4 Months and Counting

This blog post is at least a week and a half late. Nonetheless, Constance's four month milestone deserves to be documented. At 11.4 lbs and 25.5. inches long, Constance is a long, skinny baby. She is near the top of the charts for height and at the very bottom for weight. She definitely does not get the skinny genes from me. I was a chubby chubby baby.

(Disclaimer: This particular diaper makes her look bigger than she actually is.)

Constance is a very energetic baby and has continued to be very gregarious. She no longer fingers her toys; she hits them very hard and very fast. Sometimes when she is holding onto her rattle, she starts whipping it up and down and all over the place very vigorously. I have to watch her and make sure she doesn't hurt herself. She still loves to sit next to Daddy on the couch. But instead of sitting in the crook of his arm and sucking contentedly on her fist or blanket or fist/blanket, she squirms all over the place and presses all the buttons on Tom's laptop. I secretly think she wants to try her little hands at writing one of his five papers that are due this semester.

Constance stills loves to talk. We were in church today sitting in the hallway/foyer, as we tend to do these days, and Constance started squealing to the lady next to us and made a quick friend. Constance also will "tough talk" various things by letting out a row of very loud and very pronounced squeals. While we were in the doctor's office the other week, she started tough talking her pirate diaper bag. She frequently does the same to the monkeys, Eeyore, and Nala--usually right before she sticks a large part of the stuffed animal in her mouth.

Constance loves to give out kissies. Fair warning, her kissies are very wet and slobbery--more like French kissies because she opens her mouth wide and attempts to engulf your nose or cheek in her mouth and then lick it until you have a good amount of baby sauce on your face.

She had a noticeable sleep regression as she hit her four month mark but seems to be doing a bit better now. She actually sleeps in her crib during the day for naps and probably once the band equipment no longer needs to be left up, I might start putting her in the crib at night.

Bath time is even more fun now because Constance has decided to begin training for Olympic swimming. She can successfully splash a good portion of her bath water out of her bath tub using her hands and feet and with a big smile on her face. Then when I put her on the floor and try to wrap her up in a towel, she pushes up and away with her feet and I have to go after her as she scoots herself across the bathroom floor.

I'm excited to see what else she is going to come up with this next month!

A Baby on Wheels

All of this nice weather has made me want to spend more time outside and go on more walks. For our outside expeditions, I usually put Constance in the Infantino carrier I bought after we graduated from the pocket slings. When she was a newborn, Constance would fall asleep in the carrier before we were halfway down the block. Lately, she has become more interested in her surroundings so she would cock her head back and look at the tree branches and rooftops as we walked through the neighborhood. But then this past week she started getting extra squiggly in the carrier. Perhaps part of it was the warmer weather. In any case, it seemed time to try out the stroller.

Tom put together the stroller and we buckled Constance into the seat. We pushed her outside and halfway through the door, she let out a squeal. Apparently, for her riding in a stroller must be the equivalent of a Disneyland ride. We pushed Constance around the neighborhood and she absolutely loved it. She could wiggle to her heart's content and see everything she wanted to see. Now whenever I put her in the stroller for a walk, she gets this excited look on her face and when the "ride" begins she lets out a squeal and waves her arms in the air.

Baby Sauce, Discoveries, and Baby Games

Once upon a Friday I was leaning over to hand Constance to Tom so he could take her on one of his "house tours." Constance was leaning over too and almost touching Tom when she suddenly dispensed a sizable spurt of baby sauce. Luckily Tom jumped away and avoided getting contaminated but pretty much all of it went on the floor. Tom was so shaken by this close call that he immediately retreated into his "man cave" and shortly after switched out his hoodie. After some coaxing, he finally joined us again in the living room. True story.

Constance has discovered several new things to do with her ba ba besides just sucking on it. She can now stick her finger in it and suck/chew on it with her finger inside; and she can pull her ba ba out of her mouth and hold it at arm's length for inspection and then drop it and watch it disappear.

Constance loves to play games and her favorite right now is to stick her fingers right by my mouth so I will pretend to eat them. During bathtime, she is no longer as interested in making splashes in the water with her feet as in holding her knees with her arms and looking at her wiggly toes. When she is on the floor having tummy time she will first roll over then twist her upper body and head so she can see you wherever you are in the room. She likes getting tickled in the ribs and around her neck. She also giggles whenever she is lying on the floor after a diaper change and Tom comes along and lifts up her legs and gives her a few spankies. I have a suspicion that when she gets older and Tom tries to discipline her that way she will probably do the same thing.  Finally, Constance loves standing up on her feet when you support her under the arms. Although sometimes she smiles, opens her mouth wide, grunts, and makes a dive for your face like she's ready to devour it.

And now for the pictures . . . 

Our little contortionist 

Playing with the feet

Hmmm. Does she want to be a music conductor when she grows up??

The Sounds of Boo

It seems like every week Constance is making some new sound. For a while it was the gurgles and then one day she started squeaking nonstop. I've also made significant progress in teaching her how to be ticklish. This has required me to take the "goochie goo" to a whole new level so I'm not showing off any clips of me doing that. Constance is the star in these.

Here she is making a whole repertoire of noises:

Sometimes she stops squealing when she sees me with the camera so I tried sneaking up from behind:

And these are of her playing. She is enjoying her rattles more now that she has better motor control.