Here Come The Holidays!

I am so glad fall is here! That means Halloween! My favorite holiday! I couldn't really tell you why its my favorite holiday. Maybe because it is usually the first time some of those wonderful fall foods find their way to the table: pumpkin, cider, squash. Figuring out costumes, dressing up in someone else for a day. I love getting out those boxes of decorations that I have been collecting over the years. This year's addition? A pair of skeleton flamingos for the lawn! I love laying out the newspaper and covering it with pumpkin guts and separating out some pumpkin seeds to roast in the oven. Passing out candy to the neighborhood kids. Watching scary movies and listening to spooky music.
I used to love looking at pictures of me and my brother on every halloween. Those old school plastic masks. My favorite? WonderWoman of course! There was an infamous Marilyn Monroe costume one year as well. Oh and the years that my mom sewed our costumes. There was an ingenious Little Mermaid costume and a california raisin. I really should dig them out one of these days. My mom sent me this adorable picture the other day of my first halloween.

It just made me think of how badly I want to share and create new traditions with my daughter. I want to make caramel corn with her. I want to carve a pumpkin with her. I want to see her face the first time she tries Warm Cider and that smell of cinnamon and allspice. I want to make paper mache ghosts or some other silly craft project. I want to see her dig her little hand into a dish of candy corn.
Then its on to Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is so connected to memories of my mom. It has always been so special to her and us as a family that I can't wait to share those things with Callie too. I can't wait for her to open the door to Grandma Tere's house and be bowled over with the warm sensation and that blast of fall flavors and smells. I want her to wake up on Thanksgiving and say "Its Thanksgiving, let's go to Grandma's house!"
Then its on to Christmas and all the insanity. Christmas is all about the Bunts, my husband's family. I can't wait to see Callie's face when one of her relatives dresses up like Santa Claus and puts her on his lap to ask her what she wants for Christmas. I am positively giddy with the prospect of these wonderful new memories and sensations that we will get to experience with her.

Latest Challenge: Solids

We started on solids a while back. We did some cereal and then moved on to some squash. It all seemed to be going well, but the last few days she has decided she wants nothing to do with it. So we have a daily tug of war where I basically end up shoving food down her throat if at all. She wasn't going for the squash anymore so I thought I would try something sweet. I thought, "She will FOR SURE like some pears, they are so nice and sweet." Nope. Hates them. And I just get sooooooo frustrated. Obviously, I know in my head that she will eventually get it. She won't be going to college on a liquid diet. Well...er...maybe, but it certainly won't be milk! :) But in the meantime it is just really pissing me off because I am busting my ass to make her healthy, organic, home made baby food.

Sleep Training Part 2

We were so pleased with how our first night of sleep training went the other day! Bill and I talked about it at length. We loved having her so close to us in the beginning and I honestly didn't know how I was going to feel about having her in another room, but it is so nice! It is nice to have our couple space again, to have one room that isn't totally overrun with Callie. And I think it must be easier for her to sleep in her own space where she doesn't hear the noise of us rolling over or the dog moving or whining or snoring. I'm pretty sure Milo is quite content to not have a screaming baby in the room as well! And being able to get the sleep we need is huge! Everyone's quality of life has improved. I am much less stressed out and am able to enjoy Callie more.

Night 2
I put her down a bit earlier, around 11 rather than 11:30. She had taken 2 naps during the day, each around 45 minutes to an hour. We did our normal routine, bath, hang out a bit, feed, go to sleep. She was konked out again after I fed her so I put her down in her crib. I assumed she would do the same thing she had done the night before, wake up after an hour. But no! She sleep 5 and a half hours straight! When she woke up I fed her and put her down again.

Night 3
During the day yesterday she took some much longer naps because we were in the car. We had spent the day in Half Moon Bay (I will do a blog post on Callie's blog for that one, it was a lovely day!). I wasn't feeling too confident because when we got home she was all cranky. We tried giving her some more squash, since we hadn't given her any solid food during the day and I thought maybe that was part of why she was sleeping so well. I don't know if she was just tired and wanted the easy meal (the boob) rather than messing with the squash or what. But I eventually just gave her the boob. Before we figured it out we thought there was something wrong with her. She was just screaming like she was in pain! Aftewards we did our bath and put her in the doorway jumper. She was so content! She jumped for close to an hour, squealing whenever the dog so much as moved.
In the middle of all of her contentment, Bill comes in the room exasperated and says "The dog is gone." What?! Our beagle Milo had gone exploring and we didn't have his collar on, because the noise of it wakes Callie up. Earlier in the day he had done the same thing and was in the neighbor's yard and couldn't figure out how to get back. I started clicking the leash and then he would start whining. So I did the same thing and sure enough he was in the neighbor's yard. Luckily they have a gate that is easy to open to get him out:)
Once everyone was back inside, Callie was starting to jump slower and slower and slower. Pretty soon, her head started tiling to one side. It was so cute! Since it was right around 11, I fed her a bit and while she was still awake I put her down, since I wanted her to be able to get to sleep on her own, not just when she is passed out from eating. She did a fair bit of complaining, not really screaming just babbling. I had set the 15 minute timer and it went off, but she wasn't yelling so we left her where she was. Then she started. She yelled for maybe 6 minutes of so and then fell asleep. We actually stayed up to watch her on the monitor. It was pretty humorous. Crazy girl was trying to rip the crib bumpers off! Good thing I tied them nice and tight. She is gonna be trouble when she can stand up. Bill went off to bed and I stayed up for a bit to see if she stayed asleep (and also because I can't stop playing Angry Birds. God damn that game is like crack! Sheesh). I went off to bed around 12:30 expecting that she would wake up for a feeding, but she didn't! We woke up around 8:45 and she was still sleeping! It was amazing!! I went in to see if she was awake and this is what I saw:
And that is certainly the most beautiful sight I could have possibly imagined.

