Today, M turns 3 months old. Time flies by!
I figured that the first month might be the hardest, but I found this month quite challenging. It has been a whirlwind of weeks going by so suddenly that I actually need to check to know what we did at the beginning of the month.
This month we went on with teaching her to fall asleep on her own. Just when I thought that we might be reaching our goal, it started to get worse. When we were able to place her in her bed, swaddled in a muslin cloth, and she fell asleep quite some time on her own, for about 3 weeks, it hasn't been going so well for about 3 weeks. She has started to cry before naps and we need to rock her to sleep. I'm afraid it has become a sleep association and I'm trying to do everything to unlearn this. We purchased a Myhummy sleep aid for white noise (as I kept missing calls and drained the battery of my phone while using the app), I read several books on sleep (the best being The Happy Sleeper by Heather Turgeon) and followed an online seminar.
We also had some tough evenings during very warm days, as she had a very hard time settling due to warmth. It didn't help that I managed to get a heat stroke these days and M's dad needed to deal with her on his own.
M is still partially breastfed and receives formula to top it off. I'm still pumping and have built up a frozen supply for which I bought a small freezer. Now, when I stop breastfeeding, she can have 1 small bottle of breast milk for about 3 months. At the end of the month, I built pumping down to 3 times a day, which was a big relief.
This month, we think she went through the 12th-week growth spurt (I'm following the chart of The Wonder Weeks). If not, I don't know what that was! Sleep regressed quite a bit, she wanted to be even closer and did not take her bottles well. These were difficult days!
At the end of June, we decided that we will go to Estonia for a 2 week holiday. This was a difficult decision for which we made a pro-cons list and had a long discussion. Corona is scary and you can't get around it. At the moment of writing, we are in Estonia and enjoying it. The trip with a baby went surprisingly well and we even find that we can give some tips to others travelling with a baby.
While we have been in Estonia, she has developed so much! She is more aware of everything, won't fall asleep immediately when taken for a walk with a stroller and just wants to chat all the time. She started to look at the clouds and the sky, recognizes us and my parents faster and gives us a big smile and giggles. Since a few days, she can grab things and bring them to her mouth.
We think she might be teething as she drools and chews on her fist (and wants to put it in her mouth as a whole; one day it might work, you never know!).
There are so many firsts for her to look forward to!