life with baby

Pacifier Elimination Day 4

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Well, it’s the beginning of the end of babyhood, I suppose. It feels kind of symbolic to eliminate the pacifier.

I had been thinking pretty hard about it for a while now, figuring out when the “right” time would be. When he doesn’t have any cold, when he’s not teething, when he seems ready. Maybe this summer? Not too long though, I don’t want to have to explain the disappearance with fairies or something.

But as usual, things tend to work themselves out. We forgot to bring a pacifier in for Jameson on Wednesday and Thursday last week, only finding out Thursday evening at pick up that the daycare had been giving him a “loaner” which he knew wasn’t his. Consequently, he wasn’t really sucking on it but more holding it for comfort.

“Well, how is he doing falling asleep with it?”

“It takes longer, but he seems fine.”

Well, okay then.

Let’s just keep doing that.

So far, so okay.

Jameson never stopped using the up to 6 months pacifiers (the small ones), but we had purchased bigger ones for him he never used. We swapped all these ones out for the big ones, knowing he wouldn’t suck on them but hoping he would hold on to it for comfort.

Friday night was his very last night (little did he know). On Saturday, we put him down for his nap and bed with the big one. He does pretty well, and fell asleep on me for bed time. Day 1 is a great success. I am winning dad over to my side (he was not completely on board at first).

Day 2 Jameson seemed to figure out that everything had changed. He had a hard time going down for his nap, requiring soothing from both mom and dad at turns before finally falling asleep on dad. He points to the big pacifier, I give it to him, he pushes it away and points to it again. It’s clear he knows what he wants, but he’s not getting it.

Then, he talked himself to sleep on Sunday night, which is wonderful and was a final reassurance that this is going to work.

As an aside, dad notices his last molar is broken through, which must definitely be another positive sign. He has 12 teeth now, so I know it’s an appropriate time to get rid of the pacifier. The next teeth to come in don’t come for another couple months, and it’s healthier for his oral development to get rid of it.

Day 3. Monday. Presumably he continues to do okay at daycare, but going to bed was hard. Dad gave up with him and brought him back downstairs. Perhaps it was the time change and he wasn’t tired yet? An hour later we try again and he cries himself to sleep after two or three more attempts at rocking to sleep (Jameson pokes at my eyes and giggles to himself. It is definitely not working to rock him to sleep this night.). It only takes about 20 minutes total the second time, not counting the failed bed time earlier.

When he falls asleep, he crashes. He doesn’t get up in the night, which is a blessing. We definitely still have a good sleeper even without the pacifier. I am a little lot sappy about this whole thing, now.

Now we are on Day 4. We are totally committed. This is it. I am prepared to throw away his old, small pacifiers tonight I think. Maybe I’ll put one aside, just in case, since we’re leaving him overnight at his grandparents’ this weekend.

And I wonder if we should just get rid of the big pacifier too? Is it worse, him seeing this one as a reminder of the ones he can’t have? Now I am worrying about his mental state. But he’s resilient. I’m sure he’s fine. He dropped the big one from the crib last night as he was crying and then just went to sleep without it (That is probably the answer to my question.).

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Never Jinx a Sleeping Baby

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Last night, Brian and I along with his dad and family friend Craig went to see a Pink Floyd tribute band, Brit Floyd, while Aunt Melissa baby sat. (Brian’s mom was supposed to go, but she caught the most recent Jameson/Brian illness with an ear and sinus infection as well.)

Remember how I said I was tired? I sipped my rum and coke, and then… Yep, I fell asleep in the middle. The music was so mellow (loud, but mellow). Perfect for taking a little snooze.

I particularly enjoyed (from the songs that I heard all the way through) Comfortably Numb, Pigs, and High Hopes.

On the way home, Brian and I chatted about how well Jameson has been sleeping the past two weeks (completely through the night, no pacifier runs needed). We discussed taking him off the pacifier in the next couple weeks and just pulling off that band aid.

Irony of ironies, last night Jameson decided to wake up and scream (scream!) at 4:30 in the morning.

Recently, Jameson has decided that walking around is more fun that eating, so dinners have been small. We thought maybe he was hungry and so we went ahead and prepared a bottle. Which he didn’t want at all.

