SUPERBABY, Zany Zoo, + Phone Favorites

I should have a badge made that says "Crazy Mom". I am the mom whose baby fell asleep in his crib without fussing (woo-hoo!) and then decided to lug in my camera and a tripod to take some pictures of him in the dark. Risky business. Fortunately, he did not wake up. He stirred a few times and I held my breath - but thankfully he didn't wake while I was clanking around in there just a few feet away from him. I said I was crazy, didn't I?

NIGHT 6 OF BASSINET TO CRIB TRANSITION

Today, Asher only napped about 15 minutes in the car. He was up at 9 (well, up at 6, ate, then came to our room until 9. I was so tired I didn't even want to attempt the re-inserting of the paci over and over again from across the house. He went right back to sleep in our room. Bad mom! TIRED MOM.)

Any-who, he was officially up at 9, ate breakfast, then was off to work with me. He got a bottle there and we unsuccessfully attempted napping a few times. We were back home by 2.  He had lunch then we TRIED napping. He wasn't having it. Before I knew it, 5pm came around and he looked super sleepy. Since late afternoon naps can mean long, sleepless nights, I kept him up and we did bath, bottle, book, a little more from his bottle, and bed by 7:30. He fussed until that last few ounces so I think he was just still hungry? His appetite has been all over the place lately. He was out as soon as I put him down. So much for putting him down while he's still awake like "the experts" say to do, but we're doing our best here. I'm still rather new at this. :)

Presenting... SUPERBABY! He could fight crime in his sleep. He's a super sleeper.

Alas, the night is still young. I flipped our little flat head onto his side after taking these pics and got these little nuggets with my phone. Um, you're welcome.

cotton booty cuteness ;) aka cloth diaper fluffy butt

Drool spots on the sheets are probably only cute when babies do it. Or maybe it's cute for all children, but certainly not adults. Just a word to the wise. ;)

On another note, our new big boy toy came in and I, I mean Asher, was so excited! We got him a Zany Zoo that he can play with while sitting up. He already loves flipping open the doors, spinning, flicking, pressing, twirling... and he can't even see everything on top yet!

I can't even. These pictures are so edible I don't know which ones to make smaller. They're all full-size worthy. Indulge yourself in the cuteness...

Without further ado, it's time for my iPhone Favorites from the past few weeks. I am a little behind on getting these up since we've been so crazily busy. Enjoy! 

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The Big Move - Bassinet to Crib

Well, the gig is up. We are free to have more children now. Our former "angel baby" is now showing a new side. A wakeful, alert side. He still shows off his contagious smile all hours of the day...and night - he's just no longer in favor of sleeping, or more specifically, going to sleep.

We are now on night 5 of the transition from the bassinet in our room to Asher's crib in his nursery. He's 6 months old now, he is moving around a lot more in his sleep, and he is getting really close to outgrowing his bassinet. So we figured it is like a perfect time to make the move.

Night one went extremely well. Too well. Asher fell right asleep in his crib with no resistance to his 7:30pm bedtime. It may have even been 7:15pm. Out like a light. He woke just briefly around midnight for a bottle, then it was back to bed.

Our iBaby monitor allows us to watch and even take pictures of Asher in his crib on our  mobile devices.

He was then up in the morning at about 7:30am. I fed him and he wasn't having his crib anymore at that point, so I brought him into our room into his bassinet and both of us got another 2 hours of sleep (score!). <-- Daddy left early, early to go fishing and I didn't get to bed until super late - hence the excitement for extra sleep.

The following nights brought the tossing and turning and Asher's hesitance to sleep in his crib. We gave in last night, on night 4, letting him back into our room when he absolutely would not go back to sleep around 2am. Into the bassinet - done. Sleeping baby.  Tonight, if I even walked into the nursery with him he'd start to cry. I finally got him in there by rocking him to sleep with a bottle. I know that's one of the worst things to do, so I do not want to make this into a habit!

