sleeping habits of the baby boyd

Or, more accurately, NONsleeping habits.  The little dude is charming from the moment he wakes around 6:30am to eat and smile and sneeze (without fail: four times in a row).  Then, throughout the day he continues to eat and smile and poop and sneeze AND DOESN'T SLEEP FOR MORE THAN 30 MINUTES AT TIME.  For thirteen hours.  He retires as a gentleman should at the considerate hour of 9pm. 

I am doing my best to take this in stride.

But yesterday his charms were dimmed by the intermitant crying fits he deemed fit to add to his repertoire.

Alice had her sleep issues, heaven knows I struggled through them.  And as it goes, I've defended the dude's little quirks because I think he's scrumptious.  But come ON.  I've tried putting him down in quiet rooms, loud rooms, bright rooms, dark rooms, tightly swaddled and barely blanketed.  Nothing really makes a difference except if I'm actually sleeping WITH him and can attend his every whimper and move.  So that's clearly out.

Did you have or do you have children with weird sleep issues?  And more specifically, anyone have experience with the rare non-daytime sleeping baby?

This baby says Who wouldn't want to spend thirteen hours a day with me?



my excuse for not getting anything done

Because really, when there are children this delicious to smoosh on, how one be expected to blog?

now with bow tie

After Max's frightening visit to the hospital in April, I felt compelled to flee the state with kids in tow.  Don't ask me for details of the solo-parenting flights to Salt Lake (a frightening blur), but the memories I'm left with are these---

A month of reveling in familial goodness
A month of my parents mugging on Alice and Max
A month of playing with cousins and visiting with our nearest and dear
A month of checking in with our dear Winston, checking on his amazing recovery
A month of fun and backyard play

And also this, Max's blessing day, with every single one of my siblings in attendance.  All of the cousins except for one (we greatly missed Taylor).

I was the perfect reason for Max to don infant formal wear.  He was very dapper.

It felt like we were swimming in an ocean of love.  We can't thank mom and dad enough for opening their home to us.  And the hugest of thanks to Kimmie, Steve, Curtis and their families for everything. 

I do so love this group of crazy people.

a solution for leaky baby bottles

(First in a series of posts I'm calling Brilliant Ideas at 4am because damn - my synapsis are ON FIRE when I'm sleep-deprived and bleary-eyed, feeding a hungry Max in the wee hours.)




For leaky bottles.


This:

And this:

And you have a little drip-catcher and no longer find yourself cursing a wet and sticky breastmilk-covered hand and pajamas.  I bought a whole pack of the little hairband thingies and keep them with my revolving supply of clean bottles on the counter, and wash the dirty ones in the sink with the dirty bottles.  Easy.

not about the bow tie

I think it is unnatural to think that there is such a thing as a blue-sky, white-clouded happy childhood for anybody.  Childhood is a very, very tricky business of surviving it.  Because if one thing goes wrong or anything goes wrong, and usually something goes wrong, then you are comprised as a human being.  You're going to trip over that for a good part of your life.  -Maurice Sendak

I'll tell you what - I'm tired of feeling like the very sky is falling down around me, raining bits of blue-gray ceiling tiles onto my head.  I'm tired of worrying that I'll look up and find a hole way up there through which a yawning void of nothing threatens to invade.  I'm tired of feeling a clench in my stomach each time I anticipate anything that requires movement.  I'm tired of worrying over the when and the how.

Yesterday afternoon Max slept in his carrier (fresh from a trip to Target) while Alice brought me fistfuls of plastic food.  She made hamburgers and sandwiches and ice cream cones.  Fruit and eggs and maple syrup (for the hamburger, of course).  She ran to me with delight in her eyes and a smile on her face for the sheer joy of seeing me looking back at her.

Maurice Sendak passed away on Tuesday.  I'm sure you all know that, and maybe some of you don't agree with his politics.  And maybe some of you don't even like his books (Where the Wild Things Are, Little Bear, etc.).  But the man had a distinct sense of the side of childhood we don't often acknowledge - and I love him for that.  Because as I'm thinking so hard about the childhood I'm crafting for my own two little people - worrying over their naps and dirty diapers and developmental needs, I often forget how truly messy childhood really is.  And how messy, naturally so, parenthood is.  I try for perfection and really that isn't the best way to serve my little people.  They need the mess.  They need the bumps and bruises.  Because no matter what I do, those things are going to come for them anyway.

So here's to giving our children imperfection and revelling in it.  And here's to Mr. Sendak.  He will be missed.

I don't believe in children.  I don't believe in childhood.  I don't believe that there's a demarcation.  'Oh you mustn't tell them that.  You mustn't tell them that.'  You tell them anything you want.  Just tell them if it's true.  If it's true you tell them.  -Maurice Sendak