kat, unedited

So, it’s been a week since I wrote my last post about sleep. Short story—she’s doing great and is sleeping 4-5 hour stretches mostly! :)

Long story: I think she was just hungry so she was waking up more often. I can barely keep up with pumping at work and how much she’s eating at daycare. I started her on rice cereal a few weeks ago, just a couple bites here and there, and the last few nights I’ve been giving her a little bit more (as long as she’s up for it). The other night, she slept for 8 hours straight. Now, that doesn’t mean that I took advantage of that stretch of time because I was up, oh, maybe twice (?) to make sure she was still alive. But she’s been drinking so much more milk at daycare and is going to bed fuller and been staying asleep longer. Thing is, I miss her. Pretty badly. So when she does wake up, I almost always nurse her again so I can hold her and cuddle her. From the time she goes to bed (about 7/7:30pm) until I wake her up at 6am, she wakes up twice, which is what I wanted.

One thing that has really improved though is her going to sleep on her own. When I nurse her and notice that she’s drifting off, I pull her off the boob (which wakes her up) and then put her down. Sometimes she protests for maybe 5 mins tops, then settles down and falls asleep. And something I noticed is if she falls asleep in my arms (then I put her in her crib asleep) then wakes up an hour or 2 later, she will cry and cry and wait for me to pick her up. But, if she falls asleep in her crib and she wakes up, she cries out for a couple of minutes then falls back asleep. So there really is something to be said about this whole “letting them fall asleep on their own’ thing.

So there you have it. One week seems like a long time when you think about it, but I really think consistency pays off. From the time I turn her lights off and I put her down, it’s a good 15-20 mins. She pretty much expects to go to sleep once we start getting ready for bed. Oh, and as far as a routine, it’s pretty much offer rice cereal/mashed banana/mashed avocado as long as she wants it, sponge bath, a little bit of play, lights out, nursing, crib—nothing elaborate. We don’t do full baths every night as she has eczema and her skin gets sooooo dry when I bathe her. We start our bedtime routine about 30-45 minutes before I want her asleep.

Seven years ago today (exactly 2,556 days), the stars aligned and the universe conspired to bring me and Joe together to the same bar on a cold (and very random) Wednesday evening at 8pm (ish). Whoever said that you don’t meet worthwhile people in bars (or the person you will spend the rest of your life with, in my case) was very, very wrong. Cheers to 7 years, and here’s to 70 more!

Here we at Derby Day in the San Francisco area in I believe 2006?

I loved these nursing pads for the first couple of months of nursing. I highly recommend them—super absorbent, soft, and you can’t see the outlines through your bra! Here’s the link :) Oh, and fun name too!

Well, night 2 didn’t go as well as night 1, and although I’m feeling a little defeated (why must I be so hard on myself?), I really need to adjust my perspective as, well, it was ONLY night 2! She cried longer when I put her down, maybe about 40 mins. It wasn’t a continuous cry though, more like she cried for 3 mins, settled down and would fall asleep, then wake up a minute later then did the same thing. So I picked her up I think at the 20-min point just to see if she was really hungry, but she didn’t really eat, just sucked a little bit. So I put her back down. After that, she was asleep for a glorious 4 hours. I nursed again, but then she was up every 2 hours after that. Hmmm…so I guess we’ll keep doing this! She’s still asleep now (it’s almost 9am), so I guess that’s good. I’m thinking maybe she was hungrier than I thought and I didn’t time the nursing right? Really though, it could be anything, and I just have to be consistent.

I’m off work today and we have guests this weekend (Joe’s stepbrother, wife, and 3 kids!). I have a bunch to get done to get ready for their visit. AND, more exciting than that, I made plans with a girlfriend last night for our families to get together for NYE! They’re coming here with their 18mo-old son and we’ll go to an early dinner and hang out at our house the rest of the evening. With some yummy wine :)

I hope you ladies have a wonderful weekend!

Oh, and for Flashback Friday:

WEEK 2

WEEK 22

First off, let me just say that I was expecting the worst. I was thinking I would have to listen to Logan cry, scream, get worked up, then refuse to sleep after that. And that I would be sooooo tired today, but it’s ok because work is not that busy for me yet. But but but! This little girl surprised me. It went so well that I’m hoping we can continue to have evenings like last night. Actually, so well that I’m scared she’ll drop her nighttime feedings completely and it makes me sad because I won’t get to cuddle with her.

So, here’s how it went down:

6:15: bath, get ready for bed (she doesn’t get a bath every night, maybe more like every 3 days)

6:30: nurse

6:45: notice that her sucking had gotten slower, so I took her off the boob and put her down in her crib. She did root when I did that and I put her back on and she sucked for a little bit and stopped so I knew she was done nursing for food. She cried when I put her down. Made note of the time and said I’ll give her 10-15mins. I gave her the paci, she didn’t want it, but I kept offering. She took it and fell asleep after 10mins on the dot. I also want to say that I have an ipod on an ipod dock with loud speakers on in her room (I’ve always had it) so she doesn’t wake with sudden noises. I downloaded an ocean waves track and have it on repeat. I also have a very dim nightlight in her room. It used to be brighter but I think that allowed her to be distracted at night because she can see so many things and gets so curious.

8:00: she cries out. I go in her room and put the paci back in her mouth and put the lovey next to her face (on the side), making sure it’s not blocking her breathing. She cries for about 10mins and was down again.

10:00: I’m in bed and considered waking her up to nurse, but thought maybe I shouldn’t? I really want to hold her though and kiss her goodnight. And then I hear her cry. I pick her up, nurse her, and when the sucking slowed, put her down still half-awake. She protested a little (didn’t cry), gave her her paci and lovey, and was asleep withing a minute.

