Walking...well trying to

So Sophie has been taking a few steps here and there and everyday she is getting more brave. Unfortunately as soon as she sees the camera she wants to see watch videos, she hasn't quite figured out that we have to record her 1st. Anyway we finally go some video of her walking. Again cause the camera is out its not her best work, but she's awefully cute.

And of course sometimes you just have to stop to dance a bit!

When to Call it Quits

Okay, so its time to admit that I was totally wrong! After about a month of trying to move Sophie to one nap, it seems the only thing I have accomplished is totally sleep depriving my baby.

I promised myself along time ago that I would never parent myself into a corner. I've watched too many friends pull their hair out trying to get their child to fit a specific model, or behave the way a certain book said they should. I'm not opposed to parenting books, I think they are great tools, but I've never been good at fitting molds.

So when Sophie arrived BJ and I agreed that we would always be flexible. If we tried something with her and it didn't work out, rather than keep pushing we would simply try something else. I'm all for owning my choices and admitting when I mess up.

So here I am barely 3 months into the parenthood and I'm already having to readjust. Poor Sophie! I really did have the best intentions moving her to 1 nap. She really seemed like she was ready, and admittedly selfishly, I didn't like her playing in her crib for an hour before she finally fell asleep. I want her to play with me!

At first it seemed to be working out okay. Sophie was a little tired and in the evening she would have a few mood swings, but for a little while (very little while) it seemed we were on the right track. But the reality is that though she's stopped asking for her morning nap, she is clearly becoming more and more sleep deprived.

My poor baby isn't taking longer afternoon naps to make up for the lack of a morning one. In fact her afternoon naps were becoming more restless, and disrupted by her waking up crying. The last straw of us was that her night time sleep was beginning to get disrupted! This week she's been waking up crying much more often and getting up in the morning earlier and earlier.

If you know me at all you know that I cannot be sleep deprived! When I don't get enough sleep I can barely be civil let alone kind. I've adjusted to waking around 7a, but 6a or earlier is out of the question (at least when I know that her healthy wake up time is 7a).

So yesterday (BJ's birthday) was the last straw. Sophie was clearly tired in the morning so I decided to put her to bed about 11:30a. I was hoping that she'd get a few good hours of sleep, so we could have a fun afternoon with daddy, but it was less then an hour before she woke up screaming and would not go back to sleep. We ended up putting her back down about 3:30p and slept till 5p. And still by 7p she was ready for bed, but then had another restless night and was up early again this morning.

BJ and I had discussed a few time this week about whether it was time to rethink our plan, and yesterday it was very clear that it was time.

So we are going back to 2 naps...at least for now.

The New Stroller

Sophie's been home now for 3 months (seriously can you believe that!) and finally last week we bought a stroller. Strollers seem to be a challenging thing for mommies everywhere. There are so many kinds, they sorta do different things, they vary in weight drastically which hugely effects use, and then of course there is the over all astetic and what is trending.

I knew that I wouldn't need a stroller right away, a wonderful friend several years ago made me a sling and I waited a long time to get to use it, so I use it alot! Since my days in retail, I've never been a big fan of strollers anyway, at least in crowded places, they take up too much space and often don't manuver well, and lets face it most of us have either been run into by a stroller or seen a stroller take out a display at the mall.

In a sling I have both arms free, Sophie cannot reach out and grab anything that is out of my reach, she its close to me, and best of all I can look at her face and she can look at mine. I love having Sophie in a sling, and I plan, in most public spaces, to sling her until she is too big, or until she just plan refuses.

However I love to take walks! Right now I'm in a great neighborhood with a bike trail, sidewalks, a big park and as long as it isn't freezing cold or raining I love to walk (plus Monti needs a walk now and again). Taking a long walk is the one occation that I knew I would want a stroller.

So I did a lot of asking around. I read a thousand reviews and picked out a few models that had features that I wanted, asked around again and finally made our choice...then we needed it to go on sale.

One feature that was really important to me was to have a seat that could face me. I know eventually Sophie will want to look out, and then I can turn it around, but until then I wanna see her precious face!

Another feature we needed was a big, and easily accessible basket. Monti may need to take walks, but he's 14 years old and he can no longer keep up, since I don't want to have to carry him home, while pushing a stroller, it was important to have a place to tuck him.

So we bought the Britax B-Ready stroller. We love it! It is even already ready to add another seat should we someday require a double stroller. We've had it about a week and have already put some serious miles on it and everyone is happy.

SO that's our stroller story.

Another Video

This is the a video I meant to post the other day, but instead I posted the same one twice...Sorry.

Some Fun Videos

So last year I was having coffee with my girl friends and my friend C.'s daughter was wearing this adorable outfit. I just loved it, but was had a hard time coming up with a tactful way to ask for it as a hand-me-down. She was extremely gracious as I asked her if she was planning on having any more children and when the answer was no if she would mail me her daughters outfit (Lets face it I have good friends who know how to take me). Any way I had completely forgotten about it till last week, her husband came to town and wanted to stop by with a little something for Sophie. I just about died when I opened it! I still think this is one of the most adorable outfits ever and the fact that Sophie is so delightfully tiny makes it even sweeter.

This week Sophie has decided that it is hillarious when I tell her not to put things (that don't belong) in her mouth. We spent 15 minutes laughing that shoes don't go in our mouth. She would bring her shoe up to her mouth and then burst into hystarics as I said "we don't put shoes in our mouth." Yesterday it was cell phones and today we learned that books don't go in our mouth. My baby is a trip!