5 months

Liam, at five months old you are exuding so much roly-poly babyness that I can hardly stand it. You are just so stinking cute! You still have big chewy cheeks and huge brown eyes, and your hair is really starting to fill in, auburn with a bit of curl. More than that, though, you are starting to act like such a Gerber baby. You sing and coo, you roll around on the floor sucking on your toes, you squeal with delight when we airplane you through the air. These are the crowning achievements of babydom as far as I’m concerned.

You are getting much more physical. We put you in the jolly jumper for the first time this month, and you bounce and pirouette in that thing like a ballerina. They got it right when they called it jolly – that’s exactly how you look when you’re in it. As for the sucking on your toes – yes, you can contort that far! – maybe all the yoga you did with me while in utero helps?? If I hold you on my lap, you lunge at and grab for everything. At no time is this worse than during mealtimes. I said I wanted to breastfeed you exclusively until six months, but for weeks you have been making it very clear that you want something solid to eat and you want it NOW. I don’t know how much longer I can hold out. The other pitfall during mealtimes is that Captain is usually up on the counter, and you laugh at him like crazy and grab for him, too. A couple of times he’s let you touch him, but mostly he skitters away. If we had known how effective a baby could be at keeping the cat off the counter, we might have had you a long time ago!

All of your tricks from a month ago – the rolling over, the bubble blowing – are nowhere to be seen. It’s as if you’ve proven to yourself that you can do those things, and now you have loftier goals in mind. The big thing we’re working on these days is sitting up. You love to practise it. You start out in a frog pose, leaning on your hands, and can eventually work up to an unsupported sit for at least a few seconds. What usually ruins it is that you swipe at something and knock yourself off balance. I know it will make a world of difference when you can finally sit on your own, and see the world vertically, as we see it, rather than from flat on your back.

We started letting you cry it out this month. My poor sweet boy, I hope you will someday forgive me (assuming that I don’t lose my sanity along the way). You sure don’t like it but rest assured, neither do we. At best, you cried for six minutes before falling asleep. At worst, 77 minutes (please don’t make me revise this next month with a new record.) One night after a 15- or 20-minute cry, Chad asked how long it had been (because yes, I watch the clock and time it each night, down to the minute.) And when I said it had only been 20 or so minutes, he said he could not for the life of him believe that we had once survived an entire 77 minutes because the 20-or-so minutes felt like a lifetime. I knew exactly how he felt. I don’t know of any way other than this to teach you to fall asleep on your own, and I hope the lesson is learned quickly and we can move on to better things.

I’m still trying to figure your personality out. Are you brave or cautious? Easy going or temperamental? Type A or Type B? I keep watching you to try to pick up clues, but I don’t know yet. I do still think you’re shy. You will sing and play with abandon when it’s just the three of us, but if someone unfamiliar enters the room, even if it’s just your grandparents, that all comes to a halt and you keep a suspicious eye on them instead. One place you are NOT shy is at playgroup. We attend the 0-12 months session at the OEYC religiously on Tuesday afternoons – you get a kick out of the other babies there, especially Autumn, who is two months older than you. Several times you have practically been nodding off as we arrive (since playgroup coincides with naptime), but the minute you see her, you perk up and are spellbound by her for the entire hour and a half.

Sometimes you love repetition and can’t get enough of the same things over and over. I have this goofy “Baby Liam” song I made up and sang to you all the time when you fussed as a newborn, and it stopped you from crying then. When I sing it today, you stop what you’re doing and crack a huge grin – you still love it. But sometimes you look at me like, If I have to play with that toy or listen to that story one more time, I’ll go mad – don’t you have anything better to offer? There is a diaper ad in the magazines right now that says something like “8 Pat the Bunnys, 15 games of peekaboo, 2 sippy cups, blah blah blah and it’s only 8 a.m.” I swear the people at that ad agency bugged our house – that is exactly how we live. You are starting to consolidate your naps so that they are farther apart, and keeping you entertained for these longer periods is proving to be a challenge!

At five months old, you are 27 inches long and weigh xx pounds {to be determined}. The next month is going to be full of big changes: starting solids, finally sitting on your own and gaining some major independence there, and I’m willing to bet that there’s a tooth on the horizon. We’re also coming up on my favourite time of year. I can't wait to share it with you.