Leif rocking tummy time

Leif and I had a great morning. Which is fantastic, because yesterday was a lot of this from everyone:

We did some tummy time when he woke up from his short morning nap and he rocked it! He rolled over, front-to-back, four times. I can't quite believe it happened, and tend to think it was just a fluke, but then I remember that he almost rolled over a couple nights ago, too. It just seems so early for that. Of course I didn't get video of it, but I did get this:



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And some photos for you:

I sometimes think he looks like David Caruso; don't you?

He had his 2-month visit with the nurse on Monday to be weighed and measured. He's 13 pounds, 11 ounces and 24.25 inches long. Big boy! He's speeding through his clothes; it feels like just as soon as I get a new size unpacked and washed and in the dresser, he's outgrown it.

We're still having some rough evenings - yesterday he wasn't asleep until after 9pm - and his overnight sleep was back down to 3-4 hours between feedings (usually 3, ugh), but then last night he did five hours, which felt great. I hear that the rough evenings thing can last until 3 or 4 months, so we still have some rough evenings ahead of us.

We're being very social this weekend, with plans to visit friends both Saturday and Sunday. Here's hoping we all survive another weekend together (which sometimes feels doubtful)...

Hello, it's Leif!

With an active toddler running everywhere and keeping us constantly on the move, James and I had been thinking of Leif still as a newborn - a cute little blob of flesh that eats and poops and sleeps. Then we checked the very beginnings of this blog and saw that I started it when Augie was exactly the age Leif is now - and that at this age, Augie was smiling and cooing and grabbing things and coming into the world. We were surprised that Leif wasn't doing these things; and then - well, then we started paying attention to Leif and realized that he IS doing all these things! The next morning we realized that we have a smiling, laughing, toy-grabbing baby on our hands, and we'd been missing it. I think we both felt (feel?) more than a little guilty about this, and now we are both paying much more attention to Leif.

We are so blessed to have two beautiful, happy, healthy little boys.

Look how awake and aware he is!

Augie turned two years and Leif turned two months within a day of each other, so I wanted to get a cute shot of them with the blocks, like I used to do for Augie. I put the blocks on the bed with a gap between the "2 years" and "2 months", but Augie immediately moved all the blocks together in a line. When I thought he wasn't paying attention I tried again, and again he moved them all together. I had no idea he was so into organization!

We don't have space for a Christmas tree, so I wanted to get all crafty and make an alternative tree. It doesn't look great in this photo, but we're so pleased with how it turned out! I like to put Leif down in front of it on his playmat or in his bouncer seat, and he just stares at the lights.

Augie's birthday weekend

I'm a bit sheepish to report that I don't really have good pictures from our party yesterday, or from much that we did this weekend. Leif barely napped all day yesterday, and when the party came around he was overtired and upset, so I wore him in the carrier all evening - which meant that I was a bit reserved from the action and wasn't able to move around and take pictures as I would have liked. Alas. It's also difficult as there's only enough natural light to take pictures for about 3 hours each day, and the lighting in this apartment is pretty bad (I'd guess the fixtures haven't been updated in fifty years - but that's just a guess).

But, I did get some pictures, so here they are.

Our big gift to Augie was a play kitchen. He loves it. All he wants to do now is cook and wash the dishes. He puts most of his toys in the oven and in the cupboard under the sink.

Shortly after opening his present, Augie decided his bedroom - on top of the bed - was the best place for his kitchen.

I love this (it was printed on the box):

Poring over the book our friend Julie gave him:

Cake! I made a pumpkin cake with maple cream cheese frosting - it was delicious. I'm eating a piece now as I write this post.

It took him forever to go to sleep last night after the party, and he's taking a while again tonight. One day we won't be so exhausted, right?

Birthday party morning

Just a couple pics to tide you over until tomorrow (I hope!), when I can post more about Augie's second birthday (two days after his actual birthday). He loved his gift, and we had a fun time with friends. But I'm using my remaining energy tonight to write him a letter.

