Babies of Oct-Dec /04

[lil'monkey]

Lindsey - what books did you read?  Like kathy, i can't do pu/pd (dd gets really mad and vomits when I did it once) and lately b/c of the nightwakings i have been feeding/holding her back to sleep.  I sometimes wish that I can just bring dd into bed with me but she thinks that our bed is her play zone.   We dropped that df cold turkey and she slept very well 11-12hrs except the usual milestones, illnesses, etc.  Even now, when her intake during the day is low (ie by at least 8 oz) she won't take the df when it is offered.  She just turned her head away. 

Well we too are all over the map still... dd's latest is standing in her crib CONSTANTLY!  She's up all hours and won't nap easily...

Don't you just hate it!   :twisted:   Once dd is on her feet, I know that she will not settle by herself.  This is where I usually have to hold her till she is semi asleep.  Makes you think that all that hard work you did before just went down the drain b/c of all these milestones.  I was talking to a mom here, and she said that it is nothing - wait till they can climb out of the crib/bed!!!!  Oh boy!!! :roll:  :roll:

Well, here's the latest news for us.  DD can climb up the stairs and will take about 5 steps while holding my hands.  Her latest trick is to get on her tippy toes and try to reach for something on the counter.  Of course, she did fell several times but did that deter her from it?  Nooooo.... I have one stubborn little monkey!!! :lol:

I have decided to head back to work but asked my manager for a less stressful position and she said yes.  This would mean the pay is less and the commute to my new branch (I work for the bank) will be farther than before but I think taht it will be worth it.  Also, i just found out that they have job sharing.  It's good to know this just in case I want to work part time.  Anyway, fil and mil are visiting and I need to clean the house!  I hate being judged by my ils!

Hve a great weekend!!!

[pdb]

MomtoRee - Glad to hear your lo grew out of the 5:30 wake time.  THere's hope for us!    I am going to work on getting my lo back to sleep, but I don't have a lot of time to work with on week days.

Glad to see other I'm not the only one who doesn't stick strictly to BW techniques.  My lo has always done things that don't quite fit the scenarios in the book.  PU/PD was never very effective for us, probably because I was never very comfortable with it.

Kathy- Glad Jadyn finally got her teeth.  It sounded like she was in a lot of pain with those.  Susana's still haven't come out, although they are right at the surface.

Jenn - I feel your pain on the bad nap days.  Susana hasn't napped well at all since she started at the sitters so our evenings are usually pretty miserable. 

Susana likes the Crawl and Flutter bee.  (I think that's what it's called)  I made her a treasure basket and she's really into that now.  She also loves her little activity table.  I don't know what brand it is, a friend gave it to me. 

Well, I'm off to bed early since I haven't had much sleep this week and I'm expecting I'll probably get a 5 am wakeup call.  :wink:

[pdb]

Me again.  Last night was awful, but I think we're making progress.  I put my dd down right after bottle last night.  At first she laid right down and I thought she'd go right to sleep, but then she popped up and started fussing.  I sat with her, tried not to pick her up too much, but after about 15 min. she was still crying.  I decided to give her Motrin just in case her teeth were hurting, the top two are right at the surface.  She cried hard with me in the room for about 15 more minutes and then went to sleep.  She slept well until 3 am when she woke up crying.  I did the same routine as before bed, but she stayed up until 4:30.  :? After that, she slept until 6:30, which is a big improvement for us lately.

This morning I tried really hard to get her to sleep before she got too sleepy.  I put her down at 8:15 and left the room.  She fussed a little but went to sleep on her own by 8:30.  She only slept 45 min., but she had a poopy which I think woke her.  I tried getting her back to sleep for another 45 minutes and then got her up.  Let's hope tonight is easier!  Now I just have to train the sitter so she doesn't undo all my hard work. 

 What's the longest you guys have given a pain reliever?  I think someone asked that not too long ago, but I can't remember the response.


Mimi- Your work situtation sounds great.  I sure wish I could do something less stressful.   I'm a teacher and I've been in districts where you can job share, but my current district doesn't do that.  The hours of my job are great, but the problem is it's impossible to do everything in the hours you are required to be there because you're with the kids all day.  That means I end up bringing a lot home or not getting it done, both of which are very stressful.

