flea | Entries tagged with dillo sleeps

Putting the Dillo to bed last night was an exercise in comedy. He was veeeerry tired, eyes blearily one-quarter open, crawling staggeringly to me and pressing his face into my neck, giving me big wet open-mouthed kisses. You could practically hear him slurring, "No, really, I love you, man!" like a teeny-weeny drunken beer-guzzler. The he'd flop over and doze off, but wake up 30 seconds later with a twitch to come back and love on me some more.

He's such a jolly round little dude - round-headed, round-bummed, round-thighed. A round nut of a head. He can wave now, and has begun to cruise in earnest. Entering the phase where there will be many bonks, and skinned noses.

At school they're transitioned to giving him real person food that they make (rather than baby food that we send) and he eats everything. He's less of a real-food eater at home, because we don't cater to a baby palate - very garlicky hummus last night was rejected, for example. I think they also spoon-feed him most things, and I just put stuff on the tray and see what he eats, which results in a lot of crumbling, smashing, and dropping. (He has learned the "uh-oh" drop it and see Mommy retrieve it game.) But he's well on the way to eating simple people food most of the time. Still 2 bottles at school. We bought a Nuby cup, which has a bite valve, to practice drinking from a cup, and have given him some water in it. It tends to spill a bit but he does get some out of it. Must ask them how they deal with the transition away from bottles at school (5 weeks of pumping left!)

I don't know why I feel I *can't* give him cow's milk before a year, though, since he's had about a zillion other things I never would have given Casper before a year - strawberries, ice cream (I tried to give him vanilla bits and not chocolate!), a pickle, a lemon wedge. Ah, the second baby.

Yesterday I couldn't believe I had to back to work on Monday. Today I'm glad; the kids are wearing me out. I watched a movie yesterday afternoon when I could have had a nap (Persuasion) and am paying for it today.

It remains disheartening when the Dillo nurses and then immediately spits up voluminously. It's an irrational disheartenment: he isn't unhappy, he gets plenty to eat, and I make plenty of milk, but it still makes me feel bad.

He is mad to sit up right now, although he can't really do it yet. When put down on his back, he arches and tries to sit up. Ditto in his bouncy chair; if he's not strapped in he now ends up slouching out of the seat. He must have abs of steel. He sits well, supported, but slouches or flops to the side pretty fast unsupported, even if propped with pillows. Of course, all these tummy crunches result in lots of spitting up.

His talking is so vehement and conversational that it makes me think of all the Funny Videos where people have trained their dogs (and occasionally cats) to approximate things like, "I love you" and "mama." The Dillo sounds exactly like that (when he's not shrieking.)

I'm working hard to put him down in his crib and keep him there all night, and mostly succeeding at the former and not at the latter. When he gets overtired and won't go to sleep the sure thing to do is lie him on his back on our bed, crouch over him, give him the paci and shower kisses on his cheeks above the paci. This makes him sleep. He's doing better with 2 long naps, am and pm. However, Casper is impossible - she will walk into our bedroom and wake him up, although she knows she's not supposed to go in when the door is closed. I really want to duct-tape her to the wall sometimes. And the house is small enough and non-sound proof, so any attempt to remonstrate with her ends up waking the baby anyway.

1. The Dillo took two real live hour and a half naps today. Maybe this nap thing is coalescing. (His pattern these two months has been 5 or so 30-45 minute naps a day).

2. The Dillo has slept in his crib every night since Wednesday, with no trouble. I'm putting him down starting at 7; we change, read Brown Bear Brown Bear, nurse, and either he falls asleep nuring or I put him down awake and sit there helping him fall asleep.

3. Casper took HERSELF to the potty consistently all day. Usually the only way we avoid accidents is reminding, nagging, and often enough bodily carrying her to the potty over her protests. Today she'd say, "I have to go potty!" and then simply GO. Please please keep it up!

4. mr. flea cut Casper's fingernails. For the first time ever. He had a bad experience cutting the cat's nails once and was always afraid to cut Casper's.

I got hysterical giggles tonight when Casper was singing "This is the way we wash our spoons," with about 4 infant feeding spoons in her mouth. mr. flea was like, "Um, no, it's not."

Well, the Dillo hit that yesterday. http://www.flickr.com/photos/casperflea/295401532/

He looks like Casper through the eyes and forehead. Also has similar hands and feet to hers (same nails) although his fingers are longer and more flexible I think (hyperextend). His head is more square whereas hers was long. He is clearly just his own self in the nose and chin and enormous cheeks department, though his mouth is rather like Casper's. Currently also has enormous thighs. Has a funny up-and-down bellybutton. He goes in for a weigh and measure and lots of shots on Wednesday, so we'll get the hugeness verdict then. (My bet? Huge.)

