riley is three months old!

Our sweet Riley-boy is three months today and here's some of what's going on with him and new things that he's doing:

* He weighs 12 lbs 9oz.

* He’s sleeping well as long as he stays swaddled. He goes down about 7:30 and sleeps straight to 6am. Sometimes we have to reswaddle him during the night, but he goes right back to sleep. He takes 3-4 naps a day. (We're big proponents of sleeping on demand!)

* I nurse him at 6am and 7pm, feeding him bottled breastmilk approx every 3.5 hrs in between for a total of 5 feedings. We eliminated his 11p dreamfeed in favor of giving him an extra ounce during each day’s bottle feeding for a total of 5 oz per feeding.

* He’s talking more now and flashing his beautiful smile daily and we can coax a little giggle out of him sometimes.

* I can distract him from a bad mood by imitating him vocally; he’ll then play the game of “copy-cat”. The first time I did this it was fun to see him realize what I was doing, grin and make noises for me to copy.

* He loves his crib mobile and playgym. He’ll coo and talk to the animals and use his hands to move the playgym bar to cause the animals to rattle.

* He enjoys dancing to our They Might Be Giants “Here Come the ABCs” cd and playing peek-a-boo.

* When on his back, he uses his heels to propel himself backward so I never find him in the same spot after putting him in his crib or in his playgym. He does this when I’m changing him too, which makes diapering a wee more challenging as I have to move him back into position.

* One thing he does throughout the day now is bring his hands up to his mouth and suck on his fist. Only one brief thumb-sucking event that I've caught so far .

* He’s not crazy about tummy time, but he does some obligatory mini-pushups that earn him lots of "atta-boys!".

* He’s discovering his hands and starting to make repeated, deliberate movements to use them. He’ll pat the center part of his bumbo seat repeatedly or stretch toward his foot to touch it. Also, he’ll grab his blanket, pull, let go and repeat while looking at his hand, which makes me think he’s doing it on purpose.

* He likes the bumbo seat since he can sit on the countertop and see more of what’s going on. He still can’t sit up straight so when he gets tired, he slouches forward and begins sucking on his fists before telling me he wants out. I find this to be a handy thing when I need two hands to get food ready.

* He loves his daddy. He lights up when he sees J and I can already see there’s a special bond between them.

In short, Riley is a sweet, lovable, good-natured baby that is a delight to his mom and dad. We're so glad God gave him to us and for filling us up with more love and joy than we ever thought possible.

We love our boy!

Shelby