Sleep- Or lack of.

The boys have been waking up super early of late. Harrison, until yesterday, was getting up at 5am, or even earlier!

All the boys have had colds for a few weeks now, and Harrison has had a bad cough, which is only just improving. I think thats why he's not been sleeping great. So with Allister teething and waking up around 3am, or like last night, 1am, 2am, 3am, 5am I am pretty tired!

At least Harrison seems to be back to normal and getting up around 6:30 or later again, I am thankful for that! Once Allister's top teeth come through (they are RIGHT there!) I am hoping to get some sleep again, I am not a very good tired person. I have zero patience, and am a complete grumpy bum.

You really do forget how little sleep you get that first year. I don't mind the early wake-up call if only I can get some rest during the night! When Harrison was teething I could catch up later in the day, so if he was up all night I would nap when he had his morning nap. But with Harrison around its impossible, and I have (or feel like I have) so much to do I resist napping in the afternoon, its the only time I have a kidless hour or so. Add to that the fact that Matt is working all hours, we are all pretty tired in this house right now!

At least theres an end in sight.......Matts work shcdeule will calm down after the middle of next week, and those teeth better be here soon or I will go crazy!

Sleep training

I am very lucky to have good sleepers.

Sleep training in this house entails....

1: Not nursing them to sleep during the day.

2: Making sure they go to nap in their own crib.

3: Putting them down way BEFORE they are tired.

4: trying to keep them on some sort of schedule until they get the hang of it.

That's it! No crying it out required, i find a crib mirror and some sort of toy helps for distraction at this age. And I let them fuss and whine a bit when I first leave. But I never had to let my babies cry, for which I am very thankful! I'm not sure I can do it. I did it a little with Harrison, just a handful of times when I was at the end of my tether and he needed to sleep. Looking back he was probably teething or something at the time, but it happened rarely.

Allister goes to sleep all by himself and he is happy as a lamb. He is sleeping through till around 5am and then goes back to sleep till 6:30 or 7 ish. I think that 5am feed will be hard to drop when we wean, Harrison always slept till 6:30 from 3 months, so we didn't have that issue!

yay for sleeping babies!

We had almost forgotten what normal was!

After many bouts of sickness over the last 3 weeks, and Harrison being out of sorts with his lack of naps I had almost forgotten what our "normal" was. Well, this week its back.

And it feels good!

When the house is not running at full steam, things just don't go smoothly, and all the rules and plans go out of the window. We watch too much TV and don't do enough fun stuff, we stay in the house too much because we are all out of whack, and everything seems to slip.

Then, when things start to get back to normal, and we feel better, it takes a week to get our grove back. The house especially gets so messy and dirty when I am sick, and it seems to take days to put it all back together.

Well, we are almost back on track!

We are going out most morning, running errands, the park or playing in the sand box, and then back home for lunch and then naps. Naps are back BIG TIME! Harrison is napping so well right now, with his potty training all done, he is now waking up earlier in the mornings than he used to, as he needs to pee. His is pretty much dry most nights and naps now, and we only have a rare accident during the day. Mostly because he wants to eat or do something super exciting that he just cant be bothered to go, even when reminded. Some things are just way more interesting than peeing don't you know! I put the dry nights down totally to these night time sleep pants. they are pretty much like cloth diapers, but slip on just like underwear. They are super thick, the photo doesn't really show how thick. But as Harrison was taking off a nappy and pull-up these have been great. they only hold about 1 pee, so when Harrison first started using them he would wake up wet in the middle of the night, and we changed sheets a lot for a week or two. But now he knows when he pees, they have trained him to sleep dry at night most nights. Occasionally he will wake up and need to go potty at night, but most mornings he wakes up dry, its pretty awesome!

The bug that Harrison had recently was a bad one, its only now he is 100% well again. After the sickness he got diarrhea, and we had a couple of messy incidents, but mostly he made it to the potty. Then I got sick Tuesday night, very sick. I can honestly say I don't think I have ever had a stomach virus as an adult, all my throwing up has been totally self inflicted if you know what I mean. Well, I was up all night ill, and them Matt had to stay home Wednesday to watch the boys as I was too ill. Then he got sick too, but he got off lucky (although he wouldn't say that!) as he felt terrible but didn't get too much of the other symptoms. I guess I need to get used to these bugs working their way round the whole gang! Allister stayed healthy and strong, thanks to his extra breast milk antibodies I guess!

Allister is finally sleeping through the night.

Can I get a "whoop!"

Thank you.

