Despite his less than stellar weight gain, Fuzzy has been doing all sorts of interesting things recently:
1) He's ambitious - although he hasn't yet mastered sitting, or even rolling over (several times he's gotten me up at night because he flipped onto his stomach and got stuck), he's already aching to stand. We used to do this move where we would have him grab onto our hands with both of his as he was laying down, and then we would pull him into a sitting position. Now he goes straight through the sitting pose, folds his feet under him, and rolls to a stand, all the while looking very proud of himself. He also likes to be held under the armpits, and then he plants his feet on any available hard surface, straightens his legs, and grins.
2) And while he can't sit up by himself yet, he has gotten better at sitting - he's great in his Bumbo chair and in the ExerSaucer, and we had to move his bouncer to a new setting to accommodate his desires to sit up instead of leaning back. Here he is, thinking about how to get out of the Bumbo and stand up.
3) Halfway through his 4th month, Fuzz slept through the night. It happened to be the one night when I was getting sick, so while my first reaction was shock and joy, my second reaction was concern that he was getting sick too. Fortunately, he did not succumb to the same pestilence that The Pit and I had, but unfortunately, he has not yet repeated that long stretch of sleep.
4) Despite his lack of weight gain, the baby is now consuming four ounces of milk when Maya gives him the bottle. This is about double what he ate two months ago, so those calories are presumably getting used up growing him taller, rather than fatter. He's somewhere around the 80th percentile in height, so it looks like he'll be tall and slim like papa.
5) In preparation for Halloween, The Pit carved a pumpkin. My mom and I gave Fuzz one of the cut-out eyes to play with, and of course he shoved the whole thing into his mouth. This was all well and good, until he got it stuck - it was way too big to go down his throat, but exactly the right shape to get wedged between his chipmunk cheeks. The Pit had to come to the rescue, and chastised my mother and I "for almost killing the baby."
6) After he finishes nursing and falls asleep, Fuzz continues to sort of roll the milk around in his mouth, and assumes a purse-lipped expression which strongly reminds me of my grandfather. It's like he's thinking something isn't quite up to par, but he's not entirely sure what the problem is. You would think this would annoy the person providing Fuzzy with perfectly good milk, but the fact that I have a dubious baby delights me - the Peachy genes are strong within this one! The following picture does not show this expression, but does demonstrate Fuzzy' growing resemblance to his mama:
7) Fuzzy's head previously fit perfectly in the hollow of my neck when I rocked him to sleep, but he's gotten too big to fit comfortably there - plus he now has a tendency to grab and try to eat my hair. However, he's come up with a new and adorable position from which to rest. When he's tired these days, he'll bend over, lean his cheek against the chest of whoever is holding him, and quietly observe the world. I haven't managed to get a picture of this, but since my last report of his kissing, I snagged several shots, which you can enjoy below:
