hello mouth; meet foot.

milo has begun to discover his feet.

especially on the changing table, while he's bare-butt and fancy-free, he likes to pull his knees up and grab at his feet before i've had a chance to put a new diaper on him.

and today he found that he can get his foot into his mouth.

class size is limited, so sign up now for milo's find-the-flexibility-you-were-born-with yoga class, meeting weekly at 5 a.m. from the comfort of his changing table. prices may vary.

behind the times...

i've never been good at sticking with a schedule/timeline/etc...

after milo was born, i started taking weekly pictures with a duck and an owl to help chart his growth in a visual way that turned out to be pretty fun.

but i'll let you in on a secret - i often fell behind or forgot to take the picture on saturday (his week-iversary day), and would make up for it by taking the picture on monday or tuesday... sometimes even wednesday or thursday, and then would try to take it on monday of the following week, and then back to saturday so that the "weekly" pictures weren't so close on the calendar.

i'm now 2 weeks behind.

also, in our "sleep training," i've been reading how beneficial it is to have a more consistant schedule or routine.

this makes me cringe, if even just a little bit.

on sunday morning we go to church, every other sunday evening is small group, every other tuesday morning is mops and every wednesday morning is a moms group at church. while the three morning things are relatively close in time proximity, they're still not identical.

i've always been a little too "all or nothing" black-and-white for my own good. i've gotten much better about simply putting forth the effort and not letting my perfectionist tendencies prohibit me from moving forward with tasks - especially when it comes to milo.

but this routine idea is still too black and white for me. i feel like i should be trying to get milo on a schedule: 6:30 am wake up, eat, play, eat, 8:30 am down for a nap, 10:30 am wake up, repeat, etc. etc. (or whatever his natural routine may be...)

but he's a baby, not a teenager at school.

i know we need more structure, but then three days a week interfere with that structure, and i haven't taken the time to figure out how to work around it.

it was also suggested to me by my dear friend that for helping milo get used to eating rice cereal, one good thing to do would be to feed it to him at the same time every day.

maybe it's because nothing feels spontaneous anymore, but i just don't want to do it.

i will, because i want him to get used to eating so we can start introducing more solids (although there's very little that's "solid" about this mush they call baby food) without the whole experience being treated like treason on our part.

and the whole "bedtime routine" - again, i know it's good for him, helpful, and is well worth the effort - however, i haven't really gotten past closing the shades (or turning the bedroom light off), turning on "sleep lamb" to the rain or ocean waves recording, feeding him, and singing "twinkle twinkle little star" (the song is a new thing i thought i'd try).... anything more complicated, and i feel like i'd have to write down instructions for when ben (or anyone else) tries to put him down, and when written instructions are involved, you know it's gotten much too complicated.

and the middle two of those routine are considered "negative associations" according to this sleep book we're reading.

oy.

sometimes i wish raising children was more like baking... if babies were recipes i'd totally have milo perfected by now.

but then again, i'm glad he's not a cupcake.

and that no one's going to eat him.

just a classic case of "careful what you wish for"

even with an easy baby, it's not always easy.

i remember not long after milo was born and - having trouble getting him to sleep in his crib, whereas he was content to sleep on our chest or in the swing - thinking "once he starts rolling over, then he'll be able to flip back and forth all the live long day (and night); then i won't have to worry so much about him sleeping at night."

well, now that he's rolling over, and sleeping on his side, sometimes he winds up on his belly. from the monitor, i can't fully tell if his head is turned or if he's smothering himself.

which makes me worry.

do i wake him up to go return him to his back? will he really be able to tell if he's not getting enough air? what if he's creating a carbon monoxide buildup between his mouth/nostrils and the mattress?

oy.

i've seen him turn from stomach/side to back when on his playmat, but i can't recall if he's ever successfully done so on his crib mattress...

so last night, when i saw he was on his stomach, i had ben turn him over after we knew he was probably asleep and wouldn't rewake. (it had been a pretty rough night, he woke up lots, was terribly fussy, and didn't want to go back to sleep, but he was fine when i had him on the changing table to change his diaper. i knew he was okay, just crying out of frustration and sleepiness.)

at 4:30 when he woke again, i checked on him, he was able to go back to sleep after some more fussing, he was on his belly again. so i rolled him back over as gently as i could, hoping to copy ben both in technique and success. no such luck - he woke up, fussed some more, but soon enough went to his side and was able to get back to sleep.

i'm okay with side sleeping, or when it's clear that his head is turned. but now i'm looking forward to when he's even more mobile, and when we're past that 6 month risk factor for sids...

i know i need to appreciate each new stage he enters while we're there, because pretty soon he's going to be 10 years old (or however long it takes for a boy to outgrow his mother) and too cool for me. no more cuddles and snuggles, no more being his favorite, no more smothering him with kisses.