I must mention that our schedules are also all out of sorts right now. Circumstances have brought me back to our shop every weekday for at least 3-5 hours. Maybe by next week I'll be able to cut it down to 3 days or so. Sometimes, if I am lucky, Asher naps. But it's unfortunately just not a nap friendly environment there. We have loud machinery running, I am using a tape gun to package up orders... I don't blame him for not being able to get quality rest while we're there.

In addition to this new schedule, our pediatrician recommended we feed Asher breakfast and late lunch rather than breakfast and dinner since he has been having more might wakings since starting solids. Working this new feeding schedule into our new work/home schedule is going to be a little tricky. But we will make it work.

Oh - ALSO - we are supposed to have him sleeping on his stomach now to combat his "flat head". He doesn't like that. So this just adds to the difficulty at sleep time.

I'm not a fan of the "cry-it-out" method for us. So I'm going to have to get creative to get Asher into the habit of sleeping in his crib. I'm going to try to let him play in his crib while I am doing things in his room, i.e. folding laundry, organizing, cleaning, etc. I'm already putting him in there for naps (with much resistance) but I'm sure this will improve in time, as well. When he wakes, I am giving him his bottle in his nursery so that he stays sleepy and hopefully won't think about changing rooms. 

Hopefully by next week I'll have some more perspective for anyone going through the transition from bassinet to crib once we have crossed the threshold. Fingers crossed this process won't take much longer than that!

When and how did you make the transition from bassinet to crib/ How did it go? Any advice?

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Why I Am Letting Go Of "Wife Guilt"

Nowadays, modern moms and dads likely share much of their day equally when it comes to both home maintenance and parenting without relying on traditional gender roles to divvy up the ever-growing list of responsibilities. But in some households, like ours, it just works better to stick with tradition a little, but I have found there to be one caveat - what I like to call "wife guilt".

Photo by Caroline Nicole Photography

We all know about the all-too-common "mommy guilt" that plagues us when we let that DVD run for the second (or - eek! - third!) time or when we pop open some processed, store-bought baby food and leave our Beaba to collect dust. Now, I let myself fall victim to even MORE guilt when my husband walks through our door at night and I am taking advantage of these  baby-free hours of the day to get some "play time" in. Pinning, tweeting, blogging... the fun stuff. The relaxing stuff.

I can just "feel" his eyes peering into the sink full of dirty dishes with disappointment or stepping over that pile of laundry that hasn't yet made its way to the washing machine shaking his head with dismay. In reality, he understands. But that guilt is a powerful thing and it convinces me that he must care and that I have failed.

Most nights, I have just gotten off my feet maybe 30 minutes before he gets home. I try to reason with my inner self. I'm not only a mom and a wife but I'm also technically always on the clock with running our online store and helping keep our manufacturing and inventory organized at our shop - even on days that I work from home I am working on and off throughout the day. And it's busy season, self! 

This plethora of unnecessary stress is thrown onto me by my guilt-ridden conscience. Deep down, I know that my husband doesn't mind our less than perfect household. John knows I am trying my best - we both are trying our best. I need to, and maybe most of us - husbands and wives alike - need to, let go of the quest for perfection. Let go of the spotless kitchens and shining sinks. Let go of the perfectly balanced and homemade meals and children with perfectly matched clothing. I will let go of the thoughts of inadequacy that tell me that I am failing as a wife because I can't do everything on my to-do list by the end of the day, week, month, year. And that's ok. And John knows that's ok. I need to remember that it is OK.

Photo by Caroline Nicole Photography

When we made the decision to marry one another, it wasn't for our abilities to wash the most loads of laundry in one week or because one of us had the cleanest sink in town. In our marriage, as a team, we shouldn't search for each others' faults or pass judgment on one another when a fault emerges. When John comes home at the end of the day to the mess that currently is our home, he knows that I am trying my best everyday and I know that he is, too. And me, I guess I can kick that "wife guilt" to the curb.

Photo by Caroline Nicole Photography

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Happy Half Birthday - 6 Months of Fun!

