The Journey of Parenthood…

Week Nine Summary

It’s hard to believe my little boy is 10 weeks old! Not a newborn anymore huh? Not that he has looked like a newborn for awhile but still I liked the excuse, “well we just had a baby.” I guess I can’t get away with that one anymore dangit! Anyway here’s what’s been going on this week:

Hands Together

When I did his 2 month update I realized I didn’t know if he can hold his hands together or not so I thought I’d watch out for it this week. And he can!
Napping

I know I mentioned before the nightmare I’ve had with naps. I’ve spent this week reading all I can on the Babywise Blog to try to get some advice. I considered trying Cry It Out…which is a big BW thing where you let the baby cry until they stop on their own, even if it’s the whole nap. I feel guilty doing this because it’s my fault he cries since he’s only crying b/c he wants the pacifier back! I spent the week logging all of his naps and I discovered that he typically sleeps great the first 30-45 min then he wakes up wanting the pacifier and pretty much needs me to go in there and put the paci back in like every 3-5 min for the rest of the nap which is about an hour. Annoying? YES!

I read on the Babywise Blog to put him to sleep RIGHT when he does his first yawn so that’s what we do 🙂
I felt like I was not doing Babywise correctly because he has the paci and that’s a sleep-prop (very anti-BW) and I don’t do CIO. Seth and Crissy came over last night and since she did BW (she was the one who introduced it to me) I asked them what I should do. Crissy made me feel SO much better about myself because she said I’m technically doing Cry It Out since we don’t hold him or comfort him until he falls asleep.

What I do is when he yawns I swaddle him, close the blinds, turn of the light, pat him on the back for a few minutes, kiss him, put him down, put the paci in. I always leave the room with him awake! I thought I was failing because I keep going in there when he cries for the paci but Crissy said I’m not actually comforting him when I go in and I never pick him up so I’m still doing it the “Babywise Way.”

Here he is right before I leave the room!
Then today I met with Stacy for lunch (so so so much fun!!!). She’s a Babywise Mom too and her son uses a paci (Stevie never did so Seth and Crissy couldn’t help me there). I told her my issues and my routine and she said Zach and I are doing it exactly how she did it; that it’s okay to go in there a thousand times as long as we don’t pick him up and that he’s still learning to self soothe and put himself back to sleep! I feel soooo relieved knowing that I’m doing the best I can do! I don’t feel as guilty about the stupid pacifier (although next baby will NOT have the joy of using it!). Stacy said it will get better and that this going-in-there-every-three-min-thing shouldn’t last too long. It gives me hope 🙂 I’m going to keep charting everything and see what works!

Finally asleep 🙂
I also think that maybe he’s had issues b/c of something I’ve been eating lately. For Mother’s Day Zach made a Greek Salad with feta and I ate one on Saturday, one on Sunday, and TWO on Monday (what can I say I LOVE Greek Salad!). We didn’t think about it then but the feta may not have been the best thing for my milk…Kye’s little tummy has been rumbling and his naps haven’t been so great. So I think that may be part of it! No more Greek Salad for me, or at least not so often!

When Kye is actually asleep when it’s time to for him to eat he’s sooo cute when you unswaddle him. I, of course, had to get a little video!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHU399HvTMU

Whenever I go in his room to check on him he’s usually smiling, just like he does once it’s time to get up! That smile is hard to resist 🙂 He smiles a lot in response to things too especially when I smile at him or Zach does.

Discovering the World

I think part of the nap issues may also be that he’s really discovering things lately. He moves that little head from side to side constantly when I’m holding him in my lap or on my shoulder. He’ll do his big eyed, open mouth look and just stare at things. I try to explain to him what he’s looking at but most of the time I can’t even figure it out! I do know he LOVES the color red (which is typical of all babies) as his curtains are red (big mistake I think) so when I close them for his nap he’ll just stare and stare and stare at them so I have to make sure to turn him away from them so he’ll remember that it’s sleepy time.

