Lilah Rose at Four Months

Somehow another month has gone by!

It’s easy to feel like every day is the same, but looking back at Lilah’s three month update, a lot has actually changed!

It will always remain amazing to me how quickly these tiny people develop.

Here’s a peek at Lilah at four months old!

Personality

Lilah is still so sweet and squishy, and she is developing quite the funny little personality!

The biggest change with her personality this month has been a strong sense of stranger danger.

We saw this with both sets of grandparents this month (not that they’re strangers! She hasn’t seen them a ton though).

Everything I’ve read says stranger danger starts later, so I thought it was a fluke at first, but she started crying pretty much any time one of them held her, and sometimes just being in the same room.

It was kind of funny, because I’ve told them all what a happy and easygoing baby she is, which is normally true!

This has been super interesting to me because my toddler never had any fear of strangers at all, and still doesn’t! It’s so fun to see how different their little personalities are from the very beginning.

Other than that, she remains very happy. She loves babbling and having little conversations with us.

She loves watching James play, but also gives him the funniest looks like, “what the heck is that guy doing?” (I give him the same looks sometimes….)

She loves being read to (these are her favorite books) and listening to classical music.

She gets so calm and quiet every time we go outside. If she is ever fussy or upset, I head straight outside and she stops crying almost immediately every time.

She is great at self soothing and loves to suck her tiny thumb.

She loves watching other babies and children and is always very quiet and intent on observing them if we’re out with other children.

She is just super sweet and snuggly and it is getting hard to imagine our family without her these days. She has been the best addition.

Development

This month was all about rolling!

While Lilah rolled from back to belly for the first time at the beginning of the month, it did not become really easy for her until about a week ago.

She now rolls over frequently and loves laying on her belly and looking around at the world. Fortunately she is now really good at holding her head up too, so I don’t have to worry as much about her bonking her head on the wood floors when she does this.

The day after she turned four months old, she rolled from her belly to her back for the first time. This is still hard for her and is kind of a funny process to watch as she starts with her head and upper body and then just lays there for a minute before rolling her legs over. It looks super uncomfortable, but she doesn’t seem to mind it..

Her little hands and fine motor abilities are also developing and she loves her play gym right now and bringing toys to her mouth. She frequently lays there with her hands clasped, which makes her look so funny and serious.

Sleep

I called it – totally jinxed her sleep by saying how well she was doing in her three month update.

I’m just kidding of course, but she definitely hit a regression last month. I think it was a combination of taking away the swaddle, her really wanting to practice rolling, and the four month sleep regression hitting a bit early.

Her night sleep remained okay, but was not as solid as before…no more sleeping through the night. For a couple of weeks she was waking up twice, sometimes more. She would wake up “rage rolling” as I like to call it – desperately practicing rolling and grunting about it.

Thankfully she is now back to waking up once a night to eat, which I am fine with.

The harder part of sleep this month was naps. She went very suddenly from taking 2-3 hour naps to only taking 30-45 minute naps. I think this was part of the 4 month sleep regression, as she needed to learn to connect her sleep cycles. This naturally made her quite grumpy by evening time though.

Just this past week (starting the day after she turned 4 months old), she has started napping well again. She has started rolling onto her belly to sleep and it seems to be helping her nap a lot better. She now sometimes only takes 3 naps instead of 4, since they are longer.

The other change with sleep has been that she no longer naps easily on the go. We went to the park last week and she cried the whole time instead of falling asleep in the carrier. I decided to call it quits and just go home, and she of course finally fell asleep right when we got to the car. That was fun.

So we’re in a bit of a tricky stage for getting out of the house, but I know her awake time windows will stretch soon and that will get easier. Right now I’m just trying to find a balance between getting her good sleep and making sure we get out enough that my toddler and I don’t lose our minds 🙂

Routine

Honestly, our routine is a little on the boring side at the moment, but that is totally fine and just a part of this stage.

I’m not going to write out the whole thing, because it’s basically an ongoing cycle of napping, eating, and playing. Lilah takes all of her naps in her bed now, with the occasional nap on the go (not sure if we’re going to try the floor bed again, but for now she sleeps in the Lotus Travel Crib in our room).

We go to music class every Thursday, which she continues to love, and generally have another playdate or outing sometime in the week and stay home the other days.

I’ve resorted to Instacart (<- referral link) because grocery shopping just doesn’t seem “worth it” to mess with her naps and it’s hard to feed her, get there and back again within the time she’s awake these days (generally 1 hr 30 min – 1 hr 45 min).

We stayed home a lot this month, but spent lots of time in the backyard and watching the rain out the window, which she loves.

While it’s hard to be home on the days when one of the little ones is feeling grumpy, we’ve also had some wonderful days at home together and it’s been nice to take a step back from being so on the go.

I’m very much enjoying this stage, where she is not yet mobile but has so much personality. It’s been really fun to watch her bond with James start to grow and I’m excited to see what this next month brings!

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