Happy 2nd birthday, my love!

Augie turned two today! Wow! Two years of loving and being continually amazed by this beautiful little tyrant who runs circles around me, who exhausts me, who fills me with joy and wonder with his own joy and wonder. He's such a funny little boy - he's such a little boy. He's not a baby anymore (though of course he will always be my baby).

We've decided to spend the entire weekend celebrating him. Today was just the kick-off - a couple small presents to get him started. Tomorrow we'll do fun things and give him his big gift, and then Sunday we'll have a party with friends. I can't wait to share all the merriment with him (and with you!).

When he got home from dagis (where he ate 4 servings worth of lunch!) this afternoon he took a short nap, and then we cuddled on the couch to read.

After dinner we gave him a small gift - a star box (he is so into stars right now - or, as he calls them, twinkles) filled with dark chocolate squares: 

After dinner we went to his room to open a couple presents. The bag around his neck was a gift from Auntie Tina - he keeps growing like a tiger and pointing at the tiger on the front:

An airplane from Ah Mah and Granddad - he loved it!

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He knows that bags are for going out, so he picked up his airplane and ran for the front door. I helped him put on his boots and we went for a walk through the building:

Quickie update

Not much to show you - haven't been taking pictures lately and have been absolutely exhausted. Pictures below are leftovers I found on my phone.

At a park yesterday, Augie pointed to a statue of a naked woman (let's say a goddess) and said, "Mama!" Then he pointed at me and the statue and said "Two mamas!"

Had a follow-up appointment today for Leif's laryngomalacia; turns out there wasn't much reason to go. She offered to do another procedure to check out what's going on, but at only three weeks after the first procedure, it's unlikely there would be any change - and I'm not letting stick a tube up my baby's nose unless it's necessary! She reiterated that as long as he's gaining weight and we aren't worried, he's fine and there's no cause for concern.

Happy Thanksgiving to all my American readers! This is the first year ever I've done absolutely nothing to celebrate, and I feel the worse for it. We were invited to a dinner on Sunday, but that's the day we are going to celebrate Augie's birthday. He turns two tomorrow! Holy shit! We're having a few of his friends over for cake and toddler mischief Sunday afternoon. We'll also try to do some of Augie's favorite things this weekend - go to a construction site, ride bicycles, dig in the sand, and eat waaay too many olives. And on Saturday, Leif will be two months.

Okay, here are the remainder pics from my phone. Hoping to get much better pictures to you after this weekend.

Screens? No thanks

In yesterday's post, I forgot to tell you why I thought Friday and Saturday were so horrible, but Sunday was so much better.

Augie had been playing two little games on the iPad for a couple weeks - two innocuous, not-stupid-kid-game type of games - he'd play for a few minutes and then get bored and moved on. And then we (and by "we" I in no way mean "we", but one of us in particular) started to show Augie videos on the iPad, and then introduce him to really stupid games - and suddenly Augie was asking for the videos all the time. Rather than limiting his screen time, we (read note above) just kept giving him the iPad. All was well and good when he had it, but as soon as it was taken away, he started crying and whining and begging to nurse, and he would not give up. And this pattern would repeat over and over during the day. It was ugly.

Saturday night we talked about what role we wanted screens, and specifically the iPads, to play in our family life, and we (this time I really mean we) realized that we don't want any screen time for our family - at least when we're all together and interacting with the boys. Not for us, not for them.

So Sunday morning, neither of us got our iPads out, and when Augie asked for fish or monkeys or buses (games and videos he likes), we deflected and moved him on to something else. He didn't have a single meltdown all day, and he didn't ask to nurse except at his normal times, and he finally took a nice long nap.

Could be coincidental, could be causal. Either way, the iPads are on the shelf when the kids are up.

