3rd Child syndrome

Oops, I've just been updating a couple of bits of an old post as the links weren't complying with something as I've just had a quick flick through some posts of mine to realise that I really haven't written about Zac much at all, if anything other than his birth!!!

Feeling a bit guilty for that I must admit and definitely a case of 3rd child syndrome.

Life with three kids (and lets face it the hubby is sometimes like a fourth haha) is just so busy and full on that I just don't get much time to write anymore.

Zachary is nearly 9 months, which is just unbelievable in itself!

So before I forget or loose the scrappy bit of paper with important dates on I thought I'd type down a few bits I've missed on the blog!

At around 3 and 1/2 weeks he rolled a couple of times from his front to his back, I think this must have been a complete fluke though as it didn't happen for a long time after that. He was a super sleepy baby in the day at this age...night times maybe not so much!

At about 4 weeks old we had the first smiles, some in the bath and them some for Daddy! At at 6 weeks old we were treated with the big gummy grins especially after waking up.

He loved bath time, I think part of this must have been because when he was tiny the weather was really quite hot (feels like forever ago since summer now though) I was giving him baths quite frequently to cool him and make it more comfortable for him. Alex and Sam love bath time with him too, although a bit of a squeeze if they all want to get in at the same time!

At 8 weeks he did he first full night from about 10ish to  6.30, and by 10ish weeks this was most nights (unfortunately this was very short lived much to my disappointment)!

At 15 weeks he rolled from front to back, a day before 4 months old he mastered back to front and also sitting unaided for the first time!!

As he is one of my boys, and a Spencer boy at that I did decide to wean early at 19 weeks ( I know lots of people cringe when I say that), I've weaned all 3 of the boys early as they simply were starving! You know yourself if they are ready for food, Zachary was getting extremely angry at dinner time and was trying to grab anything he could off our plates. I just stuck to simple baby rice for quite a few weeks though. This made him so much happier, although unlike his brothers it made no difference to the night time wake ups and feeds.

By around 23 weeks we really knew that we had him as he no longer stayed in the same place as he got around the lounge with shuffling and his newly perfected rolling, always after the boys hot wheels as opposed to his own toys!

At 25 weeks you could see he was eager to crawl, up on hands and knees and launching himself forward when possible, at 27 weeks the commando crawl was happening and just a week after he'd discovered there were more rooms to explore other than the lounge (eek)!!

Not content with just crawling at 28 1/2 weeks he decided that standing himself up using the bath tub handle would be a fun thing to do too! Just to make bath times even more interesting I think!!

He's a strong lad so at 29 weeks he was able to sit up from a crawling position.

Now the next bits aren't so exact on the dates as A. I have no idea how many weeks he is now and B. we've been so busy I've forgotten to jot things down. Thank goodness I like to use facebook etc though!

I was super excited that one of my children said 'mama' first the other two were definitely 'dada' so I've rubbed this in a little to James who is a little put out by it haha. Such a magical moment, but I do wonder when it starts to change (like now if the older two say Mum constantly it grates on me haha).

He was up against the sofas at 7 months, although happy to just stand up rather than cruise.

At 7 and 1/2 months he tried to say Hiya.

At 8 months he climbed the stairs...I'd like to say with an adult behind him, I'd like to say I watched him do it, but in all honestly he snuck up when the lounge door was left ajar, the boys were supposed to be keeping an eye on him for 2 minutes whilst James and I were on an important call in the office. I've never panicked so much in my own home, the hall was dark, the boys oblivious to the fact he's even got out the room! I ran upstairs to the dark landing and still couldn't hear or see him, then I really panicked!! Sam then found him in Alex's room  (also dark) with a small piece of Lego in his mouth just to top off the bad parenting award! Needless to say a stairgate was bought quickly after that!!

At 8 1/2 months he's now trying to say 'dada' although it's normally just one big 'daaa' or 'dud'. We've had a few bab and lala type sounds too, and it's very cute when he's chatting away to himself.

He's such a good tempered baby, and generally only cries when there is really an issue of hunger, tiredness or pain (downside to an active one is they always seem to bump themselves into things). He is so active though as spots an open door, a little crumb (or not food but something else small to pop into his mouth!) stairs from a mile off, so really have to watch him. He's opening cupboard doors etc now too so will be ordering so door locks.

I'd say the only thing we've yet to master yet is a proper routine, not sure if it's the school routine that has made it harder for him to fall into his own routine or just that's his way of keeping me on my toes. He often sleeps at different times of the day most days so I never really know what to expect, like for example today he's still asleep in his pushchair from our morning school run (nice to sit on sofa with the laptop for a change though), sometimes he won't sleep until after lunch, sometimes he won't sleep in his cot and only my arms.

In the past 4 or 5 months I think I can count on 1 hand how many times he's slept through, he likes to wake and be cuddled in our bed! He does usually go back to sleep straight away though, up until 8 months I'd still been breastfeeding at night when he woke but I decided to try and stop and see if it made any difference. Actually since I stopped feeding him at night he seems to be settling down quicker when he comes in and will then sleep until the morning. In fact he loves a lie in! Sometimes I'm sad to see our breast feeding journey end (without me planning on it) and in other ways I'm glad, a couple of weeks ago I started to get mastitis symptoms so just decided it wasn't worth the pain and to just stop after I'd cleared the blockage!

He's such a cutie and really gaining his personality now, I just wish he'd slow down a little!! Can't imagine our family without him.