7.5 months and wintertime.

Arden is now 7.5 months old, and - dare I say it? - things have been feeling much more manageable these days.

Sleep training was really the game-changer for us. For the first five months, she either needed to feed to sleep (and keep feeding...), or be carried and bounced around the house for her naps. She wasn't sleeping well, I wasn't sleeping well, and Ben had moved into the guest room (and was also "not sleeping well," he would complain to me! ha!). A few weeks before Saralyn and Amare's visit, we decided that enough was enough and began sleep training her at 5.5 months. The transition wasn't painless, but definitely worth it in the long run. We can now put her in the crib awake, she eventually falls asleep for reasonable stretches of time, and she wakes up happy. Also because we get a break, we're now able to give her more attention during her awake-time. Everyone wins! She still wakes up to feed three times a night, but it's still such an improvement from how things used to be.

solids: the next challenge.

I found this to be really fascinating though: our friends and family in the USA thought we began sleep training way too late... while Ben's Australian coworkers thought five months was way too early to start. I'm guessing this is partly due to the differences in maternity leave and social attitudes towards birth. It's common for Australian mothers to take up to a year of leave, while in the States, mothers usually go back to work only a few weeks/months after giving birth. Because of this, many American babies are kind of forced into a routine much earlier. And come to think of it, we might never have started sleep training her if it wasn't for my intensive class...

Also - winter is now upon us! Brrrr. As I've mentioned before, Melbourne winter isn't as dreary as Washington, or as eternally cold as Michigan. But we've acclimated to Victorian winters, and they feel cold to us. At least we finally get to dress Arden in some adorable colder-weather gear though! You can't get much cuter than a baby in an animal ear hoodie.

We finally caved and bought an oil heater for our bedroom (Ben and I had gotten by without one for the past two winters by huddling under the covers, but we can't really do that with Arden). And then we had to buy a humidifier, because heaters make the air really dry. Combined with the other contraptions we've recently bought (a white noise machine, baby monitor, etc...) we now have what seems like the entire inventory of a Brookstone store in our bedroom.

It's also really nice to know that Arden is capable of taking a bottle (even though she'll usually just wait for me to get home, as we learned during my intensive class). We finally felt comfortable enough to leave Arden with some friends while we went to see X-Men: Apocalypse! (Side note: I felt a little self-conscious about dressing up/cosplaying as mutant Jubilee for a movie that's already been out for a month. But on the walk to the cinema, we started spotting some familiar characters. Marvin the Martian, Waldo, Pikachu... and then we realised that it was OzCon weekend at the Melbourne Convention & Exhibition Centre! I blended right in.)

30 going on 13.

Even though a part of me misses newborn-baby Arden, 7-month old Arden is a lot of fun to be around. She smiles often at both of us (still loves to stare our friends down, though), can relax a lot longer in her stroller before having a meltdown, and loves to play stereotypical baby "games" like peekaboo and airplane. She even recently lasted for three hours (three! hours!) while I met a friend at a coffeehouse, sitting quietly in my lap, taking in the conversation.

baby's first high tea and Queen's Birthday holiday. aren't we the best parents? and yes, I MADE THOSE COOKIES!

We're now gearing up for a visit to the States next month! We'll first be meeting up with my family in Hawaii, a destination we picked due to its close(r) location to us (sorry Michiganders! Grand Rapids is four flights away from Melbourne - not ideal for babies...) and because it's, well, Hawaii. We'll then spend time in Washington with Ben's family, also hoping to see some friends and beloved places we've missed. It'll be a busy trip, but definitely worthwhile! We're excited, a little nervous (flying and traveling with children is just one of those things), but mostly we can't wait for the rest of our families to meet our little girl.

And to experience some warmer weather. We're looking forward to that, too.

CK

winter wonderland.