I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid...

So, I got basically zero sleep. Anabelle slept just fine. JJ, for God knows why, was all over the bed and couldn't lay still to save his life. Wiggle, turn, kick, toss, cuddle, squirm, "Bud, lay still," or "Back to your own bed, JJ", all freaking night. And of course he's perky and rested, and I feel like warmed-over roadkill.

Wanna know the real kicker? The only computer we have that can cope with Netflix has once again decided that it's not going to play nice. So I can't even stick him in front of an electronic babysitter for the morning.

What I *want* to do is make him sit in an empty Pack & Play with a tray of dry cold cereal, a water bottle, absolutely nothing to do, and spank him every time he wiggles or complains.

Because that's what my parents would do if I had kept them up all night, and that's fair, right? My turn, right?

Because I am not my parents, I will not be putting my 3 year old on the equivalent of lock-down. I will not be slamming doors and muttering imprecations at inanimate objects all day long.

He has a breakfast dray consisting of fruit, a peanut butter sandwich, and sliced lunch meat, which he loves.

He has a pack of crayons and a stack of fresh paper to draw on.

He has a room full of toys and books with which to entertain himself.

And I have explained to him in the clearest possible terms that there is to be no whining, complaining, or fit-throwing today, and that pretty much everything he says to me had best start with the words "Yes, Mommy."

So far, he's doing surprisingly well with that bit.

I'm doing surprisingly well with reminding him when he forgets.

The cats keep trying to trip me, I can hear the hus-beast snoring all the way in the livingroom, the baby is still sound asleep, and oh yeah... the Road Works department decided that our setback was a good spot to put a construction warning sign. Once again I seem to be the only person who knows how to load a dishwasher or put the clean stuff away, and it's a damn good thing there's a crock full of dinner ready to go, because the kitchen's closed today.

*sigh*

I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid,
I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid,
I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid,
I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid,
I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid,
I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid,
I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid, I love my kid.

It's not his fault he had trouble sleeping. He can't help it that he was restless. I have restless nights where I toss & turn all night long... or just get up and read a book.

*deeeeeeeeeeeeeep breaths*

Helpless cooing in 3... 2... 1...

He so rarely lets me get the good snuzzle pics!

So you know those moments (hours... evenings...) where your child suddenly decides that all is right with the world, that 6:45 isn't such an unreasonable bedtime, decides to not only cooperate with the evening routine, but actively help you get it done and smile the whole time?  The rare and miraculous once in a blue moon evenings that tell you, yes, there IS a person in there, and yes, he IS learning, and no, he doesn't hate you for making him go to sleep when it's still light out?

We just had one of those.

In fact, the whole day has been incredibly smooth sailing, despite the atrociously early beginning thereof.

Yeah, JJ decided to get going at quarter past 5 today.  *groan*  Of course, it's tough to complain, because he also slept through from bedtime last night (almost 10.5 hours) with only one wake-up, and that was the post-bedtime top-off feed that I don't usually count anyway.  Once I realized that, well, I decided to stop being irritated about the 5am wake-up call.

Because of the early morning, it turned into a two-nap day, falling neatly into the ideal 2 nap day pattern, and baby was up for the afternoon at 2:30 on the dot, already awake when I went to go get him.

Ate his lunch (pureed squash ... but on toast fingers... yeah, I'm back to purées are EBIL, but that's another post)... drank some water...

Took a good half dozen sorta-maybe steps while clinging to my fingers...

Did NOT freak out during his evening play-time with Grandma (read: mommy's sanity-saving baby-free hour).  Normally he lasts about 40 minutes and then starts freaking out because Grandma is nice but she's NOT MOMMY!!!!

Sat (SAT) in his bath and played happily with his toys for fifteen whole minutes without making me constantly re-sit him.

(Here's the big one) REFUSED TO NURSE IN CLUTCH HOLD AND NURSED TO SLEEP IN CRADLE HOLD INSTEAD.  Y'all have no idea.  He is seven, almost eight months old, almost thirty inches long, and until a month ago was still exclusively nursing in clutch hold.  It's taken the last month to introduce it and for him to realize that it WORKS BETTER, so for him to actively refuse clutch is a huge big honkin' deal in the Nolan household!

