Meet "Little Mans"

This is "Little Mans"

(Yes..that is the word "Man" pronounced with an "s" at the end. It just seems more suitable that way.)

Little Mans is Michael's special friend (after Daddy, of course).

Little Mans goes with Michael...hmm...pretty much everywhere. And usually arrives with a little wet patch on his face after being mauled in the car ride.

Little Mans plays with Michael at Diaper Time...

...and Exercise Time....

He even plays with Michael at Tummy Time...

Look how Michael moved toward Little Mans during Tummy Time....how he loves his friend.

Little Mans brings Michael so much joy.....

And anything that makes this show up on his face....

Is a friend of mine too!

Taking a Wise Mom's Advice

After spending an awesome day with Kathy and her little kiddos yesterday, I walked away with a very profound piece of wisdom, which, in a schedule that is pretty busy, and an underlying fear that I'm going to instill bad sleeping habits in my little boy, I have forgotten and needed to be reminded of: enjoy this time.

Coming from a mother of three, who keeps an immaculately clean house, gardens, cooks, bakes, teaches her kids, and always does awesome things with them...I see the wisdom in this. I will probably never have a period in life again where I can just sit down and cuddle with a baby. The next child (God willing!) we have will have a big brother that I'll also have to run after and chase...sitting down for just a good long cuddle will certainly not be as frequent of an option.

I should enjoy this baby time, because it's fleeting! And as soon as Michael gets moving, being a cuddly little baby may not be as appealing to him as going after a toy, getting into Daddy's music/DVD collection, or reminding Mommy that she needs to vacuum more frequently.

So, in honor of my sister's wisdom...here's our day today:

Who does he resemble?

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Our Couch Potato

In two days, (not-so) little Michael will reach his official 2 month birthday!

He's such a sweetheart!

All has been going well in the Barber home! Daddy Michael is busy, busy, busy working on his dissertation. Please pray for him!

But despite his busy schedule, he always makes it home to have special time with little Michael. Their special Daddy-son playtime is so much fun to watch! No one can get him to kick his feet and play better than his Daddy. In fact, no one can get him to sleep peacefully better than his daddy....I'm really starting to just feel like a food dispenser around here! :)

No...I have my fun times with Michael too. We have our special "I'm gonna get you" game, which usually gets Michael to smile at me really big. I love it!

Some new developments: Michael is getting his hand to his mouth pretty regularly...he seems to like it! I can't wait for him to be mesmerized by his hands.

He is also getting really good at Tummy Time, though he hates it pretty much with as much intensity as he ever did. Although yesterday, he lifted his head really high for about 10 seconds and smiled really big! I was shocked! Of course, that was short-lived after he put his head down and began fussing to a state of rage.

One funny thing about his state of rage is that he kicks his feet and scoots himself (screaming the whole time) across his blanket. He can actually move from one end to the other! I've tried recording it, but he is usually so angry, I would be so embarrassed to post a video of him screaming and me just sitting by passively with a video recorder. I would feel like the President of the Mean Mommy club!

So you'll have to trust me on this one, ok?

Michael is getting better and worse at sleeping. Better because he fusses, yet can still get himself to sleep on his own (though the pained look on his face, even while sleeping, is heartbreaking after he fussed himself to sleep!). But after only 15 minutes of fussing to get himself to sleep...this is good progress!

What's also exciting is that last night he slept from 10pm-5 am. Ca-ching!! That is seven hours straight! He went back down for another 2 hour nap...however, I'm starting to regret going back to sleep myself. I was SO much more tired at 7:20 than I was at 5:20....will I start to become one of THOSE mommy's who rise with the dawn, getting all her chores done before the sun comes out...yet going to bed at 9 pm? Part of me hopes not..but a secret part of me has always admired those types of people. I have a great opportunity to become one of those early-risers by having an alarm clock with no snooze button! Maybe I'll try it.....maybe....

Back to the fussing himself to sleep business...Michael and I have had to employ this technique more frequently than we would probably like because little Michael is becoming more resistent to staying asleep after we put him in his crib. We will rock him to sleep and then as we stoop down to put him in his little bed, his eyes flutter open and he realizes what we are up to and starts to cry.

Mean Mommy Kim has frequently shrugged her shoulders with a "You're fed, you're changed, you're burped and swaddled, and you're yawning your head off. It's naptime!" I'm starting to employ just plain old "Quiet Time" for him, if he's not lucky enough for a nap. First, so he can learn to just spend time in his crib, and secondly, and a bit more selfishly, so I can have SOME time to grab a bite to eat, or shower, or just breathe away the minor frustration I have with a son who is clearly exhausted but doesn't want to sleep!