After falling asleep on dad and waking up when being laid back down, I got up for my turn and gave him some Advil. His teachers yesterday thought he might be teething again though we hadn’t seen any signs of it prior.

Advil and 15 minutes of rocking later, he went back into his crib without a peep.

A few days ago, I noticed a bottom molar in, but couldn’t tell if the other molar on bottom was broken through or not, so maybe that was the problem.

…Or more likely it was because we jinxed it by talking about it.

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Fourteen Months

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Jameson is 14 months old.

The past two months? I don’t know what happened. They disappeared. He just turned one yesterday. His one mural in photos is still up!

Jameson at 14 months: Loves to power walk with his walking toys. Starting to take steps away from things all by himself. A few days ago he stepped away from the chair to walk to our bed without any prompting!

He is really curious and loves to get into things that aren’t his toys. He likes to climb through the kitchen stools like an obstacle course. Jameson loves to go up and down the stairs, pull books off bookshelves, chew on shoes, hit the fireplace vent, pull toilet paper off the roll, and dive into the pillows on mom and dad’s bed.

He has a sense of humor. He loves to throw food on the floor for the puppy to eat (which is okay, until the puppy isn’t there to eat them because she is napping upstairs. Ugh).

Jameson likes to try and brush his own hair and teeth. He doesn’t want a lot of help. He has 10 teeth. 4 on top and bottom, 2 upper molars. His hair is getting really long in the back (ahem, mullet) and is due for his first hair cut.

He has signed “more”, “all done”, “fan” (once), and “eat” sporadically. His sign for eating is bopping his hand against his mouth saying “ahhhh” (like the very stereotypical indian calls). He also sticks out his tongue in addition to his spitting and fake coughing tricks.

Eating has always been a bit of an issue for us, but he is on almost all finger food now which is easier. He loves the pouches of baby food, and he has pureed fruit with his baby cereal for breakfast.

We are working on the sippy cup transition. I think we just purchased a winning sippy cup, and I am thinking of cutting him off from the bottle, except that we still love to hold him in the morning and night while he drinks his bottle.

He sleeps through the night, occasionally needing a pacifier or his bear which dad gets because mom sleeps through it. He naps well, usually one nap but occasionally two when he’s sick. His one nap is anywhere from 2 to 3-1/2 hours. He wakes up slowly (just like his grandma, she said), and loves to cuddle for about 10 minutes. Then he’s up and at ’em.

Jameson loves his little brown bear. We have three of them. Two at home, one at grandma’s. Just in case. We’re still using the pacifier, but plan on making the switch after his bottom molars come in and the weather warms up (so the cold season dies down).

He also got his very first two ear infections this month (or may have only gotten 1 that didn’t go away!). We didn’t even know he got it since he was still sleeping through the night and he was getting his teeth in at the same time. When his cold lingered and there was an RSV notice on the daycare door, we went to the doctor’s to double check.

We are working on putting shapes into the shape sorters. He can get his “coins” in the bank, but the different shapes of the sorter are stumping him.

Jameson will say “mamamama” when he wants something, “dadada” for his daddy, and “dah” for “dog” and “that”, though there is a difference in sound. He wants to know what everything is and will point at it. He’ll also point when he wants something, and we’ll hide things sometimes when we don’t want him to see it (like the pacifiers).

Sometimes he’ll throw tantrums when he doesn’t get his way (like not letting him go up the stairs), but usually seeing mom or dad playing with his toys without him will bring him around.

Jameson insisted on not sitting still for both of the photo shoots we tried this month. This one, in the middle of pink eye and sick with a cold, still seems very representative of him right now.

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1 Month to Go

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Well, today Jameson turns 11 months old, and I would never have been able to guess this time last year what this year had in store for us.

When we first started trying, I had several requirements I gave to Brian: No September/late August birthdays, because of the school cut off. Preferably no birthdays in the summer either. And Nothing was more important than making sure we didn’t have a Christmas Baby.

Of course, we found out we were due Dec. 23 and I yes, I was tracking, and yes, it was preventable. But after a few months of negative testing,  you aren’t worried as much about the date of your baby’s birth.