and yet even knowing this, i keep looking to the next stage thinking it will be easier. (i'm starting to realize this is probably not true.)

well, it's official...

it's time to get "breathable bumpers" for milo's crib.

i had planned to just skip bumpers altogether, since there's been such a hubbub over anything in the crib and how it could possibly cause SIDS.

tuesday into wednesday, milo had slept on his side all night long. he also didn't wake up much (or to the point that i had to get up and check on sleep training stuff. on wednesday morning, when i went to get milo - as he was fussing and awake - i found that he was actually on his belly (not his side), and his feet were halfway off the mattress, sticking through the slats.

and since he's started his rolling adventures, milo hasn't stayed on his back through the night.

thus - it's time for these breathable bumpers so he doesn't wind up with a limb hanging loose that he can't figure out how to pull back in (since "learning how to crawl" is still on his to-do list).

also, he's newly discovered the "mmmm" sound.

i and even my mom have heard him babble this consonant/vowel combo that sounds like "mum-mum-mum" - which we all know is british for "mom" which means milo has already started making words. (nevermind the fact that he doesn't really know what he's saying, he's just exploring new sounds. i don't care; i say it still counts.)

oh criminy...

i'm posting again because tomorrow we leave for chicago, and i don't want to forget when this first happened for realsies.

milo is now intentionally rolling. and not just rolling one way, but both ways.

before it was more of a "whoops, i leaned too far over while propped up on my arms." but not this. i looked to the monitor after he had stopped making noise, as i'd just put him down for a nap. he had been fussing for awhile, but he was fine, just annoyed that i'm not holding him while he falls asleep. anyhow, i saw that his back was to the camera - this was new. i thought he was possibly on his belly, and worried that he could be face down in the crib and not able to roll back over, i creeped in as quietly as i could, but as soon as i poked my head in, he rolled back over and smiled at me.

he did this to me twice, and then again to ben... what a little stinker!

he was more so on his side than his belly, but he's gotten to his belly as well, and was able to roll back over just fine...

so there's another milestone!

sha-ZAAAMMMM!!!!

we had HUGE thunderstorms last night. cracks of lightning and rolling thunder and rain that beat down so hard it almost sounded like hail.

when we went to sleep last night after putting milo down, i was mentally preparing myself for the many wakings and tear filled complaints, "but mooommmmmmmm, you used to always give me a bottle to help me fall back asleep, why are we stopping now? waaaaaaahhhhh!"

and while our power went out (albeit briefly), and ben and i both awoke many times to what seemed like lightning right in our backyard, milo slept through the whole thing.

what?!?

yup. didn't wake up once.

i'd like to think that ben and i are so effective at "sleep training" that it only took us a day and a half (ha!), but somehow i have this sneaking suspicion that maybe all that rain and "white noise" as they call it - even with the bright flashes and loud crashes - helped him sleep better?

anyhow, let's just say, i needed that 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep. (well, okay, maybe it wasn't exactly "uninterrupted" as we did wake up a bunch, but the wakings had nothing to do with a distraught little boy, which meant no guilt complex for mommy, and at 5:30 a.m. when he finally did wake up, i was happy and ready to go.)

and while he slept great last night, i'm not about to expect it again tonight, because when i do and then it doesn't happen, i get hulk-like miffed, and cranky-mommy is no fun for anyone.

and now... on with the day! :)

i call it "floomphing"

lately milo has been flailing his arms and legs with a lot more oomph than usual.

he's also figuring out how to stick his butt in the air and push his feet on the ground. i think this is an attempt at crawling, but clearly he hasn't really got a handle on how to add all the components together. (and really, he's only up on his forearms/hands, he has yet to discover how to get his knees under his torso.)

and when he gets tired of tummy time, i hold his hands while he stands, a little wobbly on his legs, and tries to take steps. i'm not convinced he realizes that he's walking, or that if he could simply keep himself balanced while standing, he could actually go places.

late last night (or really, early this morning, as it was about 3:30 am?) ben helped me teach milo how to self-soothe. it was both exhausting and comforting - milo just hasn't been sleeping well, but we know he's getting enough to eat. at this point, i know he's just getting up out of habit. ben took over going in and helping him calm down without a bottle, and it was a huge help to finally discuss and decide together how we want to go about this whole business of "sleep training"...

i'm not looking forward to the next few weeks, and perhaps it was foolish to try starting this right before my little jaunt back down to chicago for some pampered chef parties, but i'm tired of being tired and trying to help milo fall back asleep at night when really, he needs to learn how to get himself back to sleep. (he's totally discovered how to suck on his thumb, now if only he'd utilize it in the middle of the night...)