What are we gonna do? Do you wanna build a snow man?

7 Months

And being March Madness we had a little basketball photo shoot.

 

  

As the last 2 posts implied we're in the thick of sleep training. Still. Nothing is working slash we keep getting interrupted by stomach flu, weird fevers, colds and other fun stuff. So I've caved. We're crying it out. Tucker just barely fell asleep after 45 minutes of screaming. Cary and I have decided if he grows up to be some awful deranged criminal it will probably all boil back down to this.

This is easily the worst part of parenting so far.

Other stats
-Tucker weighs 16.5 lbs. He's in the 15 percentile for height and weight.
-His head is in the 85th percentile.
-He LOVES LOVES LOVES bath time. I think we might have a swimmer in our midst. The kid gets absolutely giddy when we walk into the bathroom and start the water and it's all you can do to hold him down and take his clothes off before he tries to jump in.

And... my brain is overrun with cortisol right now and that's all I can think to write.

Over and out.

How am I gonna be an optimist about this

I've decided to write my Sleep Training How-To
... you know to add to the overabundance already on the internet
... and because I have 2 children, therefore I am obviously an expert

1. It helps if your child likes both parents. Work on that.

2. Pacifiers are your friend. Start from day one.

3. When your overly fussy infant finally falls asleep and your toddler wakes them up--I won't judge you for screaming, or breaking something (not on or near the children).

4. You have friends through this process. Their names are Ben & Jerry.

5. Fantasizing about elaborate plans to execute the dogs that live below you is normal and probably healthy even.

6. If you feel sleep training is going too well, I recommend passing the stomach flu around the family. You'll get the chance to really make sure what you were doing works when you have to start over from square one multiple times.

These tips free of charge!

-From one sleepy mama to yourself

I'm kind of over get told to throw my hands up in the air, so there

Attempting to sleep train Tucker is making me want to blow my brains out.

I am so beyond exhausted.

Tucker was a great sleeper early on and I counted my blessings and was amazed at how easy he was compared to Zoey! Then around Christmas we hit that dreaded 4 month regression/growth spurt/hellish hurdle whatever you want to call it, and I got tired and slipped into some bad habits--nursing to sleep, and co-sleeping.

I have been trying ever since [unsuccessfully] to get baby boy back to those glorious 6-7 hour stretches of sleep.

I feel like I have tried everything with varied success. Occasionally I feel like we start to make progress and then he gets sick, or someone else is sick, or some other hiccup.

The last couple nights I've even tried to Cry It Out (a method I generally don't agree with) and not only has it been torture, but the boy can scream for hours and never falls asleep, so I finally rock him to sleep and then he wakes up with hiccups every 30 minutes.

This post is merely so that when I someday have a child who sleeps, I won't forget that it was hard earned and if Tucker ever complains about my parenting I can return the favor of waking him up every. 2. hours. then scream in his face for at least 15 minutes and see what he has to say about it then.