He can: roll front to back. Almost roll back to front - he gets 3/4 of the way over and hung up on his arm and grunts a lot. Hold his head up well - I can carry him on my hip without too much worry of him flopping about. Sit up supported, sometimes (has a tendency to nosedive and/or slowly slump). Hold things in his hand if given them, and aim them for his mouth. He doesn't pick toys up often, but will regularly pull on his clothes or a burp cloth and get that into his mouth. He will pull out his paci and look at it. He reliably gets his hands in his mouth (he has a little routine of rubbing them across his face) and really likes to suck either on a fist or a couple of fingers, either hand. Talks your ear off - coos, growling noises.

He has one mutant tooth. (Okay, so far as it's out it's a normal tooth. It's just a canine.)

He is a happy, happy, mellow, chilled-out baby and we are soooo lucky (again.)

He likes: kisses on his cheeks, smiles across the room, his sister, mama, dada, and nanny. Baths.

He dislikes: Um, not much. He gets frustrated with normal stuff - being on his tummy and unable to do what he wants. But he has no knee-jerk hates, the way some kids hate the bath or the carseat or diaper changes.

He is sleeping okay. Still has several shortish daytime naps, generally not more than an hour. To bed around 7:30. He'll sometimes wake about 45 minutes after he's put down and need to be put down again, especialy if he's put down early. Then he'll sleep well for 4+ hours, usually until 12:30 or 1. Nurse, back to sleep. Then he often wakes me every two hours, erratically, for the rest of the night. Not hungry or crying, just up and wiggly, wants the paci put in or my arm around him to settle down and sleep. I try not to nurse him unto 4. Often wide awake at 5:30 or 6. I am going to Amazon RIGHT NOW to by a new copy of The No-Cry Sleep Solution to get ideas for 1) getting him to sleep in his crib more (he is almost always in our bed now) and 2) encouraging self-soothing during thse night-time not-hungry wakings. He doesn't cry, but he kicks me, and I think he would work up to crying if I didn't wake and help him.

One of my closest friends is 20 weeks pregnant, and I am so excited about it! I realized why this morning - it's sort of like getting a neice or nephew - all the excitement of !!BABY!! without any of the actual work for me. And since the odds of either of my siblings reproducing soon/at all are slim...

On the plus side, I have a really nice baby. He's great and easy and healthy and stuff. We had him sleep in the playpen last night, and he slept according to his current routine (down at 7:30, asleep until 12, nurse, sleep until 3:30, nurse) and then was restless and not settling himself so we brought him into bed, and he did sleep well, until 7am. A good start, for 3.5 months old. Had icy paws in the night, though. And his characteristic nighttime noises (leg thumps, slurping on hand, farting) are no quieter when he is in the crib in our room as opposed to in our bed.

I was all excited to get paid today and buy me/us a treat (the treat being cute clothes for the kids), but my paycheck isn't actually enough to allow me to do that, with the rent due on Wednesday and all. Frell.

The Dillo is three months old today (13 weeks yesterday), and a bonny boy he is. When Casper was this age, her best friend was a small stuffed gingerbread man, meant as a wrist rattle, that we kept on the handlebar of her car seat. She rginned delightedly at him. Dillo does the same with his left fist, so now when I chat with him I say things like, "Oh, are you looking at your friend Fist? How is Fist today?" And then he gnaws.

After a couple of weeks of waking up at 11:45/midnight to nurse, he is now back to having the first waking of the night at 2ish. This is good (or would be if Casper weren't a devil in the night.) Maybe it was a growth spurt and not the start of reverse cycling.

He melted down last night at about 6, and we had classic evening nyuk nyuks until bedtime. I think this tends to happen when he doesn't get good naps in the afternoon. As to how to further encourage good naps, I'm not sure. He naps in his car seat or bouncy seat for new!nanny in the mronings, but in the afternoons wants to be in my arms and wakes up if I put him down, even if he seems pretty deeply asleep. My plan had been to start putting him to sleep on his own at 3 months, and let him fuss a little if that happened. So maybe I'll try to start doing that, in the pack n play, for afternoon naps. He goes down fine at night, assuming he hasn't had a meltdown evening. I can wrap him up and put him in our bed with the light off and just lie next to him and he falls asleep okay. Occasionally he's even done it unswaddled. Meltdown evenings, he needs to be rocked in arms to go to sleep.

He's a fine eater, and "enormous" was the pronouncement at Monday's La Leche League meeting. Not a lot of developmental progression at this point - head and neck strength is incremental. He doesn't grab stuff or put stuff in his mouth yet, except for Fist. An elaborate talker/cooer. Loves his big sister, and can be amused by her for long stretches, and is very resilient. (Rules we have had to make: no feet on the baby. No putting things on the baby's face. No pulling the baby to sit/stand up.)