Cereal

All of sudden Ava seems hungry. Ravenous, actually.

I usually feed her about 7:00 am, and she has been waking up hungry at 9:00 or 9:15. She has been routinely draining every bottle I leave for Heide. She drained a 5-ounce one the other day.

I ran into one of the girls from my Bradley class, whose daughter was born the day after Ava. She said that her daughter, Kyla (who, incidentally, makes Ava look small), started wanting to eat every hour and practically lunged at the spoon when she decided to give her a little cereal.

I started thinking that perhaps the reason that I'm having trouble getting her down for naps is that she is actually hungry. We decided that she was close enough to six months to give it a shot. So, for the first time, we gave her some very runny rice cereal. It's fun to see her trying to figure it all out. She's been staring longingly at everything we put in our mouths (especially Tostitos) for the past 4 months. Thought you guys might like to see some pictures of her first adventures with (semi) solid food.

After we gave her cereal in the morning, she took a two hour nap, and things have been going much better in the sleep department since. Probably not a magic bullet, but I think it might help. I've heard it said that introducing solids won't help them sleep, but my guess is that, at a certain point, not introducing them might keep them from sleep.

Anyway, it's been a fun few days. Now I've got lots more to clean out from under her chin. And the more solids she eats, the more chins she'll have.