So... seriously... who is this perfect little angel and what has he done with my child?????

He's sleeping now, and I'm waiting for the "Mooooooooooooooooooom, I'm still hungry!!!!!!!" cries to start, but I'm hoping a smooth day bodes well for a smooth night and it won't take too long to get him back to sleep.

ETA: Okay, so we're coming up on two hours since bedtime here.  At the hour mark I snuck into the bedroom, reeeeaaaaaal quiet-like, because I hadn't heard JJ fuss for his top-off feed yet.  And what do I find?  A peacefully sleeping baby who has flipped over on his tummy and clearly made it through the transition all. on. his. own.

One more bit of ultimate cuteness...

I can melt now, right?  Okay, just checking.  *melt*

Sleep Regressions SUCK!!!

It's official, my kid is the cutest kid ever. :P

That's his baby-mirror he's playing with... I recently figured out a way to attach it to his pack 'n play, so now I'm typically being woken in the morning by baby-giggles as he plays with his "friend"... infinitely preferable to being woken by "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH", let me tell you.

Okay, so y'all probably remember my moaning and whining about the 4 month sleep regression.

The 8 month?  Yeah, it's worse.

He's back to waking up an average of three times a night, and this time adjusting his reflux meds didn't fix it.  HELPED, oh wow did it help (he was up to 5-6x a night again and I was one cranky momma!), but the remaining three aren't reflux related.  Totally different cry, that.  Now, if they were spread out, I could deal with it, but they're all clustered between about 2 am and 6.

*whimpers*


He's also trying to drop a nap.  Yeah, he wants to go down to one nap already, he's been trying for a month, but until today I just wasn't seeing enough to indicate he was really ready.  Oh, we tried a couple of times, and there have been a few days where everything lined up just right and one nap did the job, but most days he just hasn't been up to the 4-5 hour wake times needed to pull off one nap.

Sacked out in the new pack 'n play.

BUT... that first nap in the morning keeps sneaking earlier and earlier.  Today he was only awake for an hour and forty before he got cranky and hungry and passed out at the breast in four minutes flat.  I haven't seen that short of a morning wake time since he was still taking three 2 hour naps every day.  Aaaand then he refused to nap again until 1:45, and only slept until 2:30.  Used to be he had to be awake by 4pm in order to sleep at 7.  Then 3:30, and it's been 3pm for a while now... so he was about due to back it up another half hour.

So, I'm thinking since John's off work tomorrow, it'd be a good day to take a real stab at the single nap day JJ apparently REALLY wants.

Kid's gonna have to get used to our Ergo (thank you, miss Elora!!!), if he's gonna only take one nap, because I absolutely cannot be stuck on my butt entertaining him all day with only one break.  Can't.  Won't.  Nuh uh.  Negative, Ghost Rider, the pattern is full.

Even if he is the cutest thing ever.

So here's the deal.

Warning, Mommy-Wars annoy me, so this is kinda rant-ish.

My son schedules himself.

If he's not maintaining his usual pattern, it's because something is wrong.

Nobody believes me.

I have friends all over the spectrum of parenting styles, and everybody thinks I'm doing it wrong.

The more mainstream types are convinced he's never going to sleep on his own because I nurse him to sleep, and any disruptions to his naps or night sleep are laid at the door of "You must not be maintaining his schedule consistently" or "Could you be feeding him too much?"

The more AP-leaning sorts say things like "It's normal for a six month old to still be waking up multiple times a night, you know," and "You know it's really hard to make a baby stick to a schedule."

Now, I'm pretty crunchy.  We cloth diaper, babywear, cosleep, baby-led weaning, homemade toys, sensory play, yadda yadda yadda.  I'm breaking ground for that garden so I can grow our veggies instead of buying produce that got sprayed with God knows what.  I'm learning to make sourdough bread from scratch, including my making own starter.

