Week 14

Naps are getting better. He's taking 3-4 naps a day, some are only 45 minutes, and some have been almost 2 hours. Also, he is technically "sleeping through the night" since he sleeps from about 8pm until 2am (and a 6-hour stretch is considered "sleeping through the night"), but unless I go to bed at 8pm too, I'm still not getting great sleep. After the 2am wake-up, he sometimes also wakes up at 4am and almost always around 6am, when Phil then brings him into bed with me and we snooze/cuddle until about 7:30am. I have moved on to reading the "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" book, and also finding lots of good info in there. Most of all, I'm learning that healthy sleep is vital to his development and good naps are so important that I can't just drag him along throughout my day anymore. Which means I'm home more, but this will be good once I start working from home anyway. (Actually did some freelance work for Gravity this week already!)

Hayden is able to roll from his tummy to his back. He's done it a few times and I even caught it on video!

He is teething big-time! I think I feel and see the tip of a tooth poking through on his lower right. But it's not the middle teeth, which usually come first, and it's coming out in the front of the gum instead of on top, so I'm a little concerned about it. (I think there's always something I can be concerned about!)

We got a cool new product called a Bumbo Seat. Hayden likes to join us at the table for dinner now. :)

I'm really loving our PEPS group. Check out these adorable babies! Hayden is the chill dude on the far right:

"Lovey" quest

I read that at about 3-4 months old, it's sometimes helpful to introduce a "lovey" (stuffed animal, blanket, etc.) for your baby to soothe himself with. Someone gave us an adorable "Rock-A-Bye Dog Infant Security Blanket" and Hayden absolutely loves it. It is so cute to see him snuggle it. I tucked it in my shirt for a few days to get my scent on it, and give it to him in the car and at naptime. He likes to suck on the nose and the paws. The problem is, it's good to have a 2nd lovey in case something happens to the one they have, and I just looked online and IT'S OUT OF STOCK (of course!)!!! There's time to switch him to a new lovey, but frankly I'M loving this lovey too and would like to find another one just like it. We got it as a gift and I've gone through all the baby shower records to try to figure out who gave it to us to see where they bought it, but can't figure it out. Please tell me if this looks familiar and let me know if you know where I can buy another one:

Week 13 (3 Months Old)

We have GOT to get some video of this kid! He is holding his head up SO well, almost rolling over, and GIGGLING (Grandpa Jim found his tickle spot!)!!! What a fun stage he is at right now! He likes to "fly" on our knees (and drool on our stomach)!


He weighs 16 lbs, 15 oz so he has doubled his birthweight already!

On Tuesday August 14, Phil and I celebrated our 8-year wedding anniversary! My sister and her husband babysat while Phil and I had dinner at SIP Wine Bar just down the street. Our first date out alone since Hayden's birth! We really enjoyed it (though I was pretty anxious to get home). One of our Anniversary traditions is to make a list of goals for the next year. We reviewed our list from last year and the #1 goal was to have a baby! I guess we wasted no time on that one! (I think I got pregnant the following week!) This year, we wrote down goals for Phil's career, financial goals, social/relationship goals, and spiritual journey goals. It might sound silly, but it is so wonderful to hear each others' dreams, figure out what's important, and TALK ABOUT SOMETHING OTHER THAN HAYDEN!! :)

On Friday, Phil's team at Costco threw us a Baby Shower! It was so thoughtful of them and really fun for Phil to get to show Hayden off to all his coworkers. Proud Daddy! And we got some more really cool stuff! Hayden is one lucky kid!


On top of a busy week, I feel like I am completely obsessed with Hayden sleeping now. After having a few nights of "sleeping through the night" followed by a week of dreadful sleepless nights, I wanted to figure things out. And being me, I immediately went onto Amazon.com, bought "The No Cry Sleep Solution", "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Baby" and "Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems". I started with "The No Cry Sleep Solution" because I'm absolutely not to the point where I can let Hayden just "Cry It Out" and that book even further confirms that CIO is NOT the route I ever want to take. (Though I vowed as a parent to never say never!)

One thing I've learned is that Hayden is not getting enough good naps throughout the day (he was just catnapping here and there), he was going to bed too late (10:00pm), we didn't have a very consistent bedtime routine, and we shouldn't be putting him to sleep in his crib already asleep. All of those things we have been trying to fix this week! I thought laying him in his crib "drowsy but awake" would be a disaster, but after we established a better naptime and bedtime routine, it actually hasn't been that hard. The trick is to start the routine when he first shows signs of sleepiness, not when he's so tired he is fussy. Also, we've gone back to swaddling so he doesn't get so preoccupied with his hands and also helps him stay asleep longer since he's not startling himself awake with an arm jerk.

