All the Little Things

I haven't been as good about blogging, mostly just if something big happens or Maddie's monthly updates. But there are other things I want to remember and so I am going to try to blog more consistently, so I can remember all the little things too.

Nate started CMO (Children's Morning Out) last week. It's a program at a local church for kids of all ages. It is sort of like school, they learn letters and numbers and all that good stuff, but the big thing right now is Nate getting play time with other kids and some structure from other adults. They have free play, arts and crafts, and story time. The best part is (aside from giving me a break a couple hours twice a week) is that it is Christian based. He was very excited the first day but since then has been reluctant to leave me when I drop him off. His teacher says he does fine, but this is another reason this will be good for him.

Nate is becoming more responsive to his movies, now laughing out loud at some parts (parts that we really don't understand why he's laughing, but oh well). I love to watch his facial expressions as he watches. He is obsessed with watching movies, and to be honest we have been watching quite a bit of tv. It will be nice when it warms up and we can go outside again. I try to do activities with him like painting or play-doh, but it only lasts so long and he wants to watch a movie again. And now his newest thing is now to want his jacket on. When we come home if I take his jacket off it is a complete meltdown. I don't know where this came from...is our house really that cold? :) Hopefully this passes soon.

Maddie has been teething again and last week she had a few rough days and nights. Two nights last week she would not sleep and we both ended up together on the couch. I also got called out of service at church on Sunday because they couldn't get her to stop crying in the nursery. When she doesn't feel good Mommy is the only one that she wants. It looks (and feels) like her top front teeth. Hopefully they pop through soon.

Michael started up a couple more online classes. He has 4 more before he will get his Associate's degree. I am looking forward to that. He stays later at work to do his homework so he has a quiet place and many evening and weekend hours are taken up with schoolwork. It has added a little more to the plate, therefore a little stress. So when we got the opportunity for a date night last week it was much needed! Our wonderful friend Sara watched the kids for a few hours so we could go up to Southport to eat at Longhorn's, our favorite place to get a steak. It was delicious and wonderful to eat without children!

6 Months

A little behind...I figure I better get this done before I need to do her 7 month post!

The topic with Maddie every month always seems to be centered around her sleeping, and so I don't want to ruin the pattern, so we'll talk about her sleep some more! Although now she is doing much better. I never thought I would look forward to getting up every 3 hours, but it is so much better than every 2. She gets up around 12am, 3am, and between 5-6am. The best part is that it is like this most nights. We haven't had an 'up every hour' night in awhile and it feels great. Don't get me wrong, I would LOVE to be sleeping all night, or even just getting up once, but I will take this. Some nights I think we could do without the 3am feeding, as she doesn't really seem hungry when she eats, but then we'll have night that she seems to need it. So I'm not ready to try and get rid of a feeding yet. In a month or so we'll see if she's ready to knock it down to 2 feedings a night. {And on a side note, the past 4 or 5 nights she's been getting up an hour after I feed her. She usually cries herself back to sleep and only takes a few moments, but it feels like she's getting up ALL night}

She is doing a lot better with eating from a spoon, although it's hilarious to watch her eat. She barely opens her mouth and just sucks it off the spoon. It takes her a few different times to like the food; she never likes it the first time she eats it. Well, except for mashed potatoes. She loved them the first time she ate them. I think she is ready for human food and says the baby food is for the birds!

I cannot believe she is 6 months old! Why is 6 months feel like such a milestone? I guess because we're at that halfway mark to the one year. Just 6 months from now, a length of time she's been with us already, and she'll be one and toddling around. She's such a great baby and people comment all the time how good she is. She will sit in her carseat or stroller much longer than Nate ever would. It's crazy. She's just so content most of the time.

She is 27 1/4" (95%) and 17lbs (90%). Our big baby girl!