Some things, we do more mainstream.  Vaccinations and baby-entertainment gear, mainly, because there have been pertussis outbreaks here recently, and it's really tough to cut sod with a baby on my hip.

But scheduling?  Nope.  He really is that predictable, as long as he's comfy.  Everything's right with his world, JJ takes two naps during the day, of 90 minutes to 2 hours each, and conks out for the night between 6:30 and 7.  He rouses once after bedtime to top off his tummy, then sleeps until 6:30 or 7 in the morning, with one wake-up during the night to nurse, anywhere between 1 and 3am.  Takes 15-20 minutes, and he never really wakes up.

Now, if he's having a growth spurt, his gums are super sore, or his reflux is acting up, all that goes haywire in extremely short order.  But that's the point.  If he's a happy baby, he sleeps like an angel.  If he's waking me up more than twice a night, something is wrong, and because I'm sleep-deprived at that point, I usually require a little help figuring out what that something might be.

I know that most babies aren't nearly that predictable.  I get that.  I am aware that I was blessed with an incredibly easy baby for my first time out, quite likely I'm using up all my free passes on this one, and his next sibling will probably be one of those all over the map babies that's perfectly happy with random naps and being wide awake at 3am.

I can hear my mother already.  It's your turn, dear.  I hope you have a child JUST like you.

Thanks, Mom.  'Preciate it.

But honestly, folks... it seems like a thoroughly unpredictable child is considered some kind of AP badge of honor, like if your kid is sleeping through the night "too early" you must be forcing the issue, and baby being off their routine is really nothing to worry about because it's normal.

By the same token, the far end of the scheduling school of thought has a predictable baby that sleeps through the night, takes regular naps, and has planned out meal- and play-times followed like clockwork as its Holy Grail, leaving very little room for a child's individual needs or personality.  If your kid isn't meeting that standard, well, you must not be doing your job!

Lucky me, JJ does six of one and a half dozen of the other, so they all think I'm nuts!

Don't mind me, I'm just going insane over here.

Okay, enough ranting, time for baby cuteness.

A couple of days ago JJ was seriously bored and I was a little tired of entertaining him, so I improvised.

Pimento jar (baby food sized), Parsley jar, Meat Tenderizer jar.

All with a dozen or so red kidney beans inside and the lids glued on.

Little dude was FASCINATED.

They all move differently and make different sounds.  The pimento jar is glass, so it's louder and kinda musical.  Plus the pop-top lid makes it drum-y, which he loves.  The parsley jar, he mostly rolls, and the meat tenderizer jar... heh.  It's his favorite because it's just small enough around for him to get a grip on, and you should have seen his face when he worked out how to make it make noise.

*shake*  Those little eyebrows start to lift.

*shake shake*  His eyes pop and his mouth does that surprised "Oh!" thing for a second, and then he flashes me this huge wide-eyed open-mouthed grin and proceeds to make with the maracas.

*shakeshakeshakerattleshake*

It also apparently makes a really awesome chew toy.

I love my life!

Six months and counting...

It's too hot to work on the garden today (seriously, it was 75º and 55% humidity at 7am... no WAY am I going out there now), so I'm blogging this morning instead.

Don't y'all feel special.  *wink*


JJ turned six months old on Friday, and all y'all know what that means.

Time for another foot pic!

       Itsy bitsy bebeh...                        Six months old....

Wow.  And his feet are getting wider too.

So, in the last month, he's gotten really super good at sitting on his own, he's even started to stand using parental fingers as balancing aids.  No, I mean it.  He will stand up if you give him your fingers to hang onto.  He's figured out that he can grip my hand and use it to pat his beany-baby type toys, instead of just patting them himself.  It's extremely cute.

One picture I wasn't able to get (due to cameras & water generally not mixing well) occurred a few days ago.  It was brutally humid & far too hot in the house, and JJ took a twenty minute nap at what should have been bedtime, popped his eyes open, and REFUSED to go back to sleep.  I finally shrugged & said "Okay, let's go take a cool shower."  Did the job, but oh, y'all should have seen the look on his face when the water from the shower head was cold.

