Three Months?!

Oliver wanted his picture on the Bumbo, too:

So, somehow, three months have already passed since my little Jo was born. Unbelievable.

Before righting this post, I took the time to read back on Oliver's three month update. I have to say, the thing that stood out the most to me was how deliberate Oliver was with his hand movements. Before he was three months old, he'd reach over in the bouncy chair (the same one I have pictured above), and he'd grab the lion ring and pull on it, making it sing all by himself. I'll never forget telling our family doctor that because the doctor told me it wasn't possible. My little Ollie Bear reached over and grabbed the doctor's stethoscope. Take that!

Well, Joanna isn't quite that dexterous. She's very good at getting her hands to her mouth, and she sucks and gnaws on the side of her hands. Her hands stay closed for the most part still, but she has just started to open them up occasionally and will accidentally grasp things near her, like my hair or her blankets. That said, she's getting very interested in objects now. She likes to watch me eat. She loves Oliver's stuffed animals, and she kicks her feet excitedly when they're near her. She really loves sitting in her bouncy chair when I (or Oliver) pull on the rings to make the songs start. You can tell she's starting to think more about things like that.

Her sleep habits have gotten a bit worse over the last couple weeks. While she still goes to bed around 8pm and sleeps until about 8am, she's waking up much more frequently. She's constantly busting out of her swaddle, and sometimes she's waking up every two hours for us to reswaddle her. I've started the bad habit of nursing her after each of these wake-ups to get her to quickly fall back asleep. In another couple of weeks, we're going to do some sleep training to teach her to sleep without the swaddle. I don't look forward to that, but I do look forward to not having to swaddle her anymore.

As for nap time, that's actually going well. I remember how desperate I used to be for Oliver to nap. Jo naps regularly, and she'll often take a really big nap from about 12:30pm to 3pm in addition to a couple cat naps.

I think she's going through a growth spurt, too, because she's started wanting to nurse a lot more frequently over the past week or so. Instead of going up to three hours between feedings, I'm finding myself pushing her to make it to two hours.

Joanna is very strong, though. One of the photos at the top of this post shows how she can sit up with me just holding one of her hands to balance her. I think she'll be sitting on her own by five months old (although I've been wrong plenty of times in my predictions with Oliver, so who knows?). She holds her head up very well, and it only starts bobbing around slightly after she's been holding her head up for multiple minutes.

I must say, we really lucked out with how easy-going Jo is. I keep saying how it makes all the difference in the world. Oliver was so high needs and was always crying and screaming. I'm really glad we went through that with our first and not our second, or else I wouldn't know what to do! Joanna really only cries when she has a wet diaper or is hungry or wants to sleep. When she wakes up or wants our attention, she usually just calls out to us. It's adorable. In a given day, I'd say she's fussy for a total of about an hour, two at the max.

She smiles all the time. It's very difficult to get her smile on film, though, because she's gotten super interested in the camera. Yesterday, I got her to laugh for the first time while playing peek-a-boo. Today, I got a small giggle out of her as I tossed balls of socks at her belly. I can't wait for the laughter to become more common place!

This month, Joanna went on an airplane for the first time (we flew to Chicago to celebrate my dad's 60th birthday). She also experienced her first blizzard. We've taken the butt padding out of her car seat now, and the straps were raised to the second shortest notch a few weeks ago.

At 3 months old, here is Joanna's list of likes and dislikes:

Likes:
Nursing
Watching Oliver
The bouncy chair
The ceiling fan
The sound of the microwave vent
Putting her hands in her mouth
Smiling
Diaper changes (and being naked)

Dislikes:
Being put in the car seat

Red lights
Wet diapers