Happy Spitter

Kye has had some CRAZY amount of spit-up this week! Like CRAZY. As in I-have-to-change-clothes-four-times-a-day crazy! I think it’s to do with my milk and this whole process of getting my supply to go down. I also think he just doesn’t know when to stop and will over eat so then it has no where else to go but out. I honestly am questioning whether or not the child even has GERD. He’s still on the Zantac but he’s spitting up like crazy…is that normal? Also he doesn’t care AT ALL when he does it. He won’t fuss, cry, or seem in pain at all. He’ll just be smiling away and bam vomit. Sometimes he even projectile vomits! I’ve been carrying him and I don’t even realize he’s puked until I hear it hit the floor. Sooo gross. And a lot of the time he’ll puke while I’m nursing so I’ll have nice warm puke right in the middle of my breasts…sexxxxxxy.

Strong Boy

With the whole roll over thing I’ve really noticed how high he can hold up his head. He will prop up on his arms and hold up his head and chest for several minutes before getting tired. Also when I hold him or have him sit with me his head rarely falls to the side anymore! I’ve been counting down until he can sit by himself and while he’s no where NEAR that milestone yet I thought I’d try him on his little infant seat. The box says not to use it until he is 4 months old but the way he holds his head made me think it may be okay to use it early.

Watching how great he sits on his own against our nursing chair is what made me try it!
I’m pretty impressed! While I don’t think it’d be okay to leave him in it for very long, look how great he did!

He really liked it even though he did kind of fall to the side after a little while haha maybe we’ll pull it out again in a couple weeks 🙂 I think you can tell he’s my first child b/c I’m all rush rush rush to get him to achieve things, I hear that one day I’ll wish I could slow it all down 🙂

Your Baby Can Read

Yes, the infomercial. I know. I’m a sucker! But have you ever watched it? The babies really do read! I did some research before ordering it and a lot of the info I found said it really does work so why not? I do not believe in tv watching before the recommended age of two but I do plan to show him the dvd and follow the instructions for him to be able to learn all the words. I feel guilty having him sit in front of the tv to watch it but most people let their babies watch regular tv and at least this should help him! Why am I doing Your Baby Can Read? Well I really wanted to teach him a foreign language! Since I’m home all day with him why not give him the best start possible? Well, Zach was mega against it so we made a compromise and since I can’t teach him a foreign language I get to do this! While we won’t see results for a long time (I’m starting it SUPER young, they recommend 3 months to start but say most people don’t start until even later) I’m enjoying it so far. He really, really loves the video and loves when we read the books and cards. His favorite? “Arms Up!” I show him how to do it and he always laughs!

It also provided me with what to look for in his language development. I need to be hearing him do vowel sounds and blowing out air, all signs that he’s heading in the right direction for speaking someday (duh not anytime soon). I noticed that all his gurgling IS different sounds and that he even blows out! I didn’t know babies could do so much so young! It’s so neat how every little sound he makes now adds up to him being able to communicate with me later!

Here he’s watching it!

Another thing I learned that he loves from the video is “The Itsy Bitsy Spider.” I don’t do the little typical hand thing with it, instead I made up a little game where the spider crawls up him, the rain falls down him, etc. He LOVES it and it’s a for sure smile everytime!

I’ve also learned that he’s enjoying peek-a-boo now! He loves it when I do it to him, as in “where’s kye?” but doesn’t understand yet when I do “where’s Mommy?”

Rattle

When looking over milestones for the second month I saw that he should be able to hold a rattle in his hand. Well up until then he hardly opened his hands! He loved to punch things but never open handed. Of course as soon as I read that I decided we should work on it 🙂

I put this rattle in his hand and was pretty impressed that he held on to it! I don’t think he understood that it was in his hand but he held it there for a long time and shook it when he moved.

He is starting to open up his hands more this week and when he reaches he still mostly does it with a closed fist but he’s starting to do it open-handed some as well. Zach called me in his room all excited because Kye grabbed this ring all by himself! Yay!

I know it seems like a week of a lot of little accomplishments, but to me I have had SO much fun! I love having little goals for us to work on together! It’s such a big responsibility to be a parent and as a stay at home mom, it’s my full time job to help him grow and develop into the best he can become ya know? I feel like it’s so important that I work with him on things and help him learn all that he can because these are the years when he will learn the most and will learn it all the easiest and quickest!

Emily Parker
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