Now, I didn’t end up having a Christmas Baby. But still, I kind of like that Jameson’s birthday falls at the end of the year. It’s a nice time when we’re already excited for the Holidays, for snow and Christmas lights and all those things you only get to break out for a short time (except Christmas music: yes I am one of those already listening to it). Jameson will always have a birthday during a season of celebration, and that is pretty awesome.

Jameson’s photo shoot today was fabulous. I got him right after he woke up and he was so cheerful and happy, it was wonderful. I took less photos and got better poses from him than I have in the past few months since he started trying to chew on the blocks.

At 11 months, Jameson enjoys sitting in the corner we actually made for the pup Sasha. The first couple times he went in the corner he giggled to himself like crazy. Aside from the corner, he likes to spin in circles on his butt, “wrestle” with dad, and there is nothing better than sneaking in a pet of Sasha before she runs away (and she runs away a lot now). He is learning how to open drawers and cabinets, so we are going to get baby locks on those very shortly.

Today I thought he might for the first time stack his blocks instead of just knock them over, but he’s not quite there yet!

He likes to say Ga and Ba a lot, but we don’t think they mean anything in particular yet.

Jameson loves to look at the pictures in books, particularly the baby touch and feel books. We have two, and he flips back and forth, turning the pages like they’re magic.

One thing we’ve been struggling with is nap time at daycare. He has recently started taking one long nap around noon or one, but he is exhausted by evening and cranky. We are trying to switch him back to a two nap schedule, but it affects his eating! I’m sure it will all work itself out soon though.

Jameson occasionally doesn’t care for the car seat and does that sneaky stiff-baby move, but he’s not strong enough (yet) to cause any big trouble. He also is needier and likes to be picked up and held, so he gets to play on mom’s lap in the evenings a lot until he decided that it actually is more fun to be able to move around and explore himself.

This photo shoot he rocked himself back and forth to make the glider move!

I can’t wait to see what’s in store for us this month!

Happy 11 months Jameson!

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Troublemaker

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Jameson has had a really hard time teething this past week and weekend. He has four teeth, two on bottom and two on top which are broken through but not all the way grown in. Now he is in process of breaking through two more teeth up top, and he’s taking this set pretty hard.

Contrary to this photo, he’s actually been really grumpy. So this is when we were checking for teeth and discovered that yes, there are two more making their way down.

My mother stayed with us overnight on Thursday night after going to a funeral. Sad times, but it was nice to get in a quick visit. We also visited with my uncle and aunt Carol, who just had knee replacement surgery a week ago and has been fairly housebound. I’m sure she enjoyed the visit, albeit brief.

He’s been up a lot at night, needing rocked to sleep which is very very unusual for him. Brian and I have been disagreeing about feeding him at night, but I think we’ve left it that Brian will feed him if he thinks he needs it and I will rock even if I think we should be holding firm on him getting to sleep by himself.

Jameson’s clearly in pain, and we’ll each do what we think will help him get back to sleep fastest. Which, in the end, is medicine. Advil and Tylenol, alternating, for the most effective pain relief according to our pharmacist neighbors. And it works.

Aside from causing us trouble sleeping, he is also becoming a bit of a troublemaker during the waking hours.

Yep, this child who is not really pulling himself up yet in the crib is climbing stairs. One stair. He’s not very coordinated yet.

He is also crawling everywhere, being told “no” quite often by the fireplace, and otherwise making mischief.

Consequently, we did some baby proofing this weekend. The outlets have covers on them now. They’re actually quite fancy, borrowed from a friend. They are tilted and go back in place with springs when removing an item from being plugged in. They’re kind of like this, but not as new or fancy. Also, we’ve finished the gate upstairs. We purchased a retract-a-gate and so far we really like it. We will have to make a decision about the downstairs gate though.

For now, we’ve been watching him on the stairs closely, finding it good practice for him to pull up. He’s only really reaching for things at his level like the stairs or ourselves when we’re on the floor with him. He isn’t quite getting the hang of pulling up from things with height like the end tables or couches.

We also have another troublemaker trying to wedge herself in corners to escape Jameson’s new mobility. Sasha turned 9 years old on October 1st. Happy birthday Sasha! We have fancy dinner planned for her this week in addition to the peanut butter bone and new toys that Brian’s parents got for her.