First Night of Sleep Training

Was a success! I read (very quickly) On Becoming Baby Wise.

Bill's cousin had told me about it a couple of months ago and after all of our sleep struggles lately I decided to finally order it. The authors are clearly not fans of attachment parenting and on demand feeding. And they make a good argument. If you have a baby that is feeding more frequently than 2-4 hours, it doesn't give your body enough time to produce enough milk in between feedings and the baby isn't getting both the pre milk and the hind milk (which contains the most fat, which they need to keep growing). Their whole setup is routine routine routine. Feeding, followed by wake time/playtime, followed by a nap. If they start crying when you put them down you can let them cry for 10-15 minutes, then go to them. I figured that was a time period I could handle. It wasn't 2 hours like some moms I had talked to. I knew I didn't have that in me. One of my only real complaints about the book is they make everything sound so simple. For example, when they talk about ascertaining which cry means what with your baby they make it sound so obvious and easy when it can be pretty tough. Like with Callie, we still don't know the difference maybe because her cry is so shrill and disturbing!
So after I had finished getting through the book I decided to give it a try. I fed her and then we played and then I put her down for a nap in her crib. I was a little worried that doing the sleep training and introducing the crib might be a bit much all at once, but she just won't fit in the co-sleeper anymore. This girl is going to pass up her mom and dad in height pretty soon if she doesn't slow down! I had also bought the baby einstein neptune soother.

It has a scrolling lighted ocean scene with music. It goes for about 15 minutes so it is perfect for our sleep training. I thought it would at least give her something to look at when she is hopping mad! So I put her down for a nap, turned on the soother and she started yelling. One thing the book talked about was parents' perception of time. So I set my stop watch on my phone for 15 minutes. I was shocked! If I hadn't been timing it, I probably would have gone in after 2 minutes. No wonder she wasn't sleeping at night! We weren't giving her time to settle herself down. Right around 12 minutes she calmed down and went to sleep. I couldn't believe it! She slept for about 30-40 minutes and then started yelling. I snuck in and turned on the soother again to see if she would go back down, but no luck. But my mom was coming over soon anyway to watch her for our usual thursday night date, so I got her up. Over dinner I laid it all out for Bill. Explained that if after 15 minutes she is still crying we can go pick her up and rock her or just pat her back and sing to her. So we got back home and gave her a bath (we are also working on her pre-sleep routine to send her the message that it is time for the long sleep) and fed her. She was mostly asleep so I laid her down in the crib. She woke up an hour later, and so we began! We snuck in and turned on the soother. We set the timer and waited. Good god 15 minutes is a long time. She was still crying so we went in and I rocked her for a couple of minutes and then put her down again. The 2nd 15 minutes was much worse. I was literally curling my toes. Bill and I held each other's hands for support and I think, to keep each other from bolting out of bed to go and get her. Thank god we were doing this in the crib. I don't know if I could've done it if it was happening in the same room. We got to the 15 minute mark again so we went back in. This time I cried with her. Bill put his arms around us both and Callie reached out her arms and held on. It was beautiful and heartwrenching all at the same time. Then down she went again. When I got back got back to the bedroom Bill had the book open looking for the part where it says what to do when she cries. I flipped through it and just as I was about to get to it and show him, we heard...Nothing. 5 minutes in she konked herself out. And she slept for FOUR AND A HALF HOURS! Praise the heavens! We had decided before we started that I would feed her during the night but not until after 2-3 am and here it was 5:30! We put her down again. She didn't struggle much this time because she was sleepy from eating and slept another couple of hours. It was amazing! And everyone is happier in the CG household today! Hopefully it will continue to go well.

No Sleep Til...Ever??

