Day 151: Weaning

Lilybeth and I hung out in her room this afternoon. We had the air conditioner blasting, just trying to stay cool. Here she is sitting in her basket of stuffed animals, which she thought was great fun. She kept digging down into the basket, poking the various bellies and noses of the animals that play music. She had quite the little symphony going.

I think she looks a bit like my youngest brother, Donald, in the photo below. Something about that impish smile.
So I've decided I want to have Miss Lilybeth weaned by August. She'll be 14 months then, and I just feel like it's time. She doesn't nurse that much at the moment: once in the morning, once at midday before her nap, and once before bed. I don't think she drinks much. I think it's more for the comfort and the cuddle. This week I introduced cow's milk to her (obviously to serve as a substitute for mama's milk), but she doesn't seem to like it at all. In fact today, she clamped her lips shut and turned her head away while I tried to get her to take the sippy cup's spout. She didn't cry or anything. She just stared blankly into the distance and wouldn't open her mouth. It was sort of sad, actually. It was her silent protest.

Her doctor said that she doesn't necessarily need to drink cow's milk, that she can get her calcium from yogurt and cheese--both of which she has plenty of everyday. I want her to drink milk because right now having milk is such an intricate part of her bedtime ritual. I worry that if she doesn't have something warm to drink at bedtime, she'll be too upset when she no longer gets her milk from me. I know I should try mixing the cow's milk with some breast milk to help get her used to the taste of the cow's milk, but I'm not producing enough milk at the moment to actually pump any. I was thinking I could put a little yogurt into the milk (I think Stonyfield makes an organic yogurt drink for kids) and then slowly reduce the amount of yogurt. Of course, she doesn't necessarily have to have cow's milk; she could have rice milk (I read that soy milk is not good for kids, but I'll have to do more research into it.)

I also want to gradually stop letting her nurse, so I've decided that the first nurse to go will be the morning nurse. This makes me sad, because while I think this is the least important nurse for her, it is also my favorite one. When I hear her calling/babbling in the morning, I go into her room where she's usually standing in her crib, looking at the door, holding Wooly Cat, and waiting for me to come. Once I pick her up, she points towards the door of Mama and Papa's room and then, when we get into the room, she points at the bed, which, I believe, is her way of telling me she wants her morning milk. So we all--Papa, Mama, Baby, and Wooly Cat--snuggle down into the bed and LB has a drink. When she's done drinking, she usually tries to find her way over to Papa to tell him it's time to get up and play.

At any rate, I'll keep you all updated on the weaning process . . .