Now my baby is 4 months old and there were some noticeable changes in his baby development. According to the Baby Centre website newsletter that I signed up, there is some amazing baby development that would surely surprise us.
I do find the baby centre newsletter informative however they do advise there are some caveats and not all baby develop at the same rate. Nevertheless the newsletters provide some useful guide and hints on what to expect as parents.
So let’s see how my baby fares against what was sent in by the newsletter.
1) Baby should be rolling over from his back onto his front and vice versa. Looks like my baby is a little behind in this development. And when place him in the prone position, he didn’t really like it. His arms are rather weak too and took several tried before he could lift his head and he tires easily from all the push up. I guess practice makes perfect so will have to do this frequently to strengthen his muscles. My only worry is that he is not too keen on it, and that may hamper his need to roll over all the more. Whatever his achievement, we should congratulate baby and smile so that it will encourage him to do it more and hopefully achieve the roll over. My mom-in-law said that boys tend to lag behind girls in this part of the baby development.
2) Recognizing faces and places and being choosy about who baby meets. When baby is about 4 months old, their ability to recognize faces and surrounding improves. Baby also becomes more selective on who they want to bestow their chirpy smile or grumpy face and loud wailing. So far baby is very comfortable with me and my wife, my mom-in-law who is helping out with the baby sitting, the 2 year old cousin sister, my wife’s sister, my mom and our maid. Anybody else now, baby’s face would turn sour and a loud wail ensues! Ouch! And way really loud crying too! So much that we quipped that he will be the next future church praise worship leader or Pavarotti opera singer! Even places like shopping malls where he likes to look-look see-see now seems strange to baby and he gets really uncomfortable rather than being curious about strange places. I wonder continuing with excursions to shopping malls would reduce baby apprehension about going out for visits to shopping malls.
3) Beginning to understand language. Researchers believe that at 4 months baby would start to understand what his basic baby language means. I should think so too as I notice some vocal patterns refers to what baby wants or who baby wants to be with. Sometimes I catch the mua-mua crying which sounds like an indication that he wants mommy rather than me, and when he just cries waa-waa he wants me to carry him. There are a few other sounds but I was not able to decipher it yet. Anyway, baby is very talkative when he is in a chirpy mood and talking to and fro should promote baby sense of communication.
4) Playing alone. Well still not quite there yet, but at this stage they usually should be able to play alone. I notice he would like to fondle the hanging toys, but he likes it best when I hold the baby toy steady in front of him as his ability to grapple the baby toy is still unstable.
5) Mouthing objects. So far so good, not quite putting things in his mouth but occasionally grabbing his napping and placing it in his mouth when sucking his thumb, sometimes up to 3 fingers inside his mouth minus the nappy of course! Some church members say thumb sucking is better than pacifiers and yet some others say is not good because it may take many years before they break the thumb sucking habit. Whatever, as long as baby is not crying I’m happy with it. Though we try to discourage too much thumb sucking by giving pacifier, but baby tends to spit the pacifier out. Oh, well…
So now baby is 4 months old as the road to growing up continues!