Ok Mamas and Papas out there. We need you. We need ideas, tips, wacky theories, anything. Our Miss Callie hasn't slept well at night in well over a month. Before that she would sleep 6 hours straight. Now we're lucky if we get 2-3. At first we thought it was teething, but the teeth are out now. Then she was sick, but she's not coughing or sneezing anymore. We started solids. I was typically giving them to her in the last afternoon around 4pm or so. That helped a little but not much. The past few days are making us run pretty ragged around here. She woke up around 11pm ready to play play play. I got up with her and put her in her exersaucer and she was content, giggling and the whole nine yards. Eventually she started getting sleepy so I laid her down in our bed. No dice. She started screaming. So I got up again and snuggled with her while I laid on the couch and she fell asleep almost instantly. I would have stayed there all night, but it was horribly uncomfortable, for me at least. So the battle began in earnest. We got so desperate last night that we made her some cereal at 3:30 in the morning and gave it to her. After she ate it she was still wired and wanting to play. I got her calmed down and she fell asleep on me and the minute I put her down in her cosleeper she starts screaming. So I started over. I got her really drowsy and put her in her crib with her womb sounds giraffe. She was just staring at it, so I thought I could get away with it. And I did for a couple of hours. I think I got 3 hours out of it until she woke up screaming.

Bill is so frustrated he just wants to put her in her crib and let her scream, but I'm not convinced. First of all, that typically doesn't work with her, she just gets more and more worked up rather than passing out. And second, it just seems cruel to everyone involved, including the neighbors, cuz damn...that girl has some serious lung power.

So mamas and papas, help us out here. Any ideas?? We will try just about anything at this point.

Callie's First Cold:(

Over the weekend, Callie got her first cold. Friday night we took her to the homecoming football game at Monta Vista. It was actually a really fun time. It practically became the baby section! But apparently we weren't bundled up tight enough, because Callie and I got hit with a nasty cold.
Saturday we went up to Santa Rosa for a wedding and it was that night that it hit. Callie had been sneezing off and on but we really didn't think much of it at first because she does that a lot. We had a nice time at the wedding and then left her with my mom in the hotel room for the reception. But apparently we were the only ones that read the invitation that said "adult only reception" because all of the other kids from the wedding were there. But honestly, we were happy to have a little break. We came back to the room after it was over and was surprised to see our little miss still awake. It was that night that the cold made itself known to us both. She didn't sleep much and my throat was on fire.
She finally slept for a 3 hour chunk from 7-10am and we were feeling a bit better. So we decided to order room service! This is something we hardly ever do. But it just sounded so perfect. I was feeling like crap and we didn't feel like figuring out where to eat with her. So we ordered in. It was fabulous. Bill's parents came by for a visit as well. We started our drive back home and I started taking a turn for the worse. What I was really craving was Saturn Cafe in Santa Cruz, some of their tomato soup and turkish coffee and peanut butter milkshakes. We were close to berkeley so we were going to head to Cafe Intermezzo, one of our favorite places (I mean, really, what's not to like about salads and sandwiches bigger than your face!) when Bill made a wrong turn and what did we find?! A Saturn Cafe in Berkeley! WHAT?! So that's where we went. We had a nice meal until our little miss decided to slam her cheek into the side of the table. Her cold was starting to get worse as well. So we packed it all up and went home.
Last night was pretty darn rough. Poor Callie couldn't breathe very well through her nose, which made it hard for her to nurse which is of course all she wants to do when she feels icky. Which meant it was time for the evil bulb syringe. Poor girl hates it but its the only way to help the little ones with their noses. Sure would be nice to hold up a kleenex to her nose and say "blow." We all napped for a while which helped the sick girls immensely. We got up to watch some tv together and the damndest thing happened. I had been holding her on my leg for an hour or so and she was doing fine. I passed her off to Bill so I could eat some food and she starts screaming at the top of her lungs! I was right next to her. Then all of a sudden she put her hand on me and let out this humongous sigh through her pacifier that almost propelled it out of her mouth. And she was fine. We talked about how she needed to be close to me even more so now that she was sick. Poor baby. One of the toughest things is to see her face and know how crappy she feels and how upset she is. She obviously doesn't understand what "being sick" is and that she will feel better soon if she just rests.
There were some very rough times last night. It was just so hard because I was so sick too. Getting her to sleep was really hard. We got out the humidifier and that eventually did the trick. But it was like it was when we first brought her home from the hospital, she would be dead asleep on me but the minute her head hit the bassinet or even our bed she was screaming.
She is doing better today, but we are definitely taking it easy. And I came out into the kitchen to find that Bill had picked up a bagel and some jamba juice for me for breakfast. I was so happy. Luckily, Bill is going to come home early tonight to give me some rest so we can all get healthy again. But it has definitely been interesting. I am so used to getting sick and just laying on the couch all day and then I would be fine the next day. It is definitely different when you are taking care of someone else first and yourself second.