Happy nine months, little nap refusenik!

Hard to believe, but Mari is nine months today. She celebrated by skipping a nap again and only finally napped in the moving stroller. I ended up with lots of blisters and a sunburn. Sigh.

I do NOT think she's getting to the point where she can do with only one nap a day, though. She's been so clearly messed up all day when she's done that. But I've been trying everything I know to try to get her to nap. I'm hoping this really is just a wonder week/fussy phase because that would mean there is an end eventually.

Another factor that might be interfering with her sleep and napping is the number of developmental milestones she's been through lately. Just two and a half weeks ago, she was only creeping backwards. Now she's not only creeping forwards quite efficiently, she's crawling, can get from belly to sitting and back again, and most recently, she has started pulling up. She's also doing great at "walking" hanging onto our hands. Maybe she's so busy working on all these new skills that she doesn't want to sleep -- at least, that's how it seems to me.

I know she needs to sleep more. She's a much happier baby when she manages 14 hours of sleep in a day, though that's rare. But I feel like I'm giving her every opportunity to sleep. She just won't sleep as much as is good for her, damn it.

Day 90: Eight months old and busier than ever

Mari turned eight months old yesterday. I can hardly believe it -- time goes so fast. Since I haven't posted photos in awhile, here are a few of the very latest ones.

Mari has been busy learning new skills too. She can now get up onto her hands and knees and her very latest trick is getting onto her hands and feet in the "downward dog" position. No crawling yet, but she seems very close. She's still doing her backwards creeping and is more efficient at it than ever.

She can now say "dada" and "daddy," though I'm still waiting for that elusive first "mama." She has two teeth now. She can now eat an awful lot of solid food. The photo above is from after she polished off half an avocado. While it may look like half an avocado is smeared all over her, I am convinced the vast majority of it went into her mouth. She's also getting good at eating even small, slippery bits of food. Oh, and she can drink from her sippy cup now, though there is still some spillage as she will only drink from it without the non-spill valve in.

As for sleep, she has been getting somewhat better about staying asleep longer for naps, which is HUGE for me, though she's still not consistent. At night, though, she's back to waking up twice most of the time, when for awhile we were down to one or none. I am thinking again about starting to limit her second night feed.

Today: An average day for sleep. A decent morning nap of nearly an hour and a half, but an afternoon nap of less than an hour, which is less than optimal. She woke up still cranky but wouldn't go back down. She was up super early this morning (6:10) and was so tired she had to be put to bed early (just after 7 PM), so I hope this doesn't lead to an even earlier waking and the beginning of a vicious circle.

Day 59: A shift in attitude

Mari is seven months old today. Already. I can't believe it. In honour of that milestone, here are a couple of pictures taken in the last week or so.

Lately Mari has been working on some new skills. Today she waved bye-bye to Jon for the first time. Before today, a few times I have thought she was trying to wave because she would open her hand and  flop her wrist, but I wasn't sure if she was just doing that randomly and it happened to be at the appropriate time. However, today she very distinctly waved, with her whole arm going up and down, as we were saying bye-bye. It was so exciting.

She also somehow managed to get off her changing pad, which was on the floor, in the brief minute or two I was out of the room. I'm not sure if she rolled over the ridge or crept backwards and then spun on her belly, but she was beside the changing pad and a foot or two over when I caught her. She still hasn't crept forwards, only backwards. She's a champion roller, but I've yet to see her roll over anything, so who knows?

She seems really close to being able to pull up from sitting. She can stand up if I just pull her arms up without my getting her bum off the floor. She was trying to pull up on the coffee table today too but couldn't manage it. She is also trying to sit up from lying down, but though she can do "crunches" from a flat position and can sit up from a reclined position, she can't yet do a full sit-up. I can't blame her -- sit up are hard for me too! (I am admittedly in awful shape, probably the worst of my life.)

She's getting good at standing. If I stand her up hanging onto something at chest to shoulder height, she can stand without me holding onto her for a little while, though I have to stay within arms' reach because she'll let go and topple without warning. Also, she can now stand up for a little while holding onto only one of my hands.

We've just come off a few poor nap days. Today was a little better than the two previous days, but she has still been having short morning naps, sometimes waking up in the middle of her afternoon nap and refusing a late-afternoon nap despite obvious fatigue. However, she's still sleeping well enough at night, so I've made the momentous decision to... (drumroll please) not worry too much about it. Yes, it's a big step for me. But I've been much happier since I've made that decision. If she wakes up from a too-short nap and still seems really tired, I do try to put her back to sleep. But if she doesn't fall back asleep again quickly, I let her stay up until the next naptime or until she's really obviously tired. Seems to be working.

Day 42: Still struggling with naps

Why is it that one day can go so well and the next day everything is all screwy again when I've changed nothing?

Mari had bad naps again today, napping only tiny periods before waking up still tired. I'd rock her back to sleep and put her down and she'd wake up again, still cranky and easy to put to sleep again -- but also too easy to wake up by putting down. Argh!

Anyway, it occurs to me I didn't post Mari's 6-month pictures, for those of you who might be grandmas or otherwise interested primarily in the cute.

Day 27: In other news...

OK, so I'm not done my nap plan yet. But it occurred to me I've been blogging about Mari's sleep rather in isolation of her other developmental milestones, which I'm sure have affected her sleep habits.

Since we started the NCSS, Mari has learned to sit up unsupported -- actually the day after we started, on Jan. 20, the day she turned five months old. When she's not too tired, she sits solidly enough now for me to be able to leave her playing alone while seated, though I still leave pillows around her as insurance, because she does tend to topple after awhile.

She has also started eating solids. We're doing baby-led weaning (here's the website of Gill Rapley, the woman who really started the movement; I have her book: www.rapleyweaning.com) and had her first food on Jan. 26 -- she licked and sucked on a piece of red pepper she grabbed off my plate. She first used a spoon by herself on Feb. 10 and managed to drink an ounce of breastmilk out of a regular glass the next day. (She is still spurning the sippy cup, though, as well as the bottle.)

In the last few days she has learned to jump in her exersaucer and has figured out how to operate the musical toy on said exersaucer.

She also seems to be trying to learn to creep. She has managed to push herself backwards a few times and is now pretty good at spinning around on her belly, but forward movement has been elusive so far. However, she can raise her chest a long way off the ground, sometimes with her head back at an angle that would make a contortionist jealous. She can raise her bum off the ground too -- just not at the same time as her chest yet.

So there you have it -- she's been a busy little monkey.

 Today: Mari had a nice two-hour nap in the morning but her latter two naps were short. Still, she seemed not too badly off, unlike the other day, when she had a short morning nap and was terribly moody. I think the morning nap is key. Last night her sleep wasn't quite as good, though I can't really complain -- she had an 8 3/4-hour stretch of sleep. But she woke up at 4:45 AM and wouldn't go back to sleep for another hour. So I've been tired today. I'm not sure whether I should now just refuse to nurse her at night now that she's proven she can do it. Any input on that would be much appreciated.

Day 20: Elimination communication dilemma

Mari and I practice elimination communication (EC), which might be briefly described as infant potty training, though really it's not as much about "training" as it is about my trying to be aware of when she needs to pee or poo and giving her the opportunity to do so in the potty instead of expecting her to sit in a dirty diaper for ages. (A better explanation can be found at www.diaperfreebaby.org)

Mari is only actually diaper-free for certain periods during the day, when we're home, I'm not going to be very distracted (such as when I'm making dinner) and she's not breastfeeding or sleeping. We don't EC at night; never have. However, I still consider that we EC pretty much full-time. 

Lately, though, I've been wondering if EC-ing should take a back seat (no pun intended) when I'm trying to get Mari down to sleep or for her naps. One of the fairly reliable times when she's likely to pee or poo is right after a feed (occasionally during, which is why I always diaper her before I nurse her). At the moment, pottying is incorporated into our naptime and bedtime routines for right after she nurses from the first boob. 

However, sometimes pottying can take significant time, especially when I'm sure she has to go but she's taking her sweet time about it. By the time she's clean and has her clothes back on, the potty trip can take up to 10 or even 15 minutes, eating into her sleeping time. Also, if I take her to the potty when she's drowsy, it tends to wake her up.

On the other hand, if I try to put her to sleep without having gone to the potty, she often wakes up quickly because she has to pee or poo -- she never seems to go without waking up at least a little. So I'm constantly torn between taking her to the potty and emphasizing sleep. Any input would be appreciated.

Today: Things went a little better in terms of keeping more or less to the schedule and getting a decent amount of total naptime, though I ended up having to hold her for a significant part of her last nap, because she kept waking up still tired. Today is logging day, so I'll post results tomorrow.

Day 13: Sleepy baby

Not much new to say today, so I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Day 9: To co-sleep or not to co-sleep?

Before Mari was born, here's how I imagined things: she would sleep in her Arm's Reach co-sleeper bassinet until she started getting too big for it. It would be good for both of us to have her there as a young baby because she'd need to nurse at night.  I'd nurse her in bed, put her back in her co-sleeper and we'd both sleep until the next time she needed to nurse. Then, once she started getting too big for her co-sleeper, perhaps around four months or so, she would easily transition to her crib because by then she'd be big enough not too need to nurse at night.

The reality looked more like this: I would put the younger Mari in her co-sleeper at the beginning of the night, but once she got onto the boob and started nursing, I'd drift off and wouldn't put her back in the co-sleeper. An hour or so later, I'd wake up uncomfortable because I'd be holding my shoulder in a weird position over her head. So I'd try to put her in her co-sleeper at that point. Often, she'd wake up, and I'd wind up putting her back in our bed again to comfort her. So she got used to being in our bed and came to prefer it. So she slept less in her co-sleeper and not at all in her crib until recently.

Now Mari is really too big for the co-sleeper. She can still fit in it -- just -- but her arms touch the sides when she flings them out, and sometimes that wakes her up. She still seems to prefer being in our bed. She wakes up less often that way. But sometimes it's clear that a movement or sound of mine wakes her up. More often, a movement or sound of hers wakes me up, and my shoulders feel permanently kinked from holding my arms above her head.

I think there are good reasons to co-sleep. I do think more cuddling helps parents and baby bond, and helps the baby feel secure. As I said, Mari does tend to wake up less often when she's sleeping with us. It is indeed easier to nurse and comfort her when she's right beside me.

However, I don't want to co-sleep with Mari forever. I think it's interfering with her learning to fall asleep and stay asleep on her own. It definitely isn't good for Jon's sleep (never mind our sex life), and it's debatable what it does for mine. I do spend more time more fully awake if I have to go to her at night when she's sleeping in her crib down the hall. However, I am less often awakened by little snorts and movements in her sleep. 

Since there seem to be more pros to getting her to sleep in her crib, I've been working on keeping her in her crib longer at night. Once I get sick of tromping down the hall in the middle of the night, I bring her into bed with me. I co-sleep with her at naptime if I also want a nap, or if she's overtired and really fussy and is having difficulty calming down enough to nap.

Sometimes do I wonder if I'm striking the right balance. There's no shortage of experts on one hand telling me that co-sleeping is best to have a close attachment to my baby, or on the other hand telling me that I should have made her sleep in her crib from day one and cry it out when she wakes up. I don't know the right answer -- I'm just doing what feels right at the moment. I do hope she spends full nights in her crib soon, but I make a point of doing a lot of cuddling during the day and I put her in her sling for outings whenever practical.

Today: It was a bad day for keeping on the schedule. She woke up later than usual, so I let her go for her morning nap later, and that nap turned out to be a long one. Then I took her shopping, which took longer than I expected, so she had a late and short early-afternoon nap, followed by a very late late-afternoon nap. Still, I have had some success this evening: a couple of times, she fussed in her sleep, I waited, and she put herself back to sleep.

Day 4: Lovey bunny

I've been working on introducing a lovey, as the No-Cry Sleep Solution instructs. I chose the bunny at right because Mari sucks on everything she touches, and I thought organic cotton would be better than some synthetic teddy. It's similar to the Snoedel NCSS author Elizabeth Pantley said she used with her youngest. Also, with a light T-shirt-like feel, I figured it would be easy to stuff it in my shirt for a few hours and give it my scent. (I wore it most of the day the day before we started the sleep plan and went around with the little bunny head sticking out from between my boobs. These are the things a mother does.)

I wasn't sure if Mari would take to it, since she hadn't adopted anything on her own as a comfort object, but she now seems to be enjoying sucking on Bunny before she falls asleep at naptimes and at night. All well and good, I thought.

Then Jon found her yesterday with Bunny stuffed right up against her face. It made us wonder if she might be able to suffocate on that thing. Of course, many babies cuddle with their blankies, some of which are no doubt thicker than Bunny. Mari evidently survived her mashing-Bunny-into-face experience. But it made us wonder what a totally safe lovey would be. I don't think I'll be trying to get her to glom onto another comfort object, at least not for now, though. I'm sure if people of my generation survived sleeping on our bellies with lots of squishy blankets, not to mention being fed with formula and non-organic baby food, Mari will survive her bunny.

On a related note, Pantley says to have an extra identical lovey in case the first goes missing or gets destroyed and baby is inconsolable. A good idea, but Bunny was a gift and I don't know where to get another. Anybody know? It's made by Piccolo Bambino.

Today: A better day for napping, though three 90-minute naps may be too ambitious for Mari, who woke up from her second one after only half an hour and absolutely wouldn't go back down. So far a not-bad evening for sleeping, with a nearly three-hour stretch in between episodes of frequent waking. Maybe there's hope.