Monkey Joes

There is an inflatables place in Greenwood called Bounce Spot. It has inflatables to jump in, however it also has video games that once Nate sees, he rather pretend to play with than to get out his energy jumping. So when I heard from Sara that Monkey Joes is strictly inflatables AND the parents can go in them as well, we had to go. There is one opening up in Southport, which is about thirty minutes north of here, but it's not open until next weekend. We really wanted to go, so we made the drive to the northside of Indy. Worth it.

This place has a lot more jumpers and it was SO MUCH FUN to be able to get in and play with Nate. We jumped and went down slides and climbed all over the place. Nate seemed surprised when I climbed in after him, pretty cool my mom is in here! Michael had Maddie so I was free to play, although I did feel bad so before we left I took Maddie for a bit so Michael could get in there and play too. The slides are super fast and so that was fun for me. And if you know Nate, then you know that he is a jumper so this is his heaven. We will definitely be looking forward to the Southport location opening up so we can have a lot more fun this winter!

Sleepless in Columbus

A couple weeks into my attempt to get Maddie sleeping at night. This is what I can say: we've had some pretty long nights. It has not been as easy or successful as I thought it would be. There are small milestones, such as the fact that she is sleeping in her own bed now and not with me. And she now sleeps in three hour spurts, most of the time. This is something that I would take, if it were more regular.

The first couple of nights were brutal. She would wake up at the two hour mark and cry. I would let her cry for a bit and then go in to comfort her, which would just upset her more, because she didn't want me, she wanted booby. She ended up in hysterics when she didn't get what she wanted. So I thought it'd be better to let her sort this out on her own. The third night I let her cry and she actually ended up crying less than when I was going in there. The problem was that she would soothe herself back to sleep just to wake up thirty minutes later. So I have actually been up more than before when I was feeding her every two hours. Although we have made progress and I can go in and rock her back to sleep.

Trying to pay attention to the crying, I think I have figured out when she is hungry and when she just needs to be soothed. It still seems as though she really is hungry every three hours, which I can handle. It's an hour more, right? So on a good night I will put her to bed at 9pm and she will get up at 12am and 3am to eat. Since day one, she has gotten up at 5am and it's not any different now. So at 5am every morning she wakes up and I just bring her back to bed with me where she instantly falls back asleep until 6am to eat again. She is up for the day at 7am. This is a good night. This doesn't always happen. In fact, it doesn't usually happen. We have had several nights where she gets up every hour. A couple nights ago we gave her a bottle for her last feeding thinking she wasn't eating enough. The first night she slept beautifully (see "a good night") but then last night was horrible again. Which on a side note, this is a good thing that she's actually taking a bottle now, even if it's only from me. I don't know why she won't sleep. I can't figure it out. Maybe it's her teeth?

So it is still a work in progress. I know it won't be like this forever, but it has definitely lasted longer than I had anticipated. But as she approaches the six month mark, I know we are at least on the down hill slope (because I figure she has to be sleeping through the night at a year old, right? Say yes!).

Sticking to My Guns

For, well ever, Nate has not really sat at the table to eat. He might sometimes, but he would mostly run around and then come back for a bite and then leave again. Or sometimes he would like to eat on the couch. I figured he is old enough to be sitting with us at the table now. So one night that's what he had to do. He was NOT happy. I strapped him in to his booster seat and when he realized that he was not going to be able to get out, it was on. The screaming & crying fit lasted for what seemed like forever, but was probably only 30 minutes. A very long 30 minutes. Several times during that fit I contemplated giving him in: he's not going to eat so I might as well just let him down. But I didn't. Instead I told myself that I can sit there for a long time. Every few minutes I would offer his dinner to him again, trying to keep my cool as he would scream louder and push it away. Then it stopped. He pointed to his plate. I lifted a spoonful to his mouth, he opened and swallowed it down. Victory! He went on to finish dinner and has been expected to eat with us ever since. It has gone well, for the most part. There has been another time but the fit lasted only a few minutes, he knew.

