Ingenue Mom

First of all, I've been reading this blog - smonkyou - that I have mentioned before, but I think you all should read! It's great! But he has posted about their decision to do a floor bed rather than a regular crib. It's an interesting idea that Lewis and I are going to talk about for our next child. The concept comes from the Montessori ideas of how children learn best. I've always been interested in the Montessori schools. Although I don't think we will send Isis to a Montessori school, I do agree with a lot of their concepts on how to help children learn. The idea of the floor bed has to do with allowing your child the opportunity to explore their environment themselves. You make their bedroom completely safe and baby-friendly and place a regular crib mattress on the floor. You start placing the baby on it at the same time you would have started putting them in their crib. Read more about it here and on smonkyou . He also posted pictures of their child's be...

HOTmilk has lots of cute lingerie for pregnant & nursing women! Although, I must admit, some of the pictures on the website really freak me out. But I definitely wish my nursing bra looked a little more like this... and a little less like this... US retailers: MilkSmartMama figleaves Linda the bra lady Breakout Bras Panano

So exciting!!!!! Last night we did our normal routine - fed Isis at 7:00pm, put her down at 8:00pm after her bath & bedtime routine. We knew the night was starting off a little strange because she didn't cry - AT ALL. Not even a peep! So much so that I made Lewis go in and check to make sure she was still breathing! She was so quiet!! Normally, she will get up sometime between 12 & 1 and then sometime between 3 & 4. Well, last night I woke up at 3:00am to find that she hadn't woken up yet!! Of course I kinda freaked out. Was something wrong?? But I heard her stir a little bit. I promptly poked Lewis to make sure he could enjoy this moment with me! Isis had finally slept for longer than 4 hours!! We were actually at 7 hours!!! Lewis went back to sleep while I just lay there wide awake because I just couldn't get over it! Finally, she woke up at 3:30am, but she didn't cry & scream like she normally does. She just cried a little, but I could tell she was up...

Written by my husband, Lewis... Before 36 weeks I waited with anticipation for Cameron to go into labor with almost an element of magic to it. Somehow I just secretly hoped it was going to be the perfect labor; short and wonderful. It was only after we thought Cam’s water had possibly broken twice that I began to almost not anticipate it anymore. I wasn’t as nervous about being a dad as I was about just waiting for labor to actually come. Based on the fact that we had both agreed that we wanted to do everything natural, I knew that it would be difficult. We began early preparing for how things would go so that we would have the best chance of succeeding. Logically I knew that labor wasn’t going to be all that pleasant but you always have that thought in the back of your mind that tells you that your wife will be the 1 in a million that has no pain from it and lasts 30 min from beginning to end. It’s funny to listen to people talk about their labor experience or about how they f...

I've asked Lewis to write a couple of posts for my blog because I want people to see what he has to say about a few things! He is currently working on the first post I asked him to do about his perspective of our labor & delivery experience. I also asked him to write about cloth diapers and also what things he's learned. I'm trying to think of other things I want him to write & I'll post them under "A dad's perspective." In the meantime, check out these other dad blogs: Smonk You: A story about being a dad Write to Mean: Fatherness

These are the pictures from the website , not pictures of Isis, but look what I bought!!! Hydrangea Felt Headband in White & Cream Bouquet Felt Headband in Vineyard & Purple Sage

First let me say that several of my friends bought me a wonderful swing at one of my baby showers! I was so excited, as were they! We all remember hearing stories from our moms about putting us in swings & how much we loved them! Well, this has not been the case with Isis! We tried putting her in the swing we had and she SCREAMED!! It was like we were hurting her by putting her in it! I was so sad! On top of this, she hates pacifiers. We have tried like 5 different kinds and she won't take one. She will, on the other hand, suck on her hand. I'm not a huge fan of this because after a while, you can take a pacifier away. You can't take away a thumb! But what are you gonna do? She will seriously choke on the pacifier if you even try to give one to her. She's just adamant that she's not going to use one! (Anyone seeing any resemblances to me?) This is why my nap issues have been so rough! She won't take a pacifier, won't sleep in a swing or in her bouncy sea...

