Piper Rose’s One Month Update

Image by Olive Juice Photography 

I decided that I’ll try to post monthly updates on Piper here on my blog — if you’re not into babies than I apologize in advance :) I can’t believe that Piper is already 5 weeks old, I know that everyone says time flies but I didn’t expect it to feel quite like this. I feel like each day she’s doing something new and surprising us with her curious little mind! Life has been so wonderful since she joined us, I’m honestly not tired (yet?!) and with the exception of our house looking a wreck most of the time I have nothing to complain about. It’s my last week on maternity leave and while I’m excited to get back to work I’m nervous about the transition of having a nanny in our home and not getting to spend every minute with Piper, I know it’s going to be a big change that takes some time to work out! Now onto the fun stuff….. ! 

Image by Natalie Franke

WEIGHT & LENGTH: At Piper’s 1 month visit she weighed 7lbs 15oz so we are pretty sure that she’s over 8lbs now and she’s 21 inches long! She’s still wearing newborn size clothing but many of her PJs are getting a little tight since she’s got some long legs on her! I can’t wait for her to fit into some of the clothing hanging in her closet but most is still too big, a lot of onesies and leggings for this little lady. 

FEEDING: Piper loves to eat, I call her my little piglet. The first few weeks of nursing were ROUGH (more on that later) but right around 3 or 4 weeks we really both got the hang of things and it’s been wonderful since. Piper is still eating at least every 3 hours. We think she may have some amount of reflux, she spits up a LOT but is so happy that the doctor isn’t worried about it, we just go through a lot of outfit changes over here. I started pumping at 3 weeks and have a decent size stash saved up in our freezer. This week (5wks) we introduced the bottle, I was so emotional and nervous about this but it went perfect. Austin fed it to her and she took to it right away and drank 2.5 ounces entirely too fast! 

DEVELOPMENT: Piper was born alert, looking around with her huge eyes and continues to love to see the world. She’s rarely inconsolable and generally a very happy baby, which we feel so lucky about! She tracks us with her eyes and last week she started smiling! It was the best milestone so far! She loves to smile, laugh and make funny faces in the morning after she feeds and we are getting more and more of these happy little times with her throughout the day now. She doesn’t mind tummy time at all and is so strong, our doctor thinks she’ll probably be an early crawler because she lifts her head so much on her own already and moves her little legs with furry. Piper really enjoys her baths and never cries during them at all. She loves to be outside, if she’s crying it’s our secret trick to calming her down. She definitely recognizes us but has started really smiling at my parents now too. Piper loves to look at her black & white picture book and listen music! 

SLEEPING: We feel extremely lucky in this department! What started out as a rough battle every night (as expected!) has slowly morphed into a routine where Piper sleeps through the night! Once we discovered Piper won’t sleep for a long stretch unless we put her down around 11pm everything changed. Around 10pm I’ll put her PJs on, change her and nurse. Then I’ll rock her and sing to her and by 11pm she’s usually sleeping and won’t wake up for 5-6 hours. This has been going on for the past two weeks and I still think it’s temporary but we are enjoying every moment of sleep while we can! I’ll usually feed her around 4 or 5am and sometimes she’ll go right back to sleep, other mornings she wants to be up that early. I’m a morning person so I don’t mind!

WHAT WE’RE LOVING: It’s so amazing what a trial and error it is with baby products! Each month I’ll be sharing what’s been working for us! Stay tuned for a more detailed monthly post with these products and more soon. 

DIAPERS: We tried all of the natural diapers on the market and right now we like Babyganics. For wipes we are still on the hunt for something affordable and mostly natural and have been using Huggies Natural Care Wipes.
PERSONAL CARE: For bath time are using Burt’s Bees Calming Wash and Noodle And Boo Super Soft Lotion and I love the scent of both. I also use Mustela’s Facial Wipes several times a day to wipe Piper’s neck and chin after spit up and between baths (we are bathing her every other day). Desitin and Honest’s Healing Balm are on rotation for the bum! 
CLOTHING: L’Oved Baby is our favorite splurge —  Carter’s, Gap & Old Navy zip up PJ’s we use every night. Piper looks so cute in her June & January headbands. Our Numpfer blanket is our favorite to swaddle and cuddle with. Piper doesn’t really fit into her shoes yet but has been wearing my baby booties non-stop. 
TOYS & GADGETS:Piper’s started enjoying her swing more and more and loves to sit happily in her Nuna Leaf seat. I don’t know where we’d be with out our Rock & Play – she sleeps in it most nights and it’s a lifesaver for us. I still love our Halo Bassinet – Piper takes her morning nap in it easily and we are working on getting her to sleep in it at night still. 

Image by Natalie Franke