how quickly my little man grows.
I am amazed at how he hits the developmental milestones at three months: the lifting of his head when he is placed on his tummy, grasping the rings that are dangling over him, and trying very hard to turn over. He is quite sociable and is happy for anyone to carry him, although when he is in one of his grumpy moods (i.e., just woken up from his nap), he will want to be cuddled by me.
lord cheeky being all clever with grasping
Now that Donald is reaching the end of his teaching term, we’ve got more time together with Oliver together. Time that I find very precious for the three of us. Well, we do have weekends. But some of the weekends are spent with other family members like his grandparents and great-grandparents, so usually Oliver is being hogged by them. So I try to cook dinner earlier, so that we have can an early dinner, Oliver will have his bath after, and we’d go take a walk around the neighbourhood.
It is usually during these walks that Donald and I would talk about Oliver, our future, what kind of parents we will be, what kind of child Oliver will be, and when we may introduce a new sibling to Oliver (definitely not in the next year or so…haha). And I enjoy these walks and talks. The most recent one being watching Oliver grow from a foetus to the cheeky boy he is today, and how far both Donald and I have come since 2005. I still can’t believe it has been 7 years. By the way, Mr. Ting, when am I getting my card, huh??
Together with his milestones is also a phase (at least I hope it is a phase!!) that Oliver is going through: bottle rejection. A couple of weeks ago, we had been having some problems with Oliver taking the bottle. It would be a MAJOR chore to feed him cos he would struggle for a fair bit before taking the bottle. Even then, he would finish every drop of his milk..which wasn’t much of an issue. Until the day he decided that enough was enough, and there would be no more bottle. Cue shrieking fits, crying AND crying.
Before I got married, some of my friends will know that I can’t take much of babies crying. The crying that says “poor me, no one cares about me/there is no one in this world that cares about me” kind of crying. With Oliver, I was always picking him up when he cried, to soothe him. With this bottle rejection, my mother reckoned that it was because Oliver knew that I could breastfeed him, therefore didn’t want to accept the bottle. I didn’t have an issue breastfeeding him, however we supplemented Oliver with formula milk as I didn’t think that I had enough milk to feed him. Meh. And also because I was going back to work for a day. It is going to be interesting how Oliver is going to feed that day.
The crying and shrieking. Oh the crying and shrieking. Took me LOTS of willpower not to walk over and grab Oliver back to nurse him. I wanted to cuddle him and soothe him. Take all his unhappiness away. *sigh* After 3 days of forced feeding, Donald and I decided that “screw the bottle”. We just didn’t see a point in making him cry for the sake of the bottle. As for the work day, I will have to mentally detach myself from Oliver and trust Donald will know how to handle Oliver.
No one warned me that hearing your child cry was going to be that heartwrenching. =(
Oliver has also been trying to flip over. It has been amusing to watching him turn 3/4 through and not be able to complete the turn cos he hasn’t figured out the rest of it yet. This little man is so impatient. He would grunt and whinge in frustration, and if he would roll back, he would cry a little before trying again, or if he has been at it for a while, he would just cry. Doh. Donald and I have been giving him a little assistance by gently leading him to turn to get him familiar with the sensation and hopefully he will figure it out by himself eventually. He also loves trying to sit up by straining his head forwards or up (if lying down), and “standing” on our laps. Helloooo, focus and master one skill at a time, young Padawan! =P
Entertainment. Oliver entertaining us, and vice versa. *laugh* His “vocab” has been increasing recently, and he has happily thrown in a couple of shrieks and squeals. Have a proper conversation with him and he will reward you with responses in his baby language. Sing to him, and he will respond by moving his arms and legs vigourously. Caring for him has just gotten so much more interactive.
The changes in three months are just tremendous. I will probably be amazed all over again when we do eventually have #2. But let me be amazed for the first time for now. =)