Been Awhile

It's been almost a month since my last post, but it's certainly not for lack of updates! We moved at the beginning of the month, which is also right when I started filming for a drama called Jejungwon (제중원). For those who know the story, I auditioned last June while pregnant, was told a couple of months later that I got the role, didn't hear from that manager for quite some time, was sought out by another manager who didn't want to do the drama because she had some beef with the casting director, contacted the casting director directly, was told everything was cast, and that was that. However, they wound up writing in a new character towards the end of the series now, and I have since been filming for it. What seems to have happened is that there were originally two main foreign doctors, but they drastically changed the direction of the drama and cut the character that I thought I would end up getting cast for.


With the leading lady.

With the leading man, plus three other foreign actors. The two other men are also half-Asian, half-white.

Anyway, so with that and life in general, it's been difficult to update.

Sitting
With my last post, I mentioned how Nehemiah was able to roll over both ways. This is such a piece of cake for him! He's now moved onto sitting unsupported.



He's been doing pretty well. Actually, he suddenly improved quite a bit two days ago on Thursday while we were at a free photo shoot for him (more on that in another post). He's incredibly strong and loves to show it.

Activity Table/Exersaucer
We went to a baby fair in March and ordered an exersaucer for him there. It's actually referred to as an activity table, though, because he doesn't sit in the middle. Instead, his seat is attached to the table and has wheels that allow him to walk around it in circles. Because he is so much taller than average, this has worked out perfectly. An average-sized baby would not be able to use it yet.


Bright Starts Tropical Fun Around We Go Activity Station

He loves the freedom he has to walk around (I am surprised at how well he can on his own!), and he has so much fun with the little piano. There are three different sound options: piano, who am I? and music. He has shocked us by not just slamming on the keys all of the time. It sounds like he's playing a real song when he uses the piano mode, and he usually waits until the end of a song on music mode before pressing another key. He really does love music.



Tooskers
Tooth number two finally broke through Wednesday, April 7th. It doesn't seem like there are any other bumps for now, but who knows?


5 Months Old!
Where has the time gone?

On April 8th, we took him to the doctor for his second Hib shot. He weighed in at about 8.65kg (19.03 lbs) and measured in at 71.8cm (28.27in). Carrying him around has sure helped develop my calf muscles again, that's for sure.

He made a new friend at the doctor. There was a four-month-old boy there whose mother and grandmother were interested in Nehemiah. Nehemiah was very good with the baby. Instead of trying to claw his face, he enjoyed just grabbing his hands and didn't even try to eat them. He has done this with a couple of other babies he has "met" as well. I hope he stays like this as he gets older!

Pumpkin

Pumpkin has been difficult to not get everywhere, but I realized it has actually been because of the rice cereal. It seems because pumpkin is thicker than avocado and because my most recent batch of rice cereal is thicker than last time's, he has had a harder time with the consistency. I just expressed some milk to mix in with it, and he's doing much better with it.

He's still doing one meal a day, but when I've got some time, I will do a little more research and see about bumping it up, possibly starting to try some fruits as well.

Halmeoni
Right before we moved, Hee Suk's mother decided to surprise us all with a visit. Some of you may be aware of how well I don't handle surprises. She's a very kindhearted woman who I am thankful is not treating me as many MILs in Korea treat their sons' wives.

I thought she would be extra gentle with Nehemiah, but ho.ly.smokes. I kid you not, she was so impressed with how strong his legs are that she was trying to balance him on one hand while lightly supporting him with the other. Thankfully, Hee Suk and his brother's family were all around to help tell her not to pursue such crazy antics. I just could not relax around her, as hard as I may have tried. I really wanted to feel comfortable with her playing with him, but I couldn't. Reminding myself that she raised her own four children and pretty much our nephew as well was of no help. Thinking of how my husband turned out may or may not have invoked a little extra fear in me.

The time came, however, when Hee Suk was "stuck" (don't get me started) at the new place supervising some cleaning being done (don't get me started on that, either, with Korea's backwards way of how the people moving in to a place get to clean up after the people moving out), and I had to go to class. That left me with two options: cancel class, or leave Nehemiah with his halmeoni ("halmeoni" is Korean for "grandmother"). After a pretty serious panic attack (no joke--I was absolutely hysterical), I decided to gather myself and leave him with her for the hour. Of course, everything turned out just fine, but holy moly. I don't know if I can go through that again, though.

Restart
At some point during my pregnancy, I was having an awful time sleeping because of having nightmares all of the time. I prayed that I would be okay with rough sleep, if only I just would stop having nightmares, and they immediately went away.

I don't know if it's hormones surging again or what, but I've been having more nightmares again. Worse than those, though, are the daymares I have been having that just leave me paralyzed with fear. I won't go into detail, but it's been a little rough. We'll see how that is after another month or two.

No More Midnight Snacks
I know that "old habits die hard," especially when it comes to feeding babies in the middle of the night. With the stress of moving, I didn't even try to wean him off of his late night feedings, but as of yesterday, I've decided I had better get a start on not allowing him to develop dependence on those feedings.

As such, I just let him whine out his frustrations of not being fed at 4:30am this morning and was shocked by the results. He didn't get as hysterical as I thought he would, and he didn't complain for nearly as long as I had expected. Moreover, he didn't wake up an hour later to repeat. He slept until about 7:30, where I decided to go ahead and feed him, and he slept until later than ever, until almost 9:30. I think this is going to go more smoothly than expected, but I am not getting my hopes up to high just yet!

We're using a method that I can't remember the name of, but he can whine for 5 minutes, and if he's still upset, we will pat him and reassure him and let him try to go back to sleep on his own. Repeat if another 5 minutes pass of frustration on his end. We've got his music box from his activity gym in his crib, though, so that does help.


Anyway, I've got to go and get some housework done. Nehemiah continues to delight us more and more every single day. We are so incredibly blessed to have him and never take a single thing for granted with him. I will never be able to thank God nearly enough for him.