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Newest Addition to the Band

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Today I’m really excited to share with you some photos of the newest addition to Jameson’s band.

(I say Jameson’s band, but we’ll see. Only time will tell!)

Vivienne was born about 5 weeks ago and we finally were able to meet her on Tuesday night. Jameson didn’t get to, but he’ll be able to this weekend for the first annual street chili cookout. The party will cross two houses, and for a last minute get together, we sure are getting a great turn out!

But enough about us. This is about this adorable lovely lady born to Jason and Lisa. She is the first baby girl amongst most everyone I know who have had babies in the past year! I think someone said she had drummer hands, but I don’t see it. These definitely look like delicate baby fingers…

See what I mean? Adorable. I might have teared up a little bit. Just a little. She’s around 8 pounds, so Jameson would’ve been much smaller at her age, but time and perspective do funny things! Vivi seemed incredibly small to me. Even Brian seemed to forget how to move a baby that small.

I’d love to show your her equally adorable parents, but Lisa told me she wasn’t dressed for photos. I took some anyway, but I’ll refrain from sharing. Oh, but here’s a few of baby Vivienne comfortable on her mother.

I’d like to say she was as angelic as her photos but she was occasionally a little fussy, as newborns often are. She was hungry a lot, so I am thinking growth spurt! or tired! or one of the many other speculations you have about newborns.

Scratch that, speculating continues on well past newborn phase.

Jameson is having some crummy nights recently. Brian is convinced he is hungry, and I am anti-middle-of-the-night bottle. 3 am is not the time to argue about such things though. I think it’s teething, ear pain, or gas pain. Something is causing him to not fall back asleep even with a pacifier in.

Last night was better than the night prior, mostly because we didn’t mess around for hours waiting to see if he’d finally fall back asleep. Within one hour we were in response mode. I tried Advil first, but you know half of it didn’t go in his mouth, it squirted right into the chair or dresser (I’ll find out later feeling around for sticky messes). Not knowing if he got much but not willing to do another full dose, we switched to Tylenol (Triaminic, same diff) and got that all in.

But wait, there’s more! We did the bottle but once he went back into his crib he was crying again, so I rocked him back to sleep. Moms to the rescue!

Now having done all that, there’s no telling exactly what is causing this. I think I’m nixing the bottle tonight though. This is the part where I laugh and say there’s no such thing as sleeping through the night. One minute they’re doing it, the next there’s something causing them to wake up in the middle of the night again.

I did have a bizarre dream though that this was a milestone issue (because sleep habits can also be upset when approaching a milestone, or so I’ve read). Anyway, I dreamt that Jameson suddenly started talking. In full sentences.

Lead singer in the making? Maybe.

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Testing Boundaries

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In addition to the wonderful crawling milestone, Jameson is also testing other boundaries… this week it has been sleeping and napping (oh, and fussing when I took the remote control from him… that’s a new one too).

Perhaps it was because Brian and I slipped up a bit (long weekend you know). He was getting up at 5:30 asking to have his breakfast bottle, and we’d give it to him then send him back to sleep. Then it slowly crept earlier, and we’d give him the bottle at 5 am. That was probably the wrong message.

Yes, most definitely the wrong message.

So this morning, we had to let him cry it out from almost 4 to 5 am. I went in to rock him for a bit, and he was happy for 5 minutes until he realized that no sir, that bottle was not coming. Back in the crib and then he crashed out, butt in the air, until 7.

I had to be the bad guy though. Poor Brian just wanted to give him the bottle and be done with it, but I certain this was the right thing to do. Having him get up in the middle of the night again is not smart. Not unless Brian wants to be the one to get up every night, heh. 😉

He woke up happy, not screaming for food, so I’m validated in my decision not to give him the bottle. Still, it was a little bit of a rough morning for us…

So! On a happier, more fun note: here’s his crawling video, as promised. It’s sort of a series, starting out just before he turned 8 months on 8/15. Most of the video is from this past weekend of him scooting backwards, and  it ends on 9/6, yesterday, when I finally got one video of him going forward.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyvOvy3B7SU]

Oh, if you are impatient and want to skip to the triumphant end, the last scene with him crawling starts at 1:56.

