I've realized that I mostly write about gross motor milestones that Alexis, Jack, and Faith have met, but in the last couple of months they have been making big strides with their milk. Yesterday afternoon was the NICU reunion picnic for our hospital and seeing the nurses and other families that we met while in the NICU made me think about how far our babes have come in these areas.
First, last night I got spit up on by Jack and I realized that this hasn't happened in weeks! Our babes were horrible spitters for the first year of their lives: out their noses and waterfalls out of their mouths. Jack's spit up was curdled and thick although he never seemed to mind spitting up. It happened every time we put them in their car seats so they always had to wear bibs when we went anywhere. Before we put them on the floor to play at home we always put them in Go Pods or the Exersaucer so that they were upright for a little longer after their bottles. We always put the quilt or something on the floor to protect the carpet, but about 6 weeks ago I took the quilt off the ground for good! I realized that it was now impossible to keep them on the quilt since they were mobile, and we no longer needed it as the spit ups were no longer happening! This is great news for everyone who was tired of smelling like sour milk when they were with our babes.
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| We tried to avoid taking pics of the spit up, but Alexis' Fu Manchu spit up was worth a pic |
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| Classic bib look over the months |
Faith used a slow flow bottle nipple until a month ago. Whenever we would try a faster flow in the past she would spit up out her nose, but when it started to take her twice as long as usual to finish her bottle I knew it was time to make the switch to the medium flow. Jack and Alexis have been on medium flow almost since they came home from the hospital, so it is now much easier to put bottles together as we don't have to look for the tiny print on each nipple that says "slow" or "medium." This has been a time saver!
Most recently, the girls have transitioned to organic whole milk. This was a slow transition as it can be hard on the digestive system to make the switch, but they don't seem to mind the taste (when it's warm). We haven't switched Jack yet as he has had trouble gaining weight in the last month and infant formula is higher calorie than whole milk. Although Jack is still on formula, we no longer need to make formula by the pitcher (for awhile we were making three pitchers a day!). This saves us time as we can just make a bottle for Jack as needed and pour milk in the girls bottles, and we don't have to wash the pitcher. Yay for simplicity!
Although I was hoping to have switched Alexis, Jack, and Faith from the bottle to the sippy / straw cup by now, they haven't been excited about drinking milk from a cup so I am trying to be patient. I really don't mind feeding them bottles as we only do it three times a day now, but it will be nice when we've completely eliminated bottles. I've also given up hope that our babes will ever hold their own bottles as even though they CAN do it, they definitely prefer to have the bottles propped. The girls almost always drink their bottles with their hands behind their heads and Jack likes to look at his hands or rub his head while he drinks. The girls are also still in Rock n Play sleepers when they drink their bottles as they seem to associate that with drinking, plus they crawl away if they are on the floor.
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| Alexis (she just woke up which is why she has a sleep mark on her forehead) with her bottle drinking pose |
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| Faith drinking her bottle with her arms behind her head |
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| Our babes typical bottle drinking poses |
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