But you know, thinking back to how things were at the very beginning, when Michael wouldn't sleep alone...Oh...the nights in the hospital where Michael Sr was desperately trying to sleep, but after putting the baby down only for him to wake up again time and time and time again for hours at a time....wow, we've come a long way. A very, very long way.

In fact, I don't even want my blogs to be considered complaints about his sleeping, rather than just reporting. He is SUCH a good boy, and so tolerant of my schedule in which I seem to be zipping him here and there and everywhere these days. But I don't think he minds because if I am in a meeting, or teaching a class, or putting together a Bible study, where do you suppose baby Michael is? In someone's arms! Either mine, or one of several people at Church (including Fr. Michael) anxious to get hold of a chubby, sleepy little baby who really only cries if he's hungry or you are not bouncing to the beat of his little personal drummer.

When we are at home, how much time do you think I spend holding him while he naps rather than trying to help him sleep in his crib...haha...let's just say, I think he's glad Mommy's running around at work. At work, my goal is to keep him content and quiet so as not to disturb others...at home I inflict mean and terrible things upon him, like crib time and tummy time and don't have to worry about glaring looks from co-workers when he cries.

The long and short of it is....we are doing great and trying our best. I just love little Michael and hope and pray everyday I'm doing things right by him! He's such a precious little boy!

"Help Me! I'm Starved!"

Worried for Nothing

This week has been a busy week for me with regard to work. On Thursday I had a meeting at the Diocese at which the Bishop would be presenting and this went from 9:30-1pm...talk about a long day for the baby! How was I supposed to avoid a crying fit in all that time?

Then, Saturday, we had an all-day workshop, at which I would be presenting several sessions...how was I going to work out feeding? What if he becomes terribly fussy...what if I can't present my topic because he is mad...how is he going to sleep?

Well, it turns out that all my biggest worries were nothing I really had to worry about at all because both days went exceedingly wel..no drama to report, and everyone (including the Bishop) was very impressed with how quiet and calm the baby was. Aside from a few well-timed times of nursing, plus a little bit of awake looking around time, Michael slept the whole time at both events and hardly made a peep! I was so proud!

However, in thinking about how it ended up so well, I realized that part of it is that Michael got exactly the kind of day he always wants: being held, non-stop.

I held him during some of my presentation, but then he was passed around among a few different people who held him, and he was loving it the whole time....which is why he slept the whole time, and I had to actually wake him up to feed him and change his diaper.

What a boy...I just hope this doesn't spoil him too much because as much as I would love to sit around and hold the baby all-day everyday, it's just not possible, even if I weren't working.

But, for those days, it worked out very well for both of us that he got to just cuddle with someone and I was happy that he was happy.

Exciting Sleep Developments

Well, it seems like my earlier worries about getting Michael to sleep are becoming almost non-existent at the point...thank goodness!

First and foremost, Michael is sleeping like a champ at night. Of course, he still wakes up once in the middle of the night to eat, and then pretty early in the morning, he is getting more and more large "chunks" of hours at night in which he is sleeping straight through.

Which means night time is no longer so stressful for me. I used to dread the night because I didn't know what it would consist of, what with Michael wanting to sleep on someone and everything. There was no routine, no pattern, no nothing...just crossing our fingers our little boy (and us) got some much-needed rest.

Since we've been swaddling him, Michael has been sleeping great, but of course that posed its own set of issues with him breaking his swaddle and waking himself up. Until....the Miracle Blanket!!

I love this blanket...and especially now that Michael is getting bigger and stronger so even his very deluxe Swaddle Blanket isn't much good to us in terms of keeping his limbs settled down.

But this Miracle Blanket, aka "Baby StraightJacket" around our home, is great in that it uses his weight to keep his arms down by his side.

Don't get me wrong, our little Houdini can still bust loose, but it is far less frequent and it takes much more effort on his part.

Here are a few exciting sleep developments for our boy!

* Michael has a bedtime of between 8:30 and 9pm. This is much better than his first few days where his "bedtime" was 3 am. Boy, I remember those days in the hospital, poor Michael Sr was the only one who could really get up and get him, Michael Jr seemed to need to eat non-stop, and two rookie parents are wondering, "What did we get ourselves into?"

* Michael has, on several occasions now, put himself to sleep!!! This is still not a regular occurence, but more than once or twice, we have been a tired-yet-awake little Michael all bundled in his crib, only to check in after a few minutes to find him asleep!! Now, more times than not, putting an awake Michael to bed will still normally lead to a period of crying, but not every time, so we are working towards that!

