The Fun Stage

That's MY latte!

So we have come to the fun toddler stage... the stage where our babies are not our babies anymore, but walking, almost talking, little people. It's so fun to watch. Waaaaaaaay more fun than the newborn stage and well, pretty much months 0-6. Haha. They are too mobile: getting into places they shouldn't be, climbing things, hitting things, grabbing stuff... which in turn makes the parents more active, as well, by running after the little troublemakers! It's so entertaining, though! I know you other moms/dads know what I mean. For those that are not parents, I was doubtful that there would ever be a "fun" stage of parenthood! But after being put through hell for the first year (OK, it wasn't that bad), being able to watch your kid discover stuff on his own is like their gift to you for putting up with them that first year!

Last weekend, Scarlett invited us to the National Building Museum in DC. That place is awesome! They had lots of fun (and free) activities for the kids to do in the HUGE great hall area. Lego blocks, soft blocks, a fountain, lots of kids and a massive area to run around! Liam loved running around the halls upstairs the best. Thanks for the invite and the ride, Scarlett! And sorry Liam drank all your orange juice!

The only pic I got of Liam w/ Scarlett

The AWESOME great hall (view from the 3rd floor)

More interested in the cart that held the blocks than the blocks.

Sleeping at night is still going great (knock on wood). I set him down, then he rolls over to his stomach and then grabs a stuffed animal or plays his Fisher Price rainforest music box (I am SOOO glad I didn't sell/give that away!!) and goes to sleep. I am so proud. In the mornings he will talk  and/or sing to himself and play until I go up there to get him ready for the day. Sometimes, right before I put him down, I get mildly anxious... I'd gotten used to him crying and middle-of-the-night wakeups, so it seems too good to be true that he is able to do this on his own now.

He's also transitioned himself to one nap a day now, around 1pm, usually around 1.5-2 hours. Still a terrible napper, but we will work on that.

Also, still no sign of new teeth yet! I did feel around again and sort of felt a molar in the same spot I thought I felt one before. Who knows?

We graduated Liam to a booster seat since he hates the highchair. He seems to feel the same way about being strapped to the booster seat though. But I think he likes being at the table with everyone. We are also trying to get him to feed himself with a spoon and fork... still in the early stages of it, but he can scoop up food with the spoon and get most of it to his mouth. The rest of it either falls or he just doesn't get the optimal angle of spoon-to-mouth food distribution after he gets the food off the spoon - which then ends up still on the spoon. The fork is a bit harder, since he can't really poke at things with it yet. We'd put the food on the fork and he'll bring it to his mouth.

Other things he can do now are kick stuff like a soccer ball (i.e. a toy would be on the floor and he'll walk to it, kick it inadvertently, follow it and do it again), move things around like a hockey puck (i.e. we let him play with wrapping paper tubes from Christmas and he will use them to move around a doggie toy on the floor), he can say Turtle - "tah-tuh" - and knows what it is, he kisses ONLY himself now (in the mirror - Mr. Vain!) - he doesn't kiss anyone else! But he can hug ("give love") like a pro!

He's also been more affectionate to Mac (our laid back male golden retriever), and Mac is tolerating him more as well. He likes to chase Mac around and try to hug him.... which is scary because the dogs are only allowed in the basement here at my folks house and the floors are pretty much concrete. There have been numerous occasions where the dogs got too excited and just plowed Liam over. They're all about the same height, but each of the dogs have about 50 lbs on Liam!

Oh! And we are also going to meet Brianna – my friend Diana's baby – for the first time this week! They are in town from NC for a wedding, so they will stop by Friday evening! Brianna is 2 months older than Liam. Preggo Shonna and Preggo me drove up to NC during the summer of 2009 and stopped at Diana's baby shower... in this photo, we are positioned in the order of our baby's births – Diana (October 3, 2009), Shonna (Nov. 8), me (Dec. 6)!

Unfortunately my body still looks like this... minus the boobs :(

I planned another photoshoot with Chris this weekend – to get Liam's (super belated) 12-month photos done. Hopefully the weather isn't crappy! I wish it would either just snow a LOT or not snow at all!

All Cried Out!

(remember that R&B song from back in 90s?)

Anyway... YES, YES, YES... we have tried the Cry It Out (CIO): Extinction method - where you don't go in AT ALL during the night.... and I am happy to report that we have been SUCCESSFUL!

I was nervous about this at first because we tried the CIO method before (not the Extinction method, but another one where you check on them at gradually increasing intervals during the crying) when Liam was about 5 months old, and that didn't work at all. I guess he just wasn't ready for CIO at that point.

Last week you may have noted our progress, which was looking good. While I was in Atlanta, though, there was one night where he cried on and off in the middle of the night for about an hour. But after I got back from Atlanta, he was at the point where we could put him down and he would be OK (not cry)... until we moved away from the crib. He would SIT up (not stand up like he did in the beginning of the "program") and cry for only a few minutes until he would fall asleep. It is so AWESOME. And he's even sleeping a little later in the mornings too!!! He used to wake up around 7:15-7:30. Now it's around 8:00 or later!