Mostly yesterday I got video of him playing with his socks. Like 10 minutes of sock playing. If you really want to see 10 minutes of baby + baby socks, that’ll be up tomorrow.

P.S. This child is sitting up in his crib now. I suppose that means we should probably lower the mattress…

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An Everyday Evening

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When I get home, it is anywhere between 5:20 and 5:30. Typically I pick up Jameson from daycare. From that point until bedtime, we try to keep Jameson happy and entertained and focused entirely on him. Seeing my baby just for an hour and a half every day is tough, but it’s better when days are good.

But quite a bit of time, Mr. Jameson hasn’t had enough naps at daycare and is consequently tired and cranky. Oh, and it doesn’t help when he’s teething or going through a growth spurt.

Anyway, I thought I’d share a snapshot of a more typical evening. Actually, a couple evenings, this wasn’t shot all in one day, it was shot on August 21 and 23rd last week.

First I eat dinner, asap while I’m not quite as tired when we get home.
Usually I’m okay with it, sometimes I’m not.

Then, I play with mom and dad for a little bit.
I like to take all my toys out of the bin.

Oh, I’m dressed all ca-ray-zy because I went through two outfits at daycare.

And then I had dinner too, so I’m pretty gross.
Mom usually edits out my drooly chin.

Mom wonders if maybe I’m teething again,
but I just like to put everything in my mouth.

Anytime now I should be crawling. Maybe one day it’ll just click.

Then all of a sudden, I realize how tired I am.

Mom scoops me up and it’s time for a bath.

I love my baths no matter how tired I am! No crying for me. Just yawns.

Mom courteously hid my cash and prizes.

My favorite puppy in the whole world waits upstairs.

I love my puppy, she makes me giggle when she licks my toes.

When I get out of the tub, I always get cranky.
It’s cold out here, mom!

Then I have a bottle. Did you know I hold my own bottle now?
Ms Colleen at daycare taught me.

There aren’t any pictures now because I don’t play in my crib anymore.

I fall asleep as soon as my head hits the mattress.
Mom doesn’t want to wake me up. Shhhh

and then, she {snapped}

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Bed Time = Playtime

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Jameson has decided that the crib is his new favorite place in the whole world. No matter how sleepy he goes in, he wakes up, gives a big smile, and rolls around, talks, and plays in his crib.

This was taken a few weeks ago. Since then, he has decided to roll over onto his belly frequently, and then yell because he has forgotten how to roll himself back (remember, rolling belly to back was the first one he did… that must have been years ago in baby time)

P.S. This video is a bit dark, you might mistake Jameson for a baby seal, or a pterodactyl.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zh7vA87HRMY]

P.P.S., Seriously, this baby is adorable. He has also discovered the joys of jumping (and laughing at dad) in one of my favorite videos yet.

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and now, for your evening entertainment…

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Brian and I typically eat dinner after Jameson goes to bed. Lately, he’s been having an earlier bed time, but last night was an exception because we had yet another financial adviser appointment. (This guys is really good and methodical, and I think we have a few more appointments to go before we’re done setting up all our plans.) Brian’s mom watched Jameson and we got back later than usual.

Cut to Brian and I sitting down for dinner around 9 pm last night, and Jameson is still wide awake and relatively happy in his crib. He’s allowed one small stuffed animal bear in his crib. It’s not large and we didn’t start putting it there until he was about 5 months old. I put it there because sometimes he’s not a fan of being rocked to sleep, and thought it might help soothe him.

Not last night. Our evening entertainment consisted of watching Jameson roll around in his crib on the video monitor (not full rolls, just half rolls to the side and back). He was rolling around with his bear in one hand and pacifier in the other “yelling” at his mobile or his little bear or pacifier, or maybe just to hear is own voice.

Seriously, we watched him for about 20 minutes at dinner, cracking up. No TV entertainment could possibly be better. [I’m being serious, this is the highlight of my life]

And speaking of rolling around, the past couple days we have been finding Jameson with his feet through the slats on the crib. I never put on the bumper that came with my crib set(mostly because it’s awful to change the sheets with it on. I mean, SIDS aside, no one ever tells you that traditional bumpers are a pain like that!). Anyway, I am thinking maybe now it might be helpful. Though, so far, we haven’t woken to a screaming baby that hit his head or anything.

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