1:00: Hmmmm, haven’t heard Logan at all. I went to check on her and she is OUT. So go back to bed.

2:00: I hear her cry. Change her diaper (I always change her once at night since we do cloth and it needs to be changed) then nursed her. Put her back in her crib when I felt she was done eating. She was awake. Gave her the paci and lovey and I sat back in the rocking chair out of her sight. She played for about 5mins, flailing her arms around and making noises. NO CRYING. Then she was out.

5:45: She was awake. I picked her up and nursed her and got her ready for the day. I usually get her up at 6am to get her ready for the day (we leave the house at 6:30am) so this wasn’t bad. Joe was out of town for work last night but if he were home, he would’ve been the one the get her out of bed as I was not done getting ready for work when she woke up.

So, I think we did AWESOME. I know I don’t want to completely night wean her as I want that time to bond and reconnect with her since we’re away from each other all day long and I miss her terribly. I think I’ll nurse her once before I go to sleep then another time in the middle of the night. I’m more than happy with that arrangement and I will at least have one 4hr stretch of sleep in there which is good enough for me.

I am learning to give Logan more credit. I think I tend to expect the worst—kind of like the whole refusing the bottle thing. I have given up on the idea of her taking the bottle and had started buying some sippy cups to try. But lo and behold, on her 3rd day in daycare, she took the bottle! I was also thinking that it would take many many nights to even have Logan accept that she won’t be nursing to sleep anymore. But she surprises me every time. She just goes with the flow and is fine with whatever the program is. I need to learn to be a little more open and not expect the worst when introducing changes.

So we’ll do the same thing tonight and through the weekend and hopefully, we keep seeing great results! And thanks to you ladies who sent me messages of support! :)

So I’ve been reading a few posts on sleep recently, and it has motivated me to work on some things with Logan. I’ve been back at work part-time for 3 weeks now and I still have the rest of the month until I go back to a full-time schedule. And recently, Logan has been waking every 2hrs in the evenings. I had no problem with it while on leave (and we mostly coslept). And really it’s not so bad now, but I am getting tired. Last night, after she went down at around 7:30pm, she woke a total of about 6 times. Don’t get me wrong—I actually don’t mind spending some time with her in the evening since I barely see her during the day when I work. BUT, 6 times is a lot. So I’m hoping to cut that down.

Basically, I’m working on her nurse-to-sleep association so she’ll be able to go back to sleep without the boob when she wakes in the evenings. I will still nurse her, but I’m hoping to do that no more than twice at night. I am letting her fuss a little, and I think 10-15mins tops is what I’m comfortable with before picking her up (I based this on daycare reports. When they put her down for a nap, she fusses for 5-10mins and then falls asleep so I’m working off of that). Tonight, she went down after 10mins of fussing and when she woke up an hour later it took another 10mins then. I’m also using a lovey as they are doing it in daycare and they say she really responds to it, and she does! And, lastly, a pacifier.

I’m crossing my fingers! We have 4 weeks! I’ll give an update in the morning :)

Logan is 22 weeks—5 months old—today. I can’t even begin to describe how happy I am with how things are going. Going back to work has not been as awful as I had feared, and I’m thankful for a great job with an awesome boss. And our daycare—I know it’s only been 5 days, but I just really love them so far. It really is a testament to the old adage “don’t judge a book by its cover”. It was our middle daycare choice, and I’m just so happy we went with this one.

Logan is thriving and growing so much. It’s almost like she is doing something new each day. Right now, I’m sure to get a laugh out of her, may it be by being silly or tickling her with kisses. She loves to suck on her toes during diaper changes, and is grabbing everything I’m holding! Just yesterday, I sat on the floor with her and had one of our dogs sitting with us, and she started petting him. Logan is LOVING her Daddy right now. Every time she sees him, she lights up and is smiling non-stop! It is the cutest thing in the world, and something I’ve always kind of pictured in my head. Joe of course loves it and he is in a whole lot of trouble when Logan starts to talk! I just know they’re going to be inseparable. 

In the past 5 months, I’ve learned that my baby (and each baby) truly is an individual. I only ever tried to do a schedule once, and now I just go with her cues. Logan is doing so well with her own little schedule that there is no need to change it. She doesn’t really ever fuss, and she is starting to entertain herself a little more.

I do miss her when I’m at work, but knowing that she is being taken care of, played with, HELD—that makes it so much easier to be away. The teachers communicate everything with me and this is so important. I feel like I know exactly what happened while she was away from me, so it doesn’t feel like I’m missing out.

I am just so happy. I do have moments where I wish she didn’t wake up to nurse twice a night (like this past week when I couldn’t breathe out of my nose and my throat felt so raw), but honestly, those moments are fleeting. I think going back to work has also helped rejuvenate me as an individual. I love my job, and I feel that when I’m home with Logan, the time we spend together is just all the more special.

Here she is with her puppies—she loves watching them. She smiles when she sees them and even talks to them! :)

So, I’ve been doing this Swagbucks thing for about a month now and I love it! Have you heard of it? I found out about it through a cloth diaper forum that I belong to and after seeing all these people getting FREE Amazon giftcards, I decided to try it. Well, in the month that I’ve done it, I’ve earned enough Swagbucks to redeem $50 worth of Amazon giftcards AND a $10 Starbucks giftcard! Soooo worth it! If you’d like to join, you can click this link and I get a referral :) CLICK ME! —> http://www.swagbucks.com/refer/Mamakat1234 

Now I just need to figure out what to buy! My Amazon shopping cart is begging to be filled :)