6 Month Update - Development & Milestones

I've said it and I will say it again, I can't believe it has been 6 months already since our sweet baby was born. 1/2 of a year! It went by so, so fast.

Asher is so much more lively and interactive now than ever before. He is happy all day and lets us know with a huge, as John would say, "Kool-Aid grin" that stretched from ear to ear. He laughs, he plays, he is curious... and he is so smart!

SIGN LANGUAGE UPDATE - 6 Months

Asher is now signing:

Dog

Milk

Up

Eat

More

We have seen glimpses of...

Cereal

Mama

Dada

Water

He gave up on:

Banana 

Carrot

I have now introduced these new signs:

Diaper

Change

Sleep

Sleep Clothes aka Pajamas

Train

Airplane

Car

Ball

Bath

Pacifier/Binky

Play

SIGNING IN USE...

The other night, I had to change Asher's diaper after having already put him to bed. While on the changing pad, he signed "milk". I wouldn't have otherwise given him any since he had just eaten, but once I did he ate the whole thing! This is just amazing to me and really solidifies our desire to continue with baby signing.

Here's a video of our little signer showing off his skills signing "dog" when he sees and hears the pugs during his pictures this morning...

MILESTONES @ 6 MONTHS

• Asher can now sit without using his hands for support (still topples over after a minute or so).
• Crawling "inchworm" style, still, only he is now making more progress in terms of moving across the floor. He can't yet lift his belly and support himself on his hands and knees, but once he figures that out - watch out! He'll be unstoppable.
• Sounding out "brrrr", "thhh", "deh", "meh", and blowing spit bubbles. I swear I heard "mama" and "dada" tonight but it may just be wishful thinking. ;) I DID hear "eee-ooo" while he was trying to  do peek-a-boo and I'm pretty sure he wants to say "doggy" so badly!
• Can drink from a sippy cup (but loses his grip within a few seconds). Just a tiny bit of water with his "crackers" (which I then discovered "may contain milk or soy" - oops - so I made homemade ones and will share the recipe soon. They also said they contain "organic flavor"? What the heck is "organic flavor"??? I am getting crunchier by the minute...)

Half-birthday onesie from Kakabaka on Etsy.

TEETHING UPDATE

We are still on "tooth watch"! Nothing yet, but lots of crankiness in the evenings, so something must be moving around in there. We've got a close eye out for anything breaking through...

We've been giving Asher 2-3 Hyland's Homeopathic Teething Tablets in his bottles whenever he seems to be experiencing teething pain. We also picked up some BabyGanics Teething Pods which I have only had to break out once and it really seemed to have helped a lot. 

SOLID FOOD UPDATE

Asher loves solid foods! He loves them so much that he will only drink half his usual amount of milk in the mornings and is extra finicky with bottles now. I had to start giving him brown rice cereal (against my original plan) so that I could mix more milk into his solids to thicken everything up.

It's been about 2 weeks now that he has been eating brown rice cereal and over the past week or so we have seen an onset of mild eczema on his face, arms, legs, and chest. I am not sure if this is related to the rice cereal or the introduction of stage 2 baby foods (which have multiple ingredients in them) so I am going to be doing some backtracking to stage ones and hopefully I can figure out what is causing this issue. Our city has also made changes to the water recently and it smells like awful chlorine now, so maybe it could be related to that... It's so frustrating! His next doctor's appointment is just around the corner, so unless the skin issue takes a turn for the worse before then, we'll address it then.

POSTPARTUM UPDATE

My hair is still shedding like crazy - when does this stop?!?! Otherwise, things are pretty much back to normal, for the most part. Thank goodness!

Giving Suki the "stink eye". :)

Happy Half-Birthday to our ENERGETIC little jumping bean. He is so sweet and loving but he is also showing signs of never ending ENERGY! Those feet - they just go and go and go. We have our work cut out for us with this one, I think. Oh and that mischievous smile... Yes, we are in trouble. 

We love you baby Asher! 

Don't tell Daddy, but now it is time to start planning your 1-year birthday...

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