Sleeping

So every time I tell someone that Ben and I sleep in the living room so our little bundle of joy can have his preshus little privacy, they look at me like I am completely stupid (which? okay, maybe I am, but not for wanting my sleep however I can get it.) Then they suggest that we try to put him in Harry's room and reclaim our space, man. And we totally would if we thought, you know, that they would both sleep for 12 hours straight like they do now (well, okay, Jack is a 12 hour man, but Harry sleeps from 7:45-5:50 in his room and usually from 5:50-6:30 on the couch with Ben). But what if they don't sleep well together? What if Harry has a bad dream and wakes up screaming about monsters? What if jack craps his pants at like 3 a.m. and wakes up for a change? What then? Hmmmmmm-- you know, as I type this I realize that in that case, we could probably deal. And what's the worst thing that would happen? We'd sleep someplace crappy like a recliner? Hmmmm....

Harry takes a while to fall asleep-- I wonder if his talking, asking for water, reading books to his stuffed animals, demanding that someone come spray his closet for monsters, etc, would keep Jack awake. Unbeknownst to us (because we never gave him the chance to demonstrate his skillz) Jack is quite the self-soother. He has a bath, cries from shampoo-pajama time, listens to a story, and then eats and eats (lately, he is not satisfied nursing before bed-- he eats both sides and then drinks 8 ounces of the devil's powdered cow's milk-based infant product). Then we dim the lights, put on the rainforest tunes that play on his swing, and put him in the Pack and Play. He sits up, grabs his Uglydoll, chats with it for a few minutes, and then fall asleep (presumably-- we turn on the bathroom exhaust fan for white noise and get the hell out of dodge, so I don't know when he actually drifts off).

Do you think these two routines sound compatible? If we put them in the same room, will Jack never sleep through the night again? Will Harry climb into the crib and kill him in his sleep? Will they both wake up at 5:50? What do you all think?

And I gotta say, I thought I would feel bad if I didn't make it through Jack's first year nursing exclusively, but I really don't. I am stoked about buying new bras-- bras with skinny shoulder straps, for example-- and we still nurse before naps on days I am home (and I will try to keep this up for the next couple of months-- at least through cold and flu season). Here's the thing: to me, nursing is really important because of the lifestyle it suggests-- be with your baby 24/7 for most of the first year (to me, this is really important), follow your baby's schedule instead of feeding by clocks and ounces, attend to your baby in the middle of the night (although Jack is old enough to leave me the heck alone between 7:30 and 7:30, and I am so cool with that), etc. I understand that immunities are important, but other than that, it's not so much the nutrition for me, if that makes sense. Also, I am still carrying 7-8 pounds of extra weight, and I blame nursing (not all the shitty food I have been eating).

Oh! Speaking of shitty food-- the mercury in HFC of course freaked me out (Of course it did, right? I mean I chucked the BPA stuff before you could say Nalgene and certainly before I thought about the fact that the new plastic that's being used in baby products is probably also an endocrine interrupter-- and one that hasn't been tested yet), and I am no longer buying food with HFC, which means my grocery list just got a lot shorter. Dang.

Apropos of nothing:


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I was ready to sit down and write a pst about how balanced I feel lately-- maybe because of the sleep (albeit in an armchair), maybe because of the yoga I've been doing, maybe because my schedule this semester allows me 2 work-out-of-the-home days, 2 stay-at-home-mom days, and 1 half-preschool/baby bonding-day / half-run-errands/work-at-a-coffee-shop nanny day, giving me the compartmentalization I need to be sane.

But then I got dressed and realized my jeans are tight. Maybe tighter than they were a couple of months post partum. So I ate a bunch of mini Hershey bars and now I'm going to clean the bathroom. For fun.

When the kiddies get up, they are going to don their matching sweaters, and we're going to go get some pictures before Jack turns 10 months.

Harry, as you can see, is in love with our new TV; we saved the box that the TV stand came in, thinking he would like to turn it into a pirate ship or a fort, but he could not tear his gaze away.


He tried to play with his sticker book,

but was drawn Linus-like back into the " T E's" clutches.

This guy?

Super duper happy to have the master bedroom to himself.


And now I must get off the couch before my jeans cut off circulation to my thighs. Awesome.