For the past few nights this has been our routine:
7:30pm - Bathtime
7:45pm - Phil gives Hayden a Bottle, plays a CD with ocean waves/meditation music, sings to him and says "Keywords" like "Shhhhh. Nighty-Night Hayden, It's Bedtime". Then Phil swaddles him, cradle-holds him while gently bouncing on the exercise ball (just until his eyelids are heavy), and then lays him in his crib. It's a nice Daddy bonding time. And look at this Big Boy holding his own bottle!


8:15/8:30pm - Hayden is asleep! Phil and I get to enjoy some "us" time and then I pump the next night's bottle before we go to bed around 10:30pm.
1:00am - Hayden wakes up. I go in and nurse him and he goes back to sleep in his crib within 1 minute after I feed him!
5:00am - Hayden wakes up again. I nurse him, but then he has a poopy diaper and changing him wakes him up a bit more. I bring him into bed with me and he'll fall back asleep by about 5:30/5:45am
7:30am - We're awake for the day.

So he's not exactly "sleeping through the night", but this I can live with.

Now days are a different story. He still isn't taking longer than 45 minutes or so naps. He goes into his crib for the nap fine, and then wakes up, smiling and ready to play about 45 minutes later. I read that everyone experiences a brief awakening in their sleep cycles about 45 minutes into sleep, but Hayden isn't falling back asleep and is coming fully out of his sleep cycle instead. According to all my readings, his naps should be about 2 hrs long! Wouldn't that be nice! He's only taken a few 2 hr naps in all his life so far!

OK, so enough about sleep. I've probably put everyone to sleep by now.

Week 12

Well our luck was very short-lived regarding Hayden sleeping well. This week has been the most difficult week EVER! I've heard that around 3 months old, a baby's eyesight shifts from being able to see only 2-3 feet away to 8+ feet away (don't quote me on those figures, it was something like that). And so all of the sudden, Hayden is just too curious about the world to close his eyes for a nap. He used to fall asleep on walks in his stroller, and now the trees and houses and people are just too fun to look at to close his eyes. Plus, I think we've thoroughly confused and frustrated him by doing so many sleep experiments: To swaddle or not to swaddle? Crib or bassinet? Pacifier or no pacifier? Rock/bounce him to sleep or let him 'cry it out'? White noise or music or silence? Whatever happened to consistency??!!!

One thing we've discovered that has helped a little is a sleep positioner system I bought from Target that allows him to sleep on his side. That's more like how we hold him so the transfer to the crib isn't as abrupt. He's still waking up every 2-3 hours throughout the night, but at least over the past couple days he will sleep that long! For a few days there he was not sleeping out of my arms AT ALL! Pretty rough on Mommy!

I also think he is pre-teething: drooling and wanting to put everything in his mouth, so that might be contributing to his fussyness too.

In other news: Hayden is loving books! My mom just shipped us a ton of books she saved from when my sisters and I were little, so combined with the ones from Auntie Katie, we now have quite a library! He really sits still and looks at the pages. And Phil is enjoying actually finishing a book for once! ;)

Week 11

Big news! Hayden slept through the night 3 times this week! On Wednesday, we put him to bed around 10:30pm, and I woke up around 3:00am feeling ready to feed him and wondered when he was going to wake up. At around 4:00am I started getting a little worried, but he was doing fine, sound asleep. He woke up around 5:00am! Six and a half hours!!! That's the longest stretch since he was born. I thought it might be just a fluke, but then the next night he slept for 7 hours straight! Unfortunately on Friday night, it didn't go so well--he woke up every 3 hrs. I thought our luck had run out, but last night, he slept another 6 hours straight! We aren't really doing anything different, so I'm not sure what the magic trick is, but I sure hope it continues like this! My only concern is how to keep my breasts from getting so engorged! It's actually hard to sleep!

Another cool milestone is that Hayden is suddenly very fascinated by his hands. He makes a fist and just stares and stares at it! Especially his left fist. Put up your dukes!
But don't go buying him left-handed golf clubs just yet, Grandpa! ;) His right/left-handedness isn't going to be determined until a couple more years! He is also bringing his hands together really well, in almost a "praying" position. This is also considered a developmental milestone. So we've had a great week! What an amazing little boy.

Also, he weighed 15 lbs, 4 oz last Thursday and is looking more and more like a Mini-Me of Daddy everyday!