The Paulin Pack: 5 Months Old

I cannot believe our sweet girl is already 5 months old! It seems like Kate is learning new things every day! Recently she has started to grab and hold on to things, especially certain toys. She has lots of favorite toys now, too! She loves her blue octopus, her baby doll, her very hungry caterpillar, her exersaucer, and her taggie dog. She has also started imitating us more and more. She loves to stick her tongue out at us and purse her lips together and blow out.

She does such a good job of going to bed at night! We have been working on transitioning from bassinet to crib for the past week and she does better and better every night. Everyone knows this has been a struggle for Kate... She loves her bassinet and has been a little weary of the crib, but she is really starting to come around to it finally (just by typing that sentence I'm sure I have jinxed myself and she will again want nothing to do with her crib tonight...). The going to sleep at bedtime isn't the problem, she does a great job of going to bed. The problem is about halfway through the night she decides she wants to start waking up every 2 hours! Exhausting! She only does this in her crib. In her bassinet she sleeps through the whole night, sometimes getting up once, around 3 am, to eat. But, like I said, she is getting a little better every night so hopefully soon she'll be sleeping all night in her crib!

Taking naps is a different story. She fights sleep so badly during the day. It's almost like she doesn't want to miss anything that might happen while she's asleep. Nick and I joke that we have to trick her into taking a nap. Either she'll fall asleep in the car and will continue to take a long nap in her car seat after we get home, or we have to follow a very specific process. This includes (but is not limited to): having her nursery as dark as possible, having white noise turned on, being swaddled, and, most importantly, having a full belly! If all of the above conditions are met, Kate takes a nap. Could be for 20 minutes, could be for 3 hours, but, nonetheless, it is a nap!

At 5 months old, we are still waiting for Kate to roll over from back to belly. We work with her all the time on this, but we know she'll do it when she's ready and, most likely, when we least expect it. Much like when she decided to start rolling from her belly to her back.

Kate has started eating oatmeal cereal! She eats one bowl in the morning and one before bed, and she loves it! She is doing such a great job eating from a spoon, though it took lots of practice!

More than anything, Kate is such a happy, happy baby! All you have to do is look at her and smile, and she beams! Nick can make her laugh hysterically like no one else can, and those little belly laughs are the most beautiful sound. I'm still trying to catch one on video!