Never before seen footage! Harry on the BIG! RED! MAT!

OMG-- there he is-- on the mat! If Ben hadn't brought home these pictures, I would have never believed it! (that sentence had too many helping verbs, and yet, I feel it actually needed more. Weird).

Harry has never wanted to wheel barrow.

Scaling the "rock" wall

and using LG as an excuse to beat up his other grandpa.



Here we are at lunch. Oaky WTF am I wearing, I know, I know. I have been such a mom hag lately, and I can't help it for some reason. And the boots? Okay, here's the thing-- we got a ton of snow this winter, and now because of global warming it's all freaky warm here, so everything is melting into gray and brown piles of slushy gook, so galoshes are a must. I went out to buy some Wellies, but they were really ugly and pricey (which I know is an odd thing for the girl with 4 pairs of Uggs to complain about), so I got these ones from Target, which are ugly and cheap. But anyway, lunch was fun and delicious. Then we went to a toy store and came back home to play blocks and Wii. An excellent day.

Jack really committed himself to enjoying his sweet potatoes. He just dove right in head first.

Spiderman and Other Spiderman are snuggling on a couch I built them out of blocks. Then Harry buried them in the rest of the blocks, which he called a blanket. And then he built them a block TV.

Wii with the J grandparents-- these videos need no further introdction

Untitled from sarah on Vimeo.


Untitled from sarah on Vimeo.

Good news and bad news

Good News: Jack slept ALL NIGHT LONG in his own bed! (the pack and play in our room, I mean)

Bad News: Ben slept here:

And I slept here:

Apparently, Jack is not a cosleeper. Every night, we have been putting him down at 7:30, and then we end up waking him up no matter how quietly we creep into the room when we come to bed at like 10:30. I think he smells us or something. He comes into our bed, and everyone gets a crappy night's sleep. Last night, I passed out in the chair and slept uninterrupted until Harry came downstairs at 4:30, which woke everyone up and turned our pleasant night's sleep into Thurber's "The Night the Bed Fell" only with more poop and less hilarity. But even though I have been up since 4:30 (not ON MY FEET, but awake-- well, that's not true, I drifted off again a little after 5-ish, only to be woken up by Ben who was frantically searching under all my covers for Jack-- who was happily back to sleep in the crib in Harry's room-- Harry was asleep on the couch), I feel better rested than I have in 10 months (Jack is 9 months and 3 weeks, but that last week of pregnancy sucked sleep-wise).

Bad News: Our cute little 26 inch TV that we bought the day after we got back from our honeymoon broke last night. Right before dinner-- the crankiest time of Harry's day. Harry lost his crap when the screen stayed black and Mommy and Daddy couldn't find a picture of Dora to match her words. I have never seen the kid so inconsolable. He kept wailing "I can't see T E!"
Good News:


Despite the crazy bed switching party we had this morning, we're all in unusually good spirits




I think until further notice, Ben and I will be sleeping in front of the tube.

when in doubt, just throw them in the tub

this time, we tried our no-fail boredom cure with swim diapers and no water-- ironic, huh?

a masterpiece if ever there was one


harry is used to such madness, but jack was all, what the hell guys? this is cold and kind of dumb. also WASH MY ORANGE NOSE!


see that brown thing sticking up at the bottom of the frame? that's my hair in a bang ponytail. don't worry. i got a haircut since that picture was taken. when i told my stylist about the bang pony, she said if i should ever go out in public like that again and if anyone should see me and inquire about my hair, i am not supposed to tell them who cuts it.


it thawed a bit here, so after nap, we are going to put on our new rain boots and take a walk through the slush. because i got an email from the babycenter.com yesterday, telling me that my preschooler needs to play outside everyday. and just when i was shaking my fist at them (hard to shake your fist at cyberspace) and saying how dare you make me feel guilty babycenter? we live in a frozen wasteland and besides my preschooler walks from the car to the gym playroom 5 days a week-- that's plenty of outdoor time, we got a fabulous 40-degree heat wave. (and you might think this sounds kind of bleak, but I guarantee you there will be people walking around downtown with no coats on eating ice cream because that is how people celebrate a thaw in these parts.)

he's excited about the prospect of fresh air.

He comes in peace

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