Our little girl has reached the 8 month milestone! Here is a quick update:
Aislinn's 6 month check-up went well, she measured 6oth percentile for weight, 70th percentile for height, and 99th percentile in head circumference (obviously a very smart girl). Within a few hours of her appointment, she started to run a low-grade fever, which we anticipated with her vaccines. This went away, but a few days later Aislinn started to run a high fever, up to 106 degrees. We were worried about infection and took her in to see her pediatrician. The doctor ran cultures (which was traumatizing for both Aislinn and Mommy and Daddy) and gave her a dose of antibiotic. We went home and tried to keep her fever down with cool baths, tylenol and motrin.
Late that night, we had a scare. I woke up and noticed that Aislinn felt cold in bed next to us. We got up to change her diaper and check her temperature and noticed she was acting differently than normal. Her eyes were open wide and she was staring blankly at us, and her body was stiff and shaking. Her temperature was only 99, but with this change in her behavior we decided to take her to the hospital ER. By the time we arrived at the hospital, Aislinn was feeling really warm again. We gave her Tylenol and waited to see the ER doc. Within 30 minutes she was evaluated and the doctor said based on what we described that Aislinn may have had a febrile seizure, which he said was common with babies, as they have immature neurological systems that are inept in handling the rapid changes in temperature experienced during illness.
He said we were doing everything right and sent us home with instructions to follow up with Aislinn's pediatrician. We saw physicians at the office three days in a row, and ultimately came to the conclusion that Aislinn had a virus that needed to run its course (most likely something she picked up at her well baby visit-GRRRR). Aislinn's fever broke within a week, and within 3 weeks she was back to normal.
At 8 months, Aislinn is back on track. She has grown so much in the last two months. She is still sleeping through the night (usually from 9:30pm to 6:30 or 7 am). She usually takes a nap around 9 am, then whenever she feels like it throughout the day. She always falls asleep during walks and car rides, but these naps are usually short and end as soon as the stroller or car stops moving. She refuses to go down at night unless the lights are off and Mommy and Daddy are going to bed too. I suggested we move her out of our room, which I thought may help, but Daddy is not quite ready for that!
We planned on starting solids after Aislinn's six month appointment, but had to hold off while she was sick. We started making our own food for her, but discovered she likes the jarred baby food better. We have tried several different fruits and veggies, and Aislinn has mastered the level 1 and level 2 textures. I think her favorites so far are squash, mangos and bananas. She didn't seem to enjoy the green beans she just had for dinner nearly as much!
Aislinn has been increasingly vocal during the last few months. She babbles and shreiks, laughs and cries. She continues to roll and scoot around the floor, but has just in the last week or so also started to hold herself up on her hands and knees. She bobs back and forth, but hasn't made any coordinated crawling movements. She has also started to pull herself up in the crib, although she doesn't make it all the way to a standing position. Aislinn really likes going for walks and sitting on her blanket playing with toys. Sometimes she will sit and play for an hour at a time! Mommy and Daddy love it! The older she gets, the more fun we have! We LOVE our little girl!
