Sleep and our house

With a nasty cold and me going back to work, we had to re-evaluate our sleep situation. Vivi has had moments of being a great night time sleeper, but more recently has been less than stellar. It's nothing too terrible, but we found ourselves in a pattern of her squawking every 2 hours or so. She was eating about every 4. So while it wasn't ideal, certainly, I'd seen worse, it definitely wasn't feeling sustainable. However, it didn't seem to be getting better on its own and sleep is important for all of us to be happy individuals. So following her 6 month appointment, we decided to put a plan in place and see how things went. Our first attempt at sleep training Nathan was such an epic failure and pretty traumatic (we hadn't figured out his silent reflux yet) that I was especially hesitant to do it, but Vivian has been such a drastically different baby than Nathan that I decided to just see how it went. She'd been nursing less at night than normal because of a cold so it seemed like a good time to try it so that she wouldn't be expecting a ton of calories at night.

Also notable, she's drinking two 6 ounce bottles a day like it's nothing and would probably take more if I were able to keep up with that. Nathan rarely ever took more than 5 ounces. I was usually pretty thrilled if he got 8 ounces total while I was working. This definitely makes me less anxious about night weaning her. The girl is not starving. Her thighs are proof. While I don't want to jinx it, we seem to have come so far!

What follows is a log that I kept to help prove to myself that we were making progress because, for me, even one minute of crying feels like too many. I know that some people are absolutely anti-sleep training. I can't blame them. It's terrible. I hate it. It feels torturous for everyone involved. However, I'll say this. In less than a week we have a baby that is happily sleeping super long stretches without interruption. For us, this was the right choice.                                                                                                                                        

First night:
Bedtime - Approximate crying time: 40 minutes
2 hours later - Same as bedtime, but maybe a little shorter.
4:20 - I went in and gave her a dream feed to avoid her waking up for her usual 5:00 am feeding. Never really woke up.
7:15 awake for the day and happy.
I have to say, this took me by surprise. There were none of her usual squawks!

NAPS: Naps went well, no major crying, and she never cried the full 3 minutes prompting a check-in (I should probably note that this was the first day we didn't bind her arms in any way, but she's been going down for naps with no real crying for quite some time, though usually with a pacifier).

Second Night:
Bedtime - Cried 5 minutes, went in, cried 2 minutes - asleep. Approximate crying time: 7 minutes (!!!).
Before our bedtime - 2 squawks of less than 30 seconds each, and right back to sleep.
3:00-4:30 - crying off and on. This was killer, and I used this time to pump.
7:30 - Up for the day and happy, but tired pretty quickly and ready for a nap by 9:00.

NAPS: no crying at all!

Third Night:
Bedtime - NO CRYING!
Before our bedtime - called out once for 2 seconds.
3:30 - 4:15 - crying off and on, but probably only for 5 of those minutes was she well and truly angry. She found her happy place on her belly.

NAPS: Mostly no crying, 2 hour nap and then two really short ones. Rosy cheeks indicate teeth.... a slight wrench in our plan.

Fourth Night: Fussed for about 5 minutes then asleep.
11:30 - cried out for about 1 minute, then quiet.
3:20-4:45 - This one was bad. She started out just crying out and fussing for the first 30 minutes or so. When I checked in on her and patted her she calmed down, so I knew she wasn't hungry, but she couldn't seem to be able to settle. I finally decided to give her some tylenol in case it was her teeth and 15 minutes later she was asleep. I don't know if it finally wore her down or if she just had been in pain. Feeling a little guilty.
7:40 - Awake and happy though looking pretty tired still.

NAPS: Limited crying. resulting in 2hr, 1.5hr, and 30 minute naps.

Fifth Night: Cried for 10 minutes (hard) and I broke down and went and gave her a paci and stroked her head. Asleep in less than 2 minutes, but cried out 45 minutes later (gave her the paci) and I'm afraid I started a bad habit again. In my defense, Brian was pretty sure he has the flu and was sleeping in the room next to her so I was trying to be nice to all involved (and myself while putting Nathan to bed too). I'm afraid I really mucked things up here.
12:30 - 1:05 - Awake and crying off and on.
No 3am wake up!
7:15 - Awake and happy

After this point she generally starting going to sleep with little to no fussing at all. Naps she's usually good about too as long as she's not too overtired. It's not all perfect, but it's SO much better than where we were. I can see better sleep for all of us!

Vivian and Food

Vivian has been doing great with food. She's really liking purees usually, and is a big fan of bread crusts, bananas, and a few other fun foods. Periodically, I look over and she'll be doing something like this, and I can't help but laugh. 

Nathan Says (2.5years)

Conversation with Brian:
Nathan - "Dad! Look at all that snow (pronounced 'no)!"
Brian - "Yeah, that's a lot of 'no."
Nathan- "No, Dad, it's 'no."

I was singing O, Holy Night at bedtime, he pipped in with, "O Mama, O Mama."

Us: Do you want a little bit of X?
Nathan: No, very BIG much X.
(I have now figured out that he was going for opposites little/big - bit/much... kinda makes sense, actually.)

"Mama, I'm going to see something amazing this summer."
I can't wait to see what it is!

Liz's pictures from the first day

Elizabeth sent along