Sleep: Nights Four, Five, & Six

So the latter half of this week has gone exceptionally well. Night four, Emmaline woke up for about 45 minutes at 2am. She cried pretty hard but fell back asleep and didn't get up until 6:50.

Night five she woke up a couple of times, cried a little bit, but never really stayed up. And slept until 7am!

Finally, last night she went to bed around 7:30. Cried a couple times, once around 9 and once around 9:45, but nothing of any length. And is just now waking up at 6am.

So overall, I never expected a week of sleep training to go as well as it has. Of course we're very cautious, but very optimistic that Emmaline's on the right track. Overall, we think this week has been a great success.

As for Ab and I, we're still on the air mattress in the family room. However, I think tonight may be our last night there, and we just may go back to sleeping in our own bed. How novel.

Family Camp

So there is plenty of discussion on how to get your child to sleep through the night. There are books written about it, websites devoted to it, and pretty much everyone has an opinion on the subject.

So the past 3 nights Abigail and I have been doing what we call "family camp". Actually more traditionally it has been called "sleep training", "crying it out", etc. However since the head of our bed shares the same wall that Emmaline's crib is on, crying it out is very difficult. So we took another approach on Sunday night and setup 'camp' in the family room. Emmaline wasn't invited :)

We decided to give it 3 nights at first (although Abigail threatened all year if that's what it took). Here's how the first three nights have gone:

Night 1 (Sunday into Monday):
Emmaline cried from 10:10 till about 11:45. I'm pretty sure she hit defcon 1 during this time. This is as hard as I've heard her cry. She also woke up at about 3 but cried for only 10 minutes. She ended up sleeping until 7:00.

Night 2 (Monday into Tuesday):
Emmaline again woke up, but this time much later, 12:30 and cried till 1:30. Her cry wasn't nearly as bad as night #1. Please don't get me wrong, she brought her A game that night, but it wasn't too bad. She woke up again at 5:10, and we let her cry for another half hour and she slept till 6:40.

Tuesday afternoon Emmaline went down for a nap and wasn't quite ready to go down, she cried for 10 minutes and then took a nice little nap after that spell. This was quite a change from the week between Christmas and New Year where she cried for 45 minutes during a similar situation and never fell asleep.

Night 3 (Last night):
Abigail and I started to realize that three nights might not do the trick. So we went to Costco last night and bought an AeroBed. We're getting serious. Emmaline did wake up twice last night, but cried for only 5 minutes each time and fell back asleep. She was up for good at 5:40.

So overall sleep training is going well. I think we'll be conducting 'Family Camp' through the rest of this week and see where we are. But so far, after 3 nights we both feel like she's making progress.

Look what I can do...

About the only thing more impressive than me blogging twice in two days is this:

Things they never tell you at baby school

So I've decided there are a whole lot of things that people never tell parents-to-be before they join the parent club. Some are obvious. Others aren't. Either way, below is subset of things I've observed that no one told me.

1. 7:45 PM is an acceptable bed time. The thought goes something like, "If I go to bed now, I might actually get 8 or 9 hours of sleep."
2. TiVo is a must. I mean a must (actually, my coworkers tried to tell me how great TiVo was, but I was too cheap to listen. Once I had Emmaline, I was all ears).
3. Building on #1 & #2, if a live sporting event goes past the above bedtime, simply TiVo it and watch it the next morning at 5:30 AM, you'll be up.
4. Kids don't watch as much Sesame Street as they used to. When I was a kid, that's what I watched, although that's all there was at the time. Kids just don't watch Sesame Street nearly as much. For example, I've yet to find anyone that knows about Murray & his Sheep. Which is an excellent bit. Further, the amount of cameos on that show is really amazing.
   
5. A lot of kid shows are trippy. Sesame Street is certainly not excluded. They have all these weird little short segments of stop motion photography. Then there is Yo Gabba Gabba. That crap is trippy with a capital T (this fact is also covered here).
6. As a parent you get peed on and barfed on a lot. Just accept it. Emmaline is almost 14 months old, and I bet we average 3 times a week for these unexpected events.
7. There are a lot of baths, a lot of times more than once a day. Whether the little one is dirty or not, it passes time, and they are humored, a perfect combination.
   

I'm sure this list will expand, but these are my observations at 14 months.

Christmas Pictures

I've created a picasa web album full of our Christmas pictures, you can find it here:

From Christmas Pictures

Santa, It's Not You, It's Me

Ab and Emmaline went to see Santa this afternoon. This picture:

• perfectly captures the essence of our last 14 months
• was no surprise to either of us
• states "Season's Greetings", but I think only one person in the picture is actually thinking that.

Merry Christmas everyone, from Santa, me, Ab, and (reluctantly) Emmaline.  :)

Life as a 1 Year Old

Life with Emmaline can be rewarding, challenging, and sanity questioning. However most of the time it's a lot of fun. She's goofy, playful and very interactive.

We took her yesterday to her 1-year-old doc appointment. She's still somewhere between 90 & 95 percentile in height, weight & head circumference. So that's good I guess. If she keeps this up, I believe I can stop contributing on her 529 account because she's a lock for a volleyball scholarship. Right?

Anyway, I seldom post without pictures, and this time is no different.

A lot of evenings you can find Emmaline in her jammies (aka a 'sleeper'). Tonight she was wearing her pink hearts. Just before this picture she was reading a book on her own which I tried to capture. When she saw the camera she tossed the book over her right shoulder and lit up for the camera...

Sooner or later she forgets about Mom & Dad and decides to play with her toys. Usually this involves the following steps:

1. Take the toy out of whatever container it is found in
   
2. Carefully visually inspect the toy
3. (Optional) Bite on the toy with your 4 front teeth
   
4. Toss it aside.
5. Repeat

At some point in the evening, she becomes unhappy with something. If that previous sentence sounds arbitrary, well, it is. "Something" cannot be defined, and is seldom ever the same "something". I can't quite recall what this "something" was, but certainly she wasn't happy with something...

When she's upset, one easy remedy is taking her outside to 'walk the grounds'. She and Daddy spend quite a bit of time outside looking at the trees, touching leaves, etc.

Finally, we can never forget about my propensity to make a complete fool out of myself. At some point she'll be ashamed of me. Until then, I'll continue to look like and idiot...