Unrelated to this post, here are a couple bed pictures:

Leif and I took a lovely long nap together this morning, and then in the afternoon he put himself to sleep for a second (considerably shorter) nap. We've been struggling with his sleep, but today I paid close attention to the clock to make sure I wasn't keeping him awake too long and getting him back to bed at the right moment, and that's when he put himself to sleep. It's so hard to figure these things out at this age because they change so frequently - just as soon as we've figured out his sleeping/waking patterns, they change. So I figure by the time I get us settled into a routine, it'll be obsolete. 

What a s*&t show

Thank goodness the weekend is over! I never thought I'd say that, but man - what a shit show! I'll spare you the details and just give you the summary: whining, uncontrollable body-shaking crying, begging for "nurses", refusing naps, not nursing, too much nursing, early wake-ups, late bedtimes, and double meltdowns. Augie wasn't in school on Friday so we were all home together, and Friday and Saturday were messy. At one point Leif was crying so hard that I was minutes away from taking him to the hospital (James put him in the Beco carrier and he fell asleep within minutes and was fine). Just nasty days. Today, however, was great; no whining or crying from Augie, both boys fell asleep for long morning naps (Leif even put himself to sleep for a little bit), then we went for a lovely family walk to a church to listen to some music in the afternoon and enjoyed a quadruple-chocolate treat on the way. It seems that all of a sudden, when Leif gets overtired, he just loses it and screams in the most heartbreaking way, his whole little body shuddering and screaming for the end of the world.

This is from the end of the day Saturday; I actually think this photo makes me look good considering the state I was in:

But we woke up on Sunday and had some of this:

 Looking at Mama during tummy time:

This is what the end of tummy time usually looks like:

Sharing our mega-chocolate treat this afternoon (Augie ate half of mine):

While we were at the concert in the church, I was trying to distract Augie while we were in the children's alcove and I pulled over a big pile of wooden puzzles - everyone turned to look at me. I was so embarrassed!

Sleepless day

Ugh - rough day around here. I spent the entire day trying to get Leif settled into a real nap - he took a bunch of 20-30 minute catnaps, but never settled into his usual 3-hour nap (he usually takes one or two during the day). I took him walking three times, but he either didn't fall asleep or woke as soon as we got home each time. And Augie didn't nap at dagis at all, so he fell asleep in the stroller on the way home and took a nap from 4-5:30pm. Lucky for us, he still fell asleep at a reasonable bedtime (8:15 or so). Unlucky for us, Leif's fantastic nighttime sleep pattern seems to have ended; he was going 5-9 hours for his first sleep, as I said, but now he's back to 3-4 hours between wakings all night long. I'm desperately hoping this is a growth spurt which makes him wake and feed more often, but I have a sinking feeling it's just the new normal.

As James was walking to dagis to pick up Augie, he ran into the mother of one of Augie's schoolmates. They had a nice chat, and then at the end she got really awkward and asked James to look at her daughter's face: there was a big gauge on her cheek where Augie had scratched her. Apparently this happens regularly, and the teachers usually miss it happening. They've assured us that his aggression is normal for this age and developmental stage, but we're pretty upset that our son is picking on someone so much. We're going to try to go to the same playgroup tomorrow afternoon so that we can see them together and step in if (more likely when) Augie gets aggressive and teach him that this is not appropriate behavior. We're really hoping this behavior stops soon...

On an entirely cuter note, look at this guy:

He's actually sleeping in this picture, with his eyes open. He does it all the time, and it's creepy;

He's beginning to be able to find his hands fairly often, and when he does, much smacking of lips adn sucking of fingers can be heard:

Big boy

Leif had his 2-month visit with the pediatrician today. As expected, he's a "fine young boy." And he's big! He's 24 inches long (61 centimeters) and 12 pounds, 13 ounces (5.82 kilograms). He's still climbing the growth curve, so there's no worry that his funny breathing is holding him back.

Our evenings have gotten a tiny bit better (last night both boys were asleep by 7:30!), but now Leif isn't sleeping as long overnight - he's only been going 3-4 hours between feeds. Hoping this is a growth spurt and he'll settle back into the 5-9 hour stretches we were having.