I weighed myself this morning & was happy to find that I've reached my pre-pregnancy weight!! 7 weeks & I'm back to what I was before!! Except I'm not. My hips are wider & things are still distributed strangely. And my belly is not quite as tight as it used to be - hard to believe, huh? LOL. So although the number says normal, the pants say "nuh uh." I've been talking to Diana about Jazzercise & I'm thinking I may give it a shot! While it all sounds very 1987 to me, I'm thinking the price is good & Diana has a lot of fun & it would be a way to get out of the house & they have childcare for $1! Fabulous! I'm there! And by the way, I have plans this week to go to the library with Diana & to go to Laurel's house on Thursday & maybe to go to lunch with my dad & grandfather! Yay!!

First, the title of this post is not a reference to alcohol. LOL. Rather, let's have a discussion about PPD and other post-baby hardships. I'm not sure how it was for all the moms out there. Sometimes I think we feel like we can't admit if things were really hard. I know for me, I've already fallen prey to that need to act like everything is just going great. As you can see with my sleep stuff, it's not necessarily going great. I've gotten messages and comments from several people about my nap training. First - "training" is sort-of a strong word for what I've been doing. I've really just been trying to put her down in her crib for naps. Mainly because I just couldn't deal with holding her for 5-6 hours of naps everyday. And there are reasons for that. And I would like to be candid with you about those reasons. For those who know me in real life, you'll know that I've always been one of those people that has to be going, going, goin...

(I've run out of sleeping pictures...) I think I'm just troubleshooting at this point to see what method is going to work. I know I need to give it a little while. Sleep training is supposed to take 3-7 days - which it did for Isis - and then nap training is supposed to take up to 2 weeks - which it's looking like it's going to. Anyway, today Isis went back to what she did a couple of days ago. She went to sleep in the crib for naps within 5-15 minutes. She woke up in the middle of 2 different naps and soothed herself back to sleep within 5 minutes. She woke up a little while later for a total of about an hour per nap for the first 2. The third nap, I put her to sleep in her crib and then when she didn't soothe herself after she woke up in the middle of it, I went and got her. She ended up falling asleep while I held her and I let her because I knew she needed some sleep. Plus I've been reading all these message boards on Baby Center and this one woman is like ...

I'm preparing to do some post-baby shopping! I'm waiting until I can fit in all my clothes again. I'm almost there, but not quite. Any pants that are a little stretchy, I can fit in. So my stretchy jeans fit - my ones that have no stretch are still not awesome. I've got a couple more pounds left to lose, too. So I started making an effort to watch what I eat today. I'm nursing Isis, so I can't exactly "diet." I just want to make sure that all my calories are good calories! So I ate waffles for breakfast, a turkey sandwich for lunch and some sushi for dinner. Not too bad! My snacks were fruits & stuff, so that's good! I have gift cards from Forever 21 from Christmas that I'm excited to spend! I asked for gift cards there for Christmas so that I could buy some post-baby clothes when I was ready! I also have some leftover Christmas money & income from my blogging! So I think I might buy a new pair of 7 For All Mankind jeans because they...

I think it's Day 4...I've lost track. Either way, today was rough!!! I cried at one point! LOL Isis did okay going to sleep in her crib during the day for naps, but she didn't soothe herself today. She woke up screaming after 20-40 minutes of her first 2 naps. She didn't sleep much at all. I think part of it is due to her new bedding! It's absolutely fabulous - made by my friend Susan, but she's used to seeing through the slats in her crib and I think she gets scared not being able to see. But anyway, since she didn't sleep a lot, she was super tired and therefore SUPER fussy! I thought maybe it was a growth spurt because a couple of times the only thing I could do to calm her down was nurse her. But once she calmed down later in the day, she went back to just seeming hungry every 3 hours or so. I don't really care about putting her on a consistent schedule right now. We're doing the consistent bedtime, but during the day the schedule just kinda goes...