I cannot explain the feeling afterwards. I was relieved because I did not have a back up plan. But I was so happy. Parenting IS hard, but is so rewarding when you don't give in and it works. As a bonus, we went out to eat the other night and Nate sat at the table and colored and ate and never tried getting down once (one of the reasons we cannot go out to eat). He sat like a big boy and it was wonderful. Maddie slept and we could actually enjoy a meal out. Ah, it's good to stick to your guns!

5 Months

Maddie is 5 months old. I wish I could say things are getting easier. I guess in some aspects they are, but I am as tired as I would be if she were still a newborn. I finally moved her to her own bed in her own room. At this point I am going to try whatever it takes to get her to sleep! The first couple of nights were pretty rough. She would wake up as soon as I would lay her down. She did not like being apart from me. But after a few days, she got used to it and is sleeping better...most nights. She still gets up every two hours. She has had one night where she had a 6 hour stretch and lately it seems when she gets up she eats, but not like she's really hungry. So I think she's just in some bad habits that we need to break.

Last night was the first night to feed her only every 4 hours instead of 2, and boy was it a long one. I fed her at 11pm and so she woke up right on schedule at 1am. I let her cry for a little bit, and thought maybe it would be best if I rock her (give her some comfort in a different way). This just upset her more. After crying off and on for about an hour she fell asleep, just to wake up again the moment I set her down. So after more comforting and rocking, I finally got her to sleep and in her bed at 3am. 3:30am, she's up and crying. This time I fed her and she went right back to sleep. Of course she was up again at 5am, but afraid of waking Nate again (he woke up and was playing in his room at 4am) I decided just to bring her back to bed with me. We shall see what tonight brings. More exhaustion I think.

I thought the problem might be that she isn't eating enough during the day. She never feeds very long. So I decided to make up a bottle of milk. The first day she was in hysterics, refusing the bottle until I finally broke down and put her on the boob. The next day I tried again. She ate about an ounce but it took forever, like she wasn't really sucking on it, just playing around with it. She took the bottle when she was younger and I should have periodically given it to her as she got older to keep her used to it. This bottle feeding is very disappointing for me. Not only to try and see if it would have helped her sleep, but also for some freedom. I cannot go anywhere without her in case she gets hungry.

We also tried feeding her cereal. It has not been a disaster, but she hasn't quite gotten the hang of it yet. She spits more out than she eats and lifts her tongue up over the spoon. I will keep trying this here and there, but we didn't even start Nate on solids until he was 6 months so I'm not real concerned about her eating solids right now.

Other than that, she is the same happy baby. She wants so badly to be able to do things. She is sticking that little butt in the air and kicking like crazy, just not going anywhere. She rolls around to get to where she wants to go.

The Last Christmas Celebration

Our last celebration was with the Toppes on Friday. Making dinner this year was a little bit more difficult with the two little ones (and Michael at work all day!), but somehow I managed to not burn anything and it all turned out pretty good. I really love making the big holiday meal even though it's a lot of work. After dinner the kids opened their gifts. Nate actually clapped his hands after opening one gift, which is the most reaction he's had this whole time. Not that he's not happy with his gifts, he just opens them and then starts to play with them. I think the more he does this the more he gets into it. It's fun to watch the kids open their gifts. Not so much fun to watch the fighting about playing with each other's toys afterwards. Oh well, part of the age I guess.

The plan was to have them stay overnight and make a big breakfast the next morning. Did not happen. I had been up since 4am with Maddie (and that's still getting up every 2 hours with her as well) and after cooking all day, I was beat. Since we weren't going to stay up late, they decided to just head home.

And New Year's Eve was no late night for us either. We went to the Herter's to celebrate their daughter's 4th birthday. They made homemade pizza (delicious!), the kids played, and the adults visited. It was nice and we were home by 9:30, the party animals that we are.

But it was a good time and a good way to end the holiday season. I'm so glad we space the holidays with everyone out so that we aren't rushed and we don't have to try and cram it all in in just a couple of days.