[Gigismom]

the books i have read so far are "healthy sleep habits, happy child" by marc weissbluth and "sleeping through the night" by jodi mindell.  both were very dry reads, often repetitive, but i did learn many interesting and helpful facts about sleep.  yesterday i got another book i ordered online called "good night sleep tight" by kim west.  this one seems to be a little more interesting to read and also is very informative.  all 3 books suggest different ways of dealing with sleep issues, so you can choose one to try that is different from pu/pd.  actually one of the books cautions against pu/pd because that is still seen through the child's eyes as a reward for waking up. 
the biggest mistakes we are making are at bedtime.  lately, for the past couple of months, she has been falling asleep bf'ing with her lullaby cd playing in the background before bedtime.  i thought this was ok since she knew how to put herself to sleep for naps.  (plus i liked her falling asleep in my arms as that is the ONLY time i can cuddle her!!)  but this is a BIG no-no.  the books repeatedly bring out that how a child falls asleep at the beginning of a sleep period greatly affects their chances for waking up later and not being able to put themselves back to sleep.  also, the way we were responding to her in the night is wrong.  we were staying to comfort her way too long.  the books also bring out that you want to keep the comforting very brief, less than a minute, even if the child is still crying.  you do not want to reward the child in ANY way for waking.  it is ok to check on them but that's it.  "good night sleep tight" seems to have another effective way to deal with this called "the shuffle".  (in a nutshell, this involves parent sitting in a chair in child's room while child cries, progressively moving the chair out of the room over several nights).  we haven't had to use it yet, but it is an option to consider.   
so last night, we cut out the lullaby cd.  in a week or two, we are going to stop the bf'ing before bed.  or at least try to keep her awake through it.  i don't want to drop it right away because she just dropped the df so i want to make sure that goes well first.   she is still waking at night a few times, but the past couple of nights, she has gone back to sleep in a min or two without our intervention.  this am she woke at 5 though ( i think from hunger since we dropped the df).  but after i fed her, i put her down and she went back to sleep til 8 am!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  a first!!
sorry this is so long.  but i highly recommend these other books.  in addition to dealing with the wakings, they offer reasons for the root of the problem.  also, i bought all these books used through amazon.com for less than $5 (plus shipping)...just a thought for those of you trying to save money!!

[pdb]

I have the Good Night Sleep Tight book by Kim West.  I am currently trying the shuffle.  I found today that during naptime it was better for me to just leave the room.  If I stayed by her crib she would just try to play.  I did it last night though at bedtime and in 35 minutes she was asleep.  (Down from an hour the past few nights.)  She woke at 3:00 am adn it took me a good hour to get her back to sleep, but I think she was having some teething pain and I waited awhile to give her Motrin.  Tonight I didn't even have to stay in her room.  I put her right down, she didn't fuss and I left.  So far she's still asleep, so we'll see how it goes tonight.  I found the suggestions in this book to be very similar to BW, but it gives you a few other things to try.  It also addresses slepp issues all the way up to age five.

Lindsey - let me know how it goes for you if you try it.

[lil'monkey]

Thanks Lindsey.  I've read the other two but haven't read the one by West.  I think that I should read them again.  I have a friend who swore by the book Babywise.  She said that her lo have been a great sleeper since 2 mos and she is almost a year now.  Anyone read it?  I've heard that it is very rigid.  Anyway, mil suggested that I start toilet training dd as dh was trained by 1 yr. :roll:

[Gigismom]

Mimi-i read babywise before gianna was born and was totally ready to implement it.  i read it because 2 of the families i had nannied for in the past used it with all their children and all the children were excellent sleepers.  it is very rigid in that it suggests that from birth onward, you should put the child down awake and let the child cry itself to sleep, no matter how long it takes. 
however, i underestimated how hard it would be to hear the baby cry.  gianna was definitely not "by the book".  she would cry and cry in her little bassinet.  today i am so filled with guilt when i think back to how i let her cry so much at such a young age.  so after about a week of this, i couldn't take it.  that's when we began rocking her to sleep.  then i read tracys new book and we started with that around 2 months.
babywise is basically built on the same e-a-s routine, but is much more rigid.  so if you are already doing e-a-s, there is really no need to buy it in my opinion.  there are lots of other books that are more helpful than babywise.

[Noelle]

Hey girls - it's hard to keep up with all these posts  :lol:

Sounds like a lot of you are having some troubles with nightwakings     I wish I could help you....when they are waking up are they playing or crying right away?  I just ask because with my 2 kiddos, they would wake in the middle of the night and sometimes play for up til an hour  :shock:   Once and a while they would start to whine/cry...I force myself to watch the clock because 10 seconds feels like 10 minutes  :lol:   and they have always went back to sleep within 2 minutes..don't know if that helps at all but thought I would throw that out there.

Just wondering too.....what sippy cups are each of you using?  Did you start with that one or did you need to try a couple? Thanks!

Hey Phoebe...not quite sure what you mean by what the longest is I've given them....but if zoe is extremely fussy before bed when teething, I do give her motrin....and I would every night, when I know that it's teething 

[Jadynsmom]

Phoebe - You just described our little Jadyn last night.  She woke at 12:30am crying & would not go back to sleep.  I ended up bringing her into our bed :oops:  I swore that we would break that habit but it doesn't really bother me or my husband, so, I guess she's going to keep on coming in til her teething is done.

