Andromeda's 4 Month Update

Andi's 4th month started off very eventfully.  Her Uncle D and his girlfriend E came to visit us in Houston for a long weekend and we did a lot of exploring with them.  And then I went back to work and Andromeda started full-time daycare during the week.  She is doing great at daycare, the teachers there say that she is always happy and smiley.  After bottle bootcamp with Grandma in Florida, Andi has been great with bottles, in fact she eats more at daycare from the bottles than she does at home (she gets distracted easily these days).  She struggles a little with her naps during the day there, though, due to all of the other commotion going on (so much to look at!!!), but she seems to be handling it ok.  She just takes more frequent, short naps.

This was the first time she successfully slept in the bed with us for a glorious 2 hour family nap...

She hit her 4 month sleep regression right on time, so that played some havoc with her sleep schedule anyway.   Her sleep had been a little crappy anyway since she started waking up at night for feedings around 3 and a half months.  But then she thought "hey, I know, let's wake up every 1.5 hrs and see how that goes!"  It does not go well.  So we instituted some additional sleep training and it's helped immensely.  She has had some relapses, but for the most part she will fall asleep on her own at night in about 10-15 minutes with just some light fussing and she is only waking up at night for feedings.  We've even had a few nights where she only woke up twice to eat instead of 3 times to eat.  I'm hoping that trend continues as I usually actually get a 4 hour chunk of sleep on those nights and it is heavenly!

Andi's favorite toy to cram into her mouth, Sophie the giraffe.

Vroom vroom!  What S hopes is the beginning of Andromeda's life long love affair with cars...

Tummy time with a buffet of toys

Developmentally Andromeda is right on schedule.  She can see a lot further now and she loves to stare at S and I from across the room, go for walks (the weather has been gorgeous lately), and look at the trees when the wind blows.  But by far her absolute favorite thing to watch is her doggies!  Andi absolutely LOVES Pandora and Penny and her favorite thing to do is to look at them!  She loves to see them wrestle in the house and also adores going into the backyard to watch Pandora run while we throw the ball for her (Pandora is also absolutely thrilled with this latest trend as well as she is obsessed with both balls and her baby...)  Andromeda's coordination is improving as well, she can grab her toys, clothes, fingers, and most recently my hair quite easily now and directs everything to her mouth.  She is making attempts to roll, but is only getting about half way there at this time.  She is finally starting to like tummy time too, and she is starting to get better at sitting on her own with light assistance.

One of Andromeda's roll attempts during her 4 month photo shoot

Andromeda is starting to like her baths a lot more lately too, she kicks and splashes in the water now.  We're starting to introduce some toys, although her favorite thing to play with is the washcloth...  And she is usually happy as a clam when she gets wrapped up in her hoodie towel.  The smiles are adorable.

Pandora initially misunderstood when I suggested that we go give the baby a bath...

Inspecting her new fishy bath toy

But in the end preferring to steal both washcloths from me instead of playing with the toy

Peekaboo!  Must try to eat the towel too!

And here are the pictures from the beginning of the month when D and E came to visit us in Houston!  We were trying to Andromeda on a nap schedule, so we hadn't really tried going out into town with her much.  But spending a Sunday showing D and E around Houston was a great way to get us to branch out a little and try some new things with Andi.  We took Andi to her first brunch at City Acre Brewery (one of our favorite out of the way brunch places), then walked around the Montrose area and the outer buildings of the Menil Collection, got ice cream at Amy's Ice Cream, drove around Herman Park, and finally got an early dinner at Ninfa's on Navigation.  It was a full day and Andromeda took catnaps in our arms or in the car, so it wasn't her best day of sleep but to be honest her naps nowadays aren't really much longer than that anyway.

Andromeda's first brunch!

She was kind of obsessed with S's beer...

D and E enjoying their beer and brunch.  The food here is awesome.

Family pic on the jack sculpture where S proposed to me!

Baby's first TexMex dinner out!

D and E stayed until Wednesday.  On Monday I went back to work for my first day while they drove into town to check out the rodeo!  On Tuesday I left work a wee bit early, met up with them at Andromeda's daycare and proceeded to give D, E, and Andi a tour of Johnson Space Center.

Andromeda contemplating the giant ISS mockup at the NBL

D and E in the old shuttle cock pit trainer

S met up with us to give a tour of the giant vacuum chamber he works on

We ended Andi's fourth month with her 4-month doctor appointment where we were told she is now 23 inches long and weighs 12.5 lbs.  She's in the 25th percentile and the doctor said that, despite the runny nose and mild cough she's picked up as a result of daycare, she is a super healthy little kiddo!  We had a little bit of the wait for the doctor to come in for the appointment, so we took some pictures of Andromeda "flying", another activity she loves.  Check out that adorable little chunk!

Look mommy, I'm flying!

And we leave you with a few more outtakes from Andi's 4 month photo shoot: