems to be doing something different every day now as well. He just recently began smiling, although we usually call him our grumpy little man because he gets colicky most days.
Well, I can’t say these first two months have been a piece of cake! We’ve had our ups and downs with breastfeeding, colic and a scare when we discovered he has 2 inguinal hernias and may need an operation by or before his first birthday. However, I must say all the sleepless nights, worrying and listening to a red-faced fist-clenching howling little guy have all been worth it and I would definitely do it all again! We love our little sprout and things are getting much easier day by day as we get the hang of things. Nights are much easier since he’s only feeding 2 – 3 times and is much more efficient. We’re happily doing a mix of co-sleeping and putting him in his own crib. We’ve also been out everyday unless it pours and I’m starting to get the hang of breastfeeding in public. Our days now have a rhythm to them, although no real schedule and I’m really loving being a mom and having this warm, soft skinned, wide eyed beauty in my arms