Sharon - I bet her saying 'Dadddy' is sooo cute.  I wished Jadyn would say something even close.  All she does is cooo like a dove.  We crack up listening to her coo. :lol:  I know what you mean by Ella pulling up on her crib.  Jadyn loves to do this when she is put down for sleep.  She also loves to stand up holding our headboard.  She is crawling everywhere.  I can't put her down without her getting into things off the floor.  She's pretty quick, too.  When I tell her to stop, if she's going to or trying to, she just looks back, grins and just keeps on going, FASTER.  :lol: She thinks it's funny.  I pretty much have to put her in her seat or hold her.

Today was crazy since her sleep was soo off last night.  She woke at 7:15am, after waking 12:30am and not going back down til 1:30am.  Then woke 5am and pat back to sleep within 5mins.  So her nap was after 3hrs after her wake at 10:15am, and of course she woke after 45mins, crying.  So I extended it in her sling and she slept til 1pm when I finally had to wake her. :shock:   So then I took her over to my sis's house while we went to see a movie and told her to get her to take a catnap around 4pm.  We get back at 6:45pm, and she did not take a catnap.  That means 5hrs wake time :shock:  :shock: She didn't cry or fuss the whole time.  She fell asleep on the way home at 7:15pm, so I gently put her in her crib when we got home.  She woke 8:10pm and I nursed her and she went back to sleep.  She's still asleep. I sure hope tonight she will sleep through.

Kathy

I wanted to show a pic of her pulling up on our bed.  I was trying to put her pjs on and she won't sit still.  She just heads straight to the headboard. :lol:

[Jadynsmom]

Ok I can't seem to load the pic.  Trying again

[Mum to Ella Rose]

Oh my word Kathy!!!! What a BEAUTIFUL little peach!    Gorgeous!   

Sharon

[chell]

Hi My lo is Jacob George, and was born on 7th november. He is a little touhcy-textbook. The first few months were a real nightmare - colicy, windy, not wanting to sleep etc!! But now most stuff is sorted -thanks to the BW website (and my BW freind Rachel). My main difficulties now are dealing with Jacobs food allergies and eczema! Never mind I'll get there in the end!

Cheryl

[jillybeansmith]

Hi...you had mentioned that it's best to leave the room to get the baby to sleep.

I have to put Connor down in his crib & leave.  If he is ready, he will nod off, if he's not ready he may play, or if he really fusses, we have to bring him out and wear him out a little...But ultimately, I cannot even be in sight for him to fall asleep...sometimes I make the mistake of peeking in, and he will see me (or hear me)...then wants to play with me..

During the day naps, because of the construction that's going on, I have to sometimes nap with him, but I literally have to 'nap'...I have to close my eyes and stay still---or he will want to play...

Our issue is still the night wakings, but it really isn't a good time to iron them out because of his mixed up day schedule from the construction, AND he is working on tooth # 6...he's been working on it for a while now, but it's finally starting to cut through.  I'm hoping once these two things are out of the road, we can start working on him..but the one thing I read, is that in order to get them to sleep well at night, you have to have their daytime schedule worked out, and it's just so out of whack now.

We took Connor to a restaurant Friday night...he was SO GOOD...he didn't make a peep...He was just so interested in all the activity and people, he would laugh out loud everytime somebody smiled or talked to him, so he was getting a lot of attention.

Last night, we took him to a birthday party, and again, he was as good as gold...Complete strangers (to him) were able to take him while I disappeared to get something to eat or go to the washroom, and he didn't even care that I had gone...and there were older boys (4 & 2) that were quite interested in playing with him (and they were a little rough), but he just laughed at them...so he's becoming quite social...I was a little worried because for a while there he seemed scared of everybody.

Connor has been quite pleasant even with cutting this tooth, he's had a few crying spells at night...Doesn't it seem to bother them more at night?

[jillybeansmith]

By the way...Hi there Cheryl...you will find this group quite interesting as all of the babies are at similar stages, and quite often we are all dealing with similar issues at the same time.

Food Allergies....what is your baby allergic to, and how did you find out...how are you dealing with it?

It is highly likely that Connor has a peanut allergy.  I discovered this after me having a piece of toast & peanut butter, then 15-20 minutes later started playing with him, and I was kissing his belly and chest. He immediately broke out in lip shaped hives everyplace my lips had touched.  The dr has just told me to avoid all products that could contain nuts until he can be tested (she said at 18 months).  This has me nervous, as I don't know what the extent of it is, and the daycare that he will be going to is not a peanut-free place...I've read articles saying that indirect external contact reactions can indicate a serious problem, and that further exposure could lead to more serious reactions.  We've banned peanut butter and peanuts from our house...but it's in everything!!!

[zayandme]

I've heard that the more they stay away from peanuts at a very young age, the higher the chances of them just growing out of it. If they are exposed to peanuts often while very young, it will only aggravate a peanut allergy. My nephew seemed allergic at 12 mos, my sister kept him away from peanuts for a year and he's been fine since (3 years later). May not happen for you, but it very well could!