We still hear him cry in the middle of the night sometimes, but it's not that long and he will go back to sleep. I am SO HAPPY... after all the stress of getting him to sleep through the night, Joel and I can finally get some sleep!!

But now, I'm just nervous for new teeth to come in because I know it will mess up the beautiful thing we have going on right now. It's been quite a while since Liam's cut a new tooth. He is still at 6 teeth – 4 on top, 2 on the bottom. So we shall wait and see.

P.S. I posted a few new Jan 2011 pics to the Shutterfly.

Happy New Year and Finally, Sleep!

Wearing the cute outfit from Grandma Mary and playing with a back scratcher (?)

HAPPY 2011!

First of all, thanks everyone for your comments and suggestions on my last post. :) We have overcome the milk issue, thank goodness!

I had to work last week, but I was off on Monday and Friday. In my last post, I mentioned that Liam's rash still had not gone away from earlier last month, so I wanted to get him looked at by a doctor. The awesome doctor's office (Children's Medical Associates) that I found up here was not going to be open on Friday (my day off), so I called to get him in Thursday afternoon. After getting stuck in traffic and getting lost, we actually made good time.

The doctor we saw looked at him and said that all it was, was dry skin due to the weather and to slather him up with Aquaphor/Eucerin/baby oil. Keep him greasy! And she also said that the nurse I spoke with was wrong about the reaction from the shots. Hmm. I also asked her how to get him to drink more milk. She said to ONLY offer milk (nothing else) because he will eventually get thirsty and drink it. Then she asked me about his sleeping and I told her our horror stories of our decent sleeper gone AWOL and how we've been having multiple wake ups every night for the past 2 weeks straight. Her advice was to let him cry. If we go in there and console him even after 2 hours of crying, we're only letting him know that it will take two hours of crying for us to go in there. Ugh.

Regarding the skin, I still had this oil that we used to put on Liam's cradle cap from back in the day. So we used that on his chest and back. She also mentioned to first moisten his skin with water and then apply the oil. It is sort of like a sponge effect where it the skin will absorb more if it's already wet. After a couple days of that, the rash on his body seems to be all clear. As for his face, I've been slathering Aquaphor on it every morning and night and every chance I can get in between. Sometimes it looks like it's cleared up, but others it looks really red (especially when he's pissed off!).

Regarding the milk: her advice worked! He will drink milk like a champ again! Woohoo! Now I'm afraid to offer him water again. Definitely NO juice for right now.

And lastly, regarding the sleep issues... We started letting him cry at bedtime that night after the appointment (Thursday night). We gave him his milk (another thing we would like to wean off), then I rocked him for a few moments to get him to the drowsy point... then I put him in the crib and RAN out of there! He knows when he's being put down. He will clutch onto me! Well, of course even before I was able to escape the room, he was already pissed off and standing up. I sat in the hallway the whole time he was crying to monitor him and to make sure my parents or grandma don't go in his room to get him. I timed it and it took him 15 minutes (of crying) to settle down to sleep. We also didn't have to go up there at all that night! Yay! (Although my dad went in there when Liam was making noises around 5am and decided to put him back to sleep! ugh)

The next night was New Year's Eve. It was a crazy night to say the least (Shonna! haha). We all went over to Scarlett's house for the New Year's festivities. Liam stayed up until maybe 9:45. Shonna let us use their travel crib and video monitor since we forgot to pack the other half of our set! oops. Well, I tried to do the same method of putting him to sleep as the night before, but he wouldn't settle. We let him go for a while (the entire time we ate dinner, at least 30 minutes), but Joel eventually had to go down there and try to get him to sleep (back to square one). After that, I cant remember if he woke up again before midnight, but he definitely woke up after midnight (a funny story!), and then one more time around 3am right before we all decided to turn in for the night. That last wake up was the worst, as he did not want anything to do with Joel OR want me to set him down. Thank goodness they had their really comfy and cushy rocker in their guest room. I was able to hold him and sleep in the chair. I woke up some time later and was able to move him to the crib and myself to the bed. My back was killing me! I'm guessing that it was because he was out of his comfort zone, in someone else's house that he was acting like this.

Anyway, after that crazy sleepless night, we went back to the plan the next night. That time, it only took 12 minutes for him to fall asleep! We heard some cries during the night but he was able to put himself back to sleep on his own and we didn't need to go up there!

Last night, it only took him 6 minutes to fall asleep. We heard him a number of times in the middle of the night, but we let him cry and he went back to sleep on his own again. Woohoo!

EDIT: Tonight (night 4 of crying it out), it only took 4 minutes! :D

I am kind of nervous for this week though, because I'll be out of town for work from the 4th to the night of the 6th (after his bedtime), so Joel will have to do the night routine by himself. Right now, I've been the one to put him to sleep because as I've mentioned before, he's in the "mommy is all I want" phase and if Joel tries to hold him while I am in the room, he will get pissed and reach his arms toward me. We will see. Looks like Liam will have no choice!

I updated Christmas photos to the Shutterfly page. Feel free to check them out sometime.