Nap training today was a little messed up. I had my 6 week postpartum doctor appointment today, so we weren't home for one of her naps. And her schedule last night was different with feedings. I don't wake her up at night for feedings. I just let her go as long as she goes. It's just been lucky enough to happen that she would wake up between 8:00am and 8:30am since starting sleep training. But last night, her last feeding was at 6:45am, so she wasn't going to get up anywhere close to 8:00. So we got up at 9:30am and she ate at 9:45am. Then she went down for a nap around 10:30am. She cried just about 5 minutes and then fell asleep. She woke up after an hour and I had to hold her to get her back to sleep because she was clearly still really tired, just couldn't soothe herself back to sleep. It's funny, I guess you just get used to your own child, or maybe all children are just clear about some things - but if she's done with her nap and she's slept enough,...

I'm not going to post about Sleep Training anymore, because she's got it! She's been going to sleep within 5-10 minutes of putting her down at 8:00pm since the 3rd night of sleep training! Even with my nap training, she's still been doing really well! We stopped doing the 10:30pm feeding because we were having a hard time waking her up and she was actually going less time between feedings after that. So we are back to feeding her at 7:00pm, then she gets up - usually around 12:00am and then 2 more times. But last night, she woke up at 11:45pm, then 2:45am, then 6:45am. So that's awesome, but after that 6:45am feeding, there was no chance of her getting up at 8:00am. So today has been off a little bit. But I'll talk about that later. I want to talk about yesterday - Day 2 of nap training!! Yesterday was the best day so far in the entire 6 weeks of having her!! Here's how our schedule went: 8:00am - woke up & nursed, then changed diaper, got ready for the ...

Nap training was not so awesome today. She does great going down for the nap. For her first nap, I did a shortened version of her bedtime routine and then put her down for her nap. She cried for 20 minutes and then fell asleep for about 20 minutes and woke up crying. We let her cry a little and went in to calm her and kiss her and everything, but we couldn't get her calmed down. So I picked her up and held her for a while and let her sleep on me for a minute. I ended up putting her back in the crib asleep and she slept for another 40 minutes total - including the time I held her. Normally this nap lasts 2 - 2.5 hours, so it only being 1 hour worried me. With the second nap, she went down & cried only 10 minutes before falling asleep - I think that was thanks to the fact that the last nap was short. But after 40 minutes - one sleep cycle - she woke up crying again. This time I let her cry for about 5 minutes and then Lewis went in to calm her. She wasn't crying very hard bef...

"What took me by surprise is the way I feel when her face lights up when I walk into a room because I am her world and she is mine. Being a mother is like taking your heart out of your chest and watching it walk around." -- Author Unknown

I feel like a week ago, she wasn't doing much of anything and within the past 7 days, she's become a different baby! It's crazy!! First of all - biggest news was the smiling!! It tends to happen most often when you are changing her diaper. She definitely loves being naked! She also has more control of her head when she lifts it up during tummy time or when she's on your shoulder! (The picture above is just tummy time. I couldn't get a good shot of her lifting her head.) She's getting a little less wobbly, but we've still got a little ways to go. She will also now follow things or people with her eyes if they move around. She will hold your eye contact for longer. She's always made eye contact, but then she would kinda look at your hairline or around the edge of your head rather than right in your eyes. Now she will just stare at your for a minute straight in your eyes. She mimics our facial expressions sometimes. You usually have to do it several times b...

She's definitely got the sleep training stuff down. Last night we did the routine, put her down at 8:00pm, she kinda whimper-cried for 5-7 minutes and then fell asleep. We woke her at 10:30pm to eat, then she woke up at 2:00am and 5:30am. We all got up for the day at 8:30am. Not too shabby. I'm hoping after a few weeks of this, she starts stretching those night feedings. Right now we're at about a 3 1/2 hour schedule. Big news today is we started the nap training stuff. Meaning that we are doing a shorter version of the bedtime routine for her naps, then putting her down sleepy but awake in her crib in her room. She had been falling asleep for her naps while I held her because it was literally the only way I could get her to sleep. But that was NOT my favorite! Not because I don't love the cuddling - I totally do - but because then she didn't sleep as soundly and she would wake up if I ever moved or anything. But I figured that was better than not taking a nap at a...

