Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Tough Love
At Clara's 4 month appointment the doctor said that it was time for some "tough love" when it comes to sleep. He said that based on her age and weight she should be able to go at least 8 hours at night without eating. He suggested starting sleep training sometime before 6 months, but we decided to jump right in. Our thought was that this gave us some time to try it out - if it went horribly, we could wait a couple of weeks and try again. And, let's be honest, when you haven't slept in months and you get the gree light to make it better, you don't really want to wait around!
To give you a little background, Clara has been progressively lengthening her night time sleep up until I went back to work for a two week stint at 10 weeks. She was going around 5 to 6 hours at night before that, and one time had even slept for 8 hours! Then, the week I went back to work, we went backwards quickly, all the way to 2 and 3 hours all night. Ever since then a normal night was 3 to 5 hours, with closer to 3 being the most common and 5 being a good night. It was pretty tough on us, especially once I went back to work for good at 15 weeks. We tried to appease her with a pacifier if she woke up during the night, but I think the little smarty was on to our game and once she saw Dad she just screamed louder. So really noone has been sleeping well in our house for the past 8 weeks.
It was definitely a learning process each night, because we weren't sure what she would do, and we wanted to be realistic about our expectations for her based on where we were coming from, and her age. We started on Thursday night so that we would have the weekend to rest if we ended up being up all night. Thursday night she woke up twice, and the longest she cried was 20 minutes. Friday night she only woke up once, and again cried for about 20 minutes. Saturday night we decided to start a "dream feed" (feeding her around 10 - 11 while she is asleep) so that when we get the long stretch of time at night it is when we are asleep as well. She woke up at 5 am on Sunday morning, which is of course early for our taste, so we let her cry for a bit to make sure she was really awake, and decided to get up and feed her at 5:30. We were hopeful at this point because, although the stretch after the dream feed was only around 5.5 hours, she basically slept from 7:30 until 5, which is a huge improvement!
Sunday night we fed her at 7 and dream fed her at 10. She woke up at 4, cried off and on for an hour, with the longest stretch being only around 10 minutes. This was a little tough for us because it meant we didn't sleep for that whole hour, but again, a huge improvement because it was the first straight six hours of sleep I have had in 4 months. She went back to sleep around 5 and slept until 7. The biggest reassurement about this to me is that when she woke up at 7 she was happy and played for about 10 minutes in her crib, she wasn't fussy and starving. Definite progress is being made.
For the rest of that week, she usually woke up once or twice, half-heartedly cried for about 10 minutes, and then went back to sleep. Just when I was starting to worry that maybe this was going to be the routine for a while, she did it! We put her to bed on Monday night around 7, Clint gave her a dream feed bottle at 10:30, and when my alarm went off at 5:30 I realized that that was the first time I had woken up the whole night. It took us 11 nights with very minimal crying, and I know that I actually feel like my old self again. Yay Clara!
And now, a funny picture to make reading that whole post worth it.
To give you a little background, Clara has been progressively lengthening her night time sleep up until I went back to work for a two week stint at 10 weeks. She was going around 5 to 6 hours at night before that, and one time had even slept for 8 hours! Then, the week I went back to work, we went backwards quickly, all the way to 2 and 3 hours all night. Ever since then a normal night was 3 to 5 hours, with closer to 3 being the most common and 5 being a good night. It was pretty tough on us, especially once I went back to work for good at 15 weeks. We tried to appease her with a pacifier if she woke up during the night, but I think the little smarty was on to our game and once she saw Dad she just screamed louder. So really noone has been sleeping well in our house for the past 8 weeks.
It was definitely a learning process each night, because we weren't sure what she would do, and we wanted to be realistic about our expectations for her based on where we were coming from, and her age. We started on Thursday night so that we would have the weekend to rest if we ended up being up all night. Thursday night she woke up twice, and the longest she cried was 20 minutes. Friday night she only woke up once, and again cried for about 20 minutes. Saturday night we decided to start a "dream feed" (feeding her around 10 - 11 while she is asleep) so that when we get the long stretch of time at night it is when we are asleep as well. She woke up at 5 am on Sunday morning, which is of course early for our taste, so we let her cry for a bit to make sure she was really awake, and decided to get up and feed her at 5:30. We were hopeful at this point because, although the stretch after the dream feed was only around 5.5 hours, she basically slept from 7:30 until 5, which is a huge improvement!
Sunday night we fed her at 7 and dream fed her at 10. She woke up at 4, cried off and on for an hour, with the longest stretch being only around 10 minutes. This was a little tough for us because it meant we didn't sleep for that whole hour, but again, a huge improvement because it was the first straight six hours of sleep I have had in 4 months. She went back to sleep around 5 and slept until 7. The biggest reassurement about this to me is that when she woke up at 7 she was happy and played for about 10 minutes in her crib, she wasn't fussy and starving. Definite progress is being made.
For the rest of that week, she usually woke up once or twice, half-heartedly cried for about 10 minutes, and then went back to sleep. Just when I was starting to worry that maybe this was going to be the routine for a while, she did it! We put her to bed on Monday night around 7, Clint gave her a dream feed bottle at 10:30, and when my alarm went off at 5:30 I realized that that was the first time I had woken up the whole night. It took us 11 nights with very minimal crying, and I know that I actually feel like my old self again. Yay Clara!
And now, a funny picture to make reading that whole post worth it.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
So Close
For the past week or so, Clara has been working really hard at rolling over from her back to her stomach. Last week she could get to her side, but couldn't get her top leg to swing over. As of Tuesday night she had fixed that problem, and now it was just that darn arm getting in the way!
I have tons of videos of all of the progress from the past few weeks. And then, this morning in her crib, she decides that this is the perfect opportunity to roll all the way to her stomach when no one was watching :) Oh well, hopefully was can document it next time.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Thursday, January 26, 2012
4 Month Appointment
We took Clara to her 4 month check-up yesterday, which included her second round of shots. Shots still aren't very fun, but she definitely handled it better than the first time. She is weighing 14 lbs 14 ozs (76%), is 25" long (76%), and her head is almost 16" around (38%) - her weight has caught up to her length. The doctor said she is perfect, which of course we already knew!
The doctor also told us that it was time for some "tough love" during the night, and that sleep training was a good idea sometime between now and 6 months. So you better watch out Clara, the party is over! No more midnight (and 2 am, and 4 am) ice cream snacks anymore :)
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The doctor also told us that it was time for some "tough love" during the night, and that sleep training was a good idea sometime between now and 6 months. So you better watch out Clara, the party is over! No more midnight (and 2 am, and 4 am) ice cream snacks anymore :)
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Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Clara and Daddy
After Clara's 4 month photo shoot on Sunday, she got some fun play time with Daddy. She is really interacting a lot, and likes when he sings "Mamacita" to her. The funny faces and voices he uses can usually get a little bit of a giggle out of her. I think she thinks he is pretty fun, and the feelings are definitely mutual!
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