He goes from 7:30-8pm when he goes to bed, right through till 6 am at least. Its so nice to be catching up on some sleep! He is stuffing his face like crazy with his solids now, and tries to grab the spoon and bowl and feed himself, so finger foods will be coming soon, he is so ready! He is eating fairly chunky food now and says "mmmmmm" all the time.

He still isn't quiet sitting up, but it wont be long! He sits for a little while, so he is working on it! He only has 1 or 2 lbs left till he outgrows his infant carrier, so he needs to sit soon or I wont be able to sit him anywhere!

Anyhow, I'm off to grab a few minutes of quiet time while both the boys sleep.

:)

50/50

Right now Harrison is napping about 50% of the time, and that's being generous!

I guess he will be giving them up sooner than i thought, or maybe when he starts his MDO program, then preschool, he'll revert back to being a napper?

The days he naps sure are a lot easier on us all, he is an active little guy, and needs some extra sleep.

Harrison will be doing 2 days a week at his MDO, Tuesday and Friday morning 9:30-1pm. They will give him a packed lunch. I know he is going to love it! He is such a social little guy, he's going t have such fun, I cant wait to see his first craft project and hear all about his day!

I'm so excited for him :)

His first day is September 3rd.

Tummy sleeping.

Allister is rolling like crazy now, he's spending a lot of time on his tummy. Today he rolled during nap time and instead of waking up screaming he settled down back to sleep. I hate the first few times they do this, I checked on him so many times!

I'm hoping he starts napping longer now though, he's been waking himself up and his short naps together with Harrison's tantrums have been taking there toll.

Allister update.

Allister is getting such a personality now its adorable.

He did his first little giggle for me yesterday, i love this phase, in fact I love them all! I am enjoying them all the more now knowing how fast they go buy, and knowing what fun is to come.

He is reaching lots of milestones now...

He can lift his head and shoulders right off the floor during tummy time.

He rolls over from his tummy still.

He is reaching out to bat at things as he recently discovered he has hands!

This has led to his finger and thumb sucking!

He also will stare at his hands as if he's thinking "Wow, look what I got!"

Hes wearing size 3-6 or 6 months clothes.

He is now sleeping a whole 5 or 6 hours a night, so therefore is only getting up once to feed. This is AWESOME! He even went 6 1/2 hours the other night! Hes been doing this a little over a week, so we are now pretty much down to 6 feeds a day and one at night. So much more manageable! He's a quick eater now too! We are done in 10-15 minutes, when you think you can spend 4 or 5 hours a day nursing in the beginning and now we are down to under 2 its amazing how much more free time you get!

Allister is starting to fall into some sort of schedule, with more predictable awake and sleep times. In fact this morning he was looking sleepy, so I laid him in his crib for the first time, and turned on his mobile. He was asleep in 10 minutes! All by himself! Anyone who has a newborn understands what a big feat that is, to just lay a baby down and for him to get himself to sleep is something most parents can only dream of. Lets hope its not a fluke!

I think my "I love to sleep" genes must be very strong!

I'm hoping this means sleep training and sleeping through the night will be as easy with Allister as it was with Harrison, no Cry It Out in this house!

Thats all for now!

Turning ONE must be exhausting!

Since Harrison turned one he has been sleeping extra long! Every morning he has been sleeping in till 8:30am. Now anyone who has a baby knows this is heaven! Especially as he is still going down at 8pm the night before. I have also had to go wake him from his afternoon nap for his dinner, or he would sleep right through!

I may use this as a chance to wean, we are still breastfeeding, but now we have made it to one year, and only feed once a day it may be time to have my body back. Bitter-sweet.

Good job I had no plans today.,........

As my baby is sleeping the whole day away!
On a typical morning Harrison wakes up around 6:30-7am, he then plays in his crib a little while and then I go get him. After playing, breakfast, nursing and bathies he then takes a nap around 9:30-10am.
This morning he slept in a little so I put him down for his nap at 10am. He didn't want to nap though so he played a while and I listened to him on the monitor. After about 45 minutes (will this child ever nap???) Harrison decides to play the "If I throw my Bunny out of my crib Mummy will come Game". After 3 or 4 rounds of this, he gives in and goes to sleep, its around 11am by now.
Well he is still asleep. I have checked on him 1000 times, yes he is breathing and he seems happy! Just sleepy..........its now 3:52pm. I have cleaned the whole house, chatted to Auntie Jules and Grammy, caught up on emails but I know the moment I get the ironing board out he will wake up. He will also be starving hungry as he slept so long!

This is how we nap.....

When we are sick. That's my bed and my leg which I couldn't move for
an hour yesterday.