We were just talking about this and I thought I'd post because I think it's interesting. It's so funny how every couple tends to just mesh in different ways. I think it's neat to see how different couples have their different style. Lewis and I apparently have a weird style. People always comment on how we deal with holidays with each other. Let me explain... We were just talking about Valentine's Day. I said something off-hand about how I would think it was really weird if Lewis bought me a Valentine's Day card or gift. It's just not necessary. I've always thought that. We usually tend to stay in on Valentine's Day and just make dinner or something because we don't want to deal with the restaurants where everyone is going out. Actually, I think there have been several years that we have forgotten that it even was Valentine' Day. Then the weirdest thing that people always comment on is the fact that we don't buy each other birthday or Chr...

This is Everly Veda from Dear Baby - and I WANT that headband !! Thanks to a recommendation from my friend Megan, I have found a new blog that I'm completely obsessed with. Dear Baby is written by a new mom from San Francisco! Her daughter, Everly Veda, was born 2 days after Isis! I feel like in some ways she is the mirror of me in San Francisco - except way cooler & more eloquent. She used a midwife & had a natural labor like I did. She is using cloth diapers like I am! She & her husband both have tattoos like me & Lewis! She is just so cute & her little girl reminds me of Isis, too! I am excited about following her blog as Isis gets older. It's like a little friend across the country! She also posts great quotes sometimes... "The moment a child is born, the mother is also born. She never existed before. The woman existed, but the mother, never. A mother is something absolutely new." ~Rajneesh "Certain is it that there is no kind of affe...

I'm not sure if anyone will have any suggestions for this, but I end up taking the majority of my pictures of Isis with my iPhone because it's just always right there! So I would love to get a nicer kind of photo editing app! Any suggestions? Right now I use Polarize and Mill Colour, but they're both free and the paid apps do tend to be better for stuff like that.

As I said yesterday, she cried 5 minutes & then went straight to sleep again last night! That was pretty fabulous! We woke her up at 10:30pm to feed one last time before we went to bed. She woke up to eat at 2:15am and then at 4:00am and then woke up for the morning at 8:00am. The 2:15am to 4:00am was unusual. She usually goes at the very least 3 hours between waking up at night. We couldn't figure out why she woke up that early, but she was crying a bunch and clearly it wasn't just a little night wakening. She wanted something. So I went in there and decided to try to feed her after trying to calm her down for a little. After I had been feeding her for about 1 minute, she had the most massive poop! So clearly she woke up because of that. She usually gets a little fussy right before a big poop. (Understandably - not always the best feeling for adults either! LOL) But then she slept until 8:00am, so that was good! I'm still very pleased with our sleep training progress ...

I've read that there is sometimes a 6-week fussy period. Several days ago, Isis started having hers. Everyday from 6:00pm - 7:00pm, she gets really fussy! It's almost like clockwork. Exact same time everyday. She will only calm down if she is constantly entertained. Like we have to get up and walk her around the house looking at everything and then she'll stay calm. This sounds not so bad, except it's right when we are usually sitting down to eat dinner. Did this happen to anyone else? When does it pass?

Who uses a baby sling? I need help figuring out how to use one!! Can you use it if she doesn't really have head control yet? Because I tried kinda laying her in there and she hated it. I may have done it wrong though. I'm trying to find pictures, but I kinda need someone to walk me through how to do this. LOL. I have several of the slings that are the ring slings like the first 2 pictures above. Who can help me??