* Michael has spent a good deal of time asleep this past week without being swaddled!! I think his little reflex is settling down. Now, I can't just put him down awake without the swaddle, but if he is nursing and falls into a pretty deep sleep, I can put him down without swaddling him, and he'll go for quite some time without waking himself up. It's a good start towards our goal, which we can't really control, we just have to wait it out, and that is being able to have him sleep without the Swaddle.

* I've discovered the "crying it out method" has a few benefits, but it still too early for us to implement it very aggressively. The sleeping book I mentioned says that after six weeks you can try it, but until 3 months, it may not work...so try it for 10 or 15 minutes. What this means is that all his needs are taken care of, we know he is tired because he has given us sleepy cues, and the thing he needs most at the moment is sleep. Sometimes, though, he is either too excited about being around people to want to sleep, or he just isn't in the right frame of mind to fall asleep. If we put him in the crib after doing our little "sleep-time" routine of rocking and singing, and he isn't asleep, we leave the room and let him either settle himself to sleep (the goal!) or he'll start crying begging for us to come and get him because he is lonely and wants to be with us.

The times he hasn't settled himself to sleep, and he has cried, we have only once, after 5 minutes, successfully had him "cry himself to sleep" (sad, I know, but better for him than being overtired). However, the other times where we let him cry for about 10 minutes (we haven't done more of that) all it takes is for us to pick him up to comfort him, and as soon as we pick him up, he falls asleep, and then we can immediately lay himself down again for a good rest.

The crying helps to tire him, and the comfort of being picked up helps relax him enough to go back down. It's really hard to do, especially walking in and seeing tears in his eyes and down his cheeks, but this usually just happens once a day, and as a parent, it is better for him to sleep than for us to feel a little sadness at seeing our boy cry a little. With how much love and attention this guy gets the rest of the day, if he grows up with some abandonment complex or trust issues because of this 10 minutes...well, then, that would have been destined to happen anyways. I'm starting to not feel too bad about it, especially when he wakes up from his nap all smiley and cheerful...a situation I know I wouldn't have gotten if he got no nap at all because I was too anxious to hear him crying.

(Do I sound like I'm justifying myself too much? Hmm...you are perceptive)

* Michael has fallen asleep and stayed asleep in his bouncy chair! Someone bought me a bouncy chair for Michael when I'm at work. Watching the Campbells with their bouncy chair, I often envied them for them being able to sleep so well in it while Kathy gets work done. Well, even though it hasn't happened too often, on a few occasions, I have gotten Michael to sleep in his bouncy chair while I bustle around the office getting work done. It's great!! Another bonus to it is that it has dangling things that he can bat at when he's awake, and so he's pretty content in it for a little while then too! However, he's so cute to watch while he is awake and playing with the dangly things, I don't get the work done I need to! Oh well, I still think I chose the better part!

So...tomorrow we are going on seven weeks and the sleep concerns are definitely, definitely ironing themselves out. I'm so grateful! There have been a few "hiccups" during the nights when he normally sleeps so well...sometimes he wakes up in between feedings for an unknown reason...though it seems to be that he just wants some attention because as soon as we touch him and talk to him, he goes back to sleep...and of course, yesterday on my birthday he was up pretty much every hour, but I think it is because he wanted me to enjoy as much of my birthday awake as possible (how thoughtful!). It was a teensy-bit frustrating because, after all, it was my birthday, and doesn't he know that I deserve to sleep in on my birthday, not to be bothered with such trifle things as providing him nourishment and sustenance? What insensitivity!

Haha. Just kidding. But seriously, I had to remind myself of that when it was during the wee hours of the night, that he doesn't understand the concept of giving mommy some slack on her birthday....or maybe he does....I do have to say, there were several occasions during those early morning wakings that I was kind of grumbling at first and then he flashed a BIG smile and a loud "coo!" and I immediately changed my tune to: "Thank you for waking me up for that!" Maybe he just wanted to give me that little birthday present early....

In closing, I am going to spend the last few minutes musing over the fact that Michael never, ever sleeps until 9 am (and still going!). However, because I have a meeting at the Diocese today, he has elected to sleep and sleep and sleep and sleep, and with all this talk about making sure my boy is well-rested, I haven't the heart to wake him up!!

And of course, in my angst to get to my meeting, I got all gussied up and dressed, and couldn't possibly just go back to bed while he is sleeping. This kid, it's almost like he knows when to tease!

So the Bishop will have to wait (well, he's not going to wait on my anways, I'm just one of 100+ people...the show will go on)...but in the mean time, sweet dreams, Michael!