Eating and Sleeping

It's been a little while since I posted about Carter's current eating and sleeping habits and since I didn't take any pictures the last few days, I figured I'd write about those things.

Carter still isn't eating what we eat. I often feed him before we eat since Brian gets home from work pretty late. Though when we go out, we can usually give Carter a little bit of our meal and then also feed him something we bring. Once he does start eating more of we do, it should be easy when we go out because I never really finish my meal and also like my food a little plainer so it should be easy to share. That's not going to work out so well though once we have 2 solids eaters!

I think what Carter does eat is really healthy, though he still is missing out on some protein. He's getting better though. If Carter doesn't like something, he's quick to spit it out and not be willing to try it again the rest of the meal. He often remembers something he didn't like at a previous meal and refuses to open his mouth to even try it.

I still feed Carter some pureed vegetables and things like yogurt and applesauce. He likes to hold a spoon but definitely doesn't have the control to really use it yet. Sometimes I'll put something solid (like cheese) on the spoon for him and let him try to get it to his mouth. He's not too bad at that. Carter still requires a lot of attention during meal times because you can't just put a bunch of food on his tray. He'll try to stuff it all in his mouth at one time. So I have to give him one or two pieces of things at a time to make sure he doesn't choke.

Carter has been eating like a little piggy for the last month or so, but he's suddenly cut back a lot in the last couple of days. He ate a lot right through his cold but now that he's better, he's eating about half as much at meals and skipping some snacks. I think he's grown a lot in the last month (I no longer have to roll any of his pant legs and some are getting short) so maybe he's done with a major growth spurt.

We haven't made any major breakthroughs on the milk front. Though, today, I mixed in some milk with his water most of the day (1 part milk and 3 parts water) and he willing drank it. He still didn't drink as much as he does when it's just water, but he also didn't make a yucky face and put down his sippy cup right away. Hopefully he'll drink it like that again tomorrow. If he were to keep up with drinking that mixture, I'd slowly increase the amount of milk until he's drinking 100% milk, but I'm not getting my hopes up that it's going to work. Carter's 15 month check up is next week so I'll try to get some more recommendations from the pediatrician then. I'm so ready to stop breastfeeding. Carter is way too old and understands way too much to be nursing him still.

I finally have Carter back on two naps a day. He put up a fight for at least a week, but he's much happier when he's getting more sleep. One benefit of that messed up week of naps is that Carter's been sleeping a little later in the morning (now that I've written that, he's going to start getting up early again). He was waking up between 5 and 5:30 am with me getting him at 6 am, but lately he's been waking up between 6 and 6:30 am! I usually get him about 10 minutes after he wakes up (he'll occasionally go back to sleep for 15 minutes or so and I'll take that little bit of extra sleep if he'll give it to me).