Thursday night was by far the best!! I fed her at 7:00pm and we did the bedtime routine after that. She was in the bed at 8:00pm and get this...she cried for 5 minutes & fell asleep on her own!!! She stayed completely asleep!! She woke up at 10:00pm and cried for a few minutes, but it was more like a whimper kind-of cry and she went back to sleep after several minutes, so we didn't go in and get her. She ended up waking up to eat at 11:15pm, then 3:00am and 6:00am. Last night raised several other questions for me. First of all, she ate at 6:00am and she is totally one of those babies that wakes up with the sun. We don't have curtains for her room yet, so it's bright in there in the morning. There are these off-white kind of blinds, but no curtains. So if she wakes up to eat any time after 5:00am, it's getting light outside when we put her back down to sleep. Therefore she was pretty fussy and slept very lightly from about 6:30am to about 8:00am. She woke up for goo...

I have found that there are several iPhone apps that I can't live without now!! The first and most important one is called Total Baby and we use it to track her feeding, diaper changes, baths & sleep times. It was like $4.99, but it has been so worth it!! Now when we go to the doctor, I can tell him specifically how she's doing - which may seem over the top to some people, but it really helps me keep my head on straight. Without organization, I go insane. I also can't do without Facebook because I'm constantly uploading pictures & messaging my friends who are moms with different questions! Keeping in touch has never seemed so important!! It's also really fun to play around on Facebook at 2am when you're up feeding the baby. Other middle-of-the-night entertaining apps are Words With Friends (do you have a username?? let's play!) and Echofon where I'm checking Twitter all the time. I also play Solebon Solitaire and update/check my Tumblr stuff...

Night 1 was Tuesday night. I fed Isis at 7:00pm. Then around 7:40 we gave her a bath & then did our bedtime routine. We put her down in the crib at 8:00pm. She had yawned a couple of times during the routine, so we knew she was sleepy, but she was awake when she went in the crib. That night, she didn't start crying immediately. She started a few minutes later and kinda cried off & on for a little while. We went in to comfort her and kiss her and pat her belly about every 5-10 minutes depending on how upset she was. We only had to go in twice in an hour because she wasn't that upset. She kept getting quiet for long periods and made her little cooing noises, so we knew she was already starting to soothe herself. She ended up falling asleep right before 9:00. Her total amount of crying time was about 30 minutes. That night, she woke up to eat at 10:40pm, 2:00am, 5:00am and then around 7:45am - when we got up for the day. I did a morning routine with her at the 7:45am time....

Before reading my thoughts, please keep in mind that I don't tend to follow the attachment parenting views and I am a fan of scheduling & sleep training babies. I know that everyone has different opinions about how best to raise their babies, so I just wanted to throw that out there that my opinions on these books comes from the above general viewpoints. Feel free to disagree! On Becoming Baby Wise by Gary Ezzo, M.A. and Robert Bucknam, M.D. I read this book while I was pregnant & then I read a lot of it again right at the beginning of Isis being home. I had planned on just really sticking with this, but found that the only thing I could really put into practice was the every 2 1/2 to 3 hour feeding routine & then eat, wake, sleep pattern. While I still think it's a great method if you can do it, I found myself basically flying by the seat of my pants right at the beginning and my main problems were that I couldn't get Isis to go to sleep. She would fight it so...

So we started sleep training with Isis yesterday. She's almost 6 weeks old and some people may have strong opinions against sleep training an almost 6 week old baby, but I've been reading & reading about it & Lewis & I both felt that she was ready. She'd been doing a few things lately that made us feel like she was ready and she had also been having a hard time going to sleep and staying asleep which led to her being overtired & fussy all the time. So we decided it was time to help her out. We started sleep training last night, but I started doing some different stuff with her naps on Monday & the difference in just the last 2 days has been CRAZY! First of all, I thought I should share the books I've been reading. I'm going to share thoughts on them in my next post. I'm also going to share the order I read them in. On Becoming Baby Wise by Gary Ezzo & Robert Bucknam, M.D. Twelve Hours Sleep by Twelve Weeks Old by Suzy Giordano Bab...