Utter.  Betrayal.

I, of course, laughed as I realized "Oh, that's right!  You've never bathed in water that wasn't warm!"

He favored me with a repeat of this fan favorite look.

Except this time it was more like 

"No kidding, Mom.  Real brilliant deduction there."

I'm going to be ordering a few mesh baby feeders for him in the next week or so... bunkin reached for my cheese this morning.  First time he's reached for food, up until now he's been after anything we drink, but that was the first time he's shown interest in food... so it's time to get the tools!  I'm thinking avacado, peas, green stuff mostly.  Gonna try to hold off on the sweeter stuff, carrots & the like, until later, don't want him getting a sweet tooth before he even has teeth!

It's also time to either change the toys on the swing mobile to something with stretchy legs, or swap out the swing entirely for the bouncer that's sitting in the garage.  Last week JJ figured out that he can grab the toys hanging from the mobile, and actually managed to pull one off the mobile entirely.  He keeps that up, he's going to break the rotator arms, so it's time to change to something he can't hurt.

He's starting to fight me on naps again.  *sigh*  Just when I got the two nap thing figured out.  Need to lengthen his first wake time, I think, stretch it out a little.  Of course, longer wake times mean I will likely have to resign myself to slightly shorter naps.  Darn it, I was enjoying two hour blocks to get things done twice a day!  LOL

Flip side is that he's much more tolerant of the bright sunlight than he was even a month ago, which means I can take him outside more as long as we stick to the shade.

But not today.  It's 85º,  heading for mid-90s, the humidity is rising, and the UV index is high enough I'd practically have to bathe us both in sunscreen.  

Pass.

*blinks* Is that sunlight?!?!

No, it hasn't been unseasonably gray and rainy here in the big city.

I've just been stuck in the bedroom for the better part of the last month.

Baby boy's reflux got super bad, we finally got him on meds, but it the last several weeks have been a slow progression of being held for naps, then sitting on the bed while he napped in the crib so I was instantly available when the 40 Minute Monster struck, and today...

Well.  Let me back up about 18 hours.

Last night little man got into bed about an hour later than he has been going down lately, due to poor timing with phone calls and such.  Nobody's fault, it just happened.

A very frazzled mommy snuck out of the bedroom, said "Hell with it, if he wakes up, he wakes up.  I'm gonna eat dinner at the table with my husband like a grown person."

JJ proceeded to shock the living daylights out of me and sleep like a rock until hubby and I went to bed around 10.

I think if the furnace hadn't decided to randomly turn the bedroom into a turkish bath at 2am, he might just have slept through the night.

SO ... this morning I had the same rested relatively happy baby that has been smiling at me for the past several days, and I decided to make the experiment.

I am tired of sitting in the bedroom (which has dark curtains) being a mole.  Kid's gonna learn to nap, darn it!!!!

So I snuck out after I put him down for nap #1.  To my surprise, he managed a fair hour & ten minutes.  Not the hour & thirty we've been working on, but he made it through the transition on his own!

Progress.

Nap #2... Again, I quietly shut my laptop and ease out of the bedroom, still humming "Baby Mine" as softly as I am physically able.

AND HE DID IT, FOLKS!  One hour and thirty three minutes, roughly, considering that he was awake but still quiet and happy when I stuck my head in to check, which means he had not been awake for more than two or three minutes, tops.





We are now attempting Nap #3.




...





...





Fifty minutes and counting, and not a peep from the bedroom.

Well, whattaya know.  I might have a prayer of getting him on some kind of routine after all.

Oh, boy... here we go again...

Yesterday he ate like he was starving, went through fourteen (yes, I said 14) diapers, and took little 40 minute naps all day.

Today he is still eating like there's no tomorrow, but he is on his second nap.  His first was just over two hours, this one is making swift tracks for three (at which point I'm going to get him up so he doesn't wake up too hungry), and he's sleeping very soundly.  I folded a whole basket of laundry standing right next to the crib and he didn't so much as twitch.

That, my friends, signals... you guessed it...

Growth Spurt.