Quiet Mornings

You will NEVER hear us complain about how Kaylani sleeps at night. EVER. In fact, we don't complain so much that it bothers some people. For as far back as I can remember, Kaylani has slept around 12 hours a night, and that's a GREAT thing. Well, at least we thought she was sleeping for 12 hours.

Most nights, Kaylani is in bed by 7:30pm, and asleep by 7:45pm. And most mornings when I wake up at 6:45am, she's still asleep. Then finally, around 7:15am, she's awake in her crib, which according to Mommy, is because I woke her up while I was showering. On days when I go to the gym much earlier, she sleeps in a little bit until 7:30am or so before she wakes Mommy up. And on weekends, when we're fortunate enough to not have anything to wake up for, we've slept in until 8am or even 8:30am. But somedays, like today, she wakes up at 6:15am, but is back down at 7am, awake again at 7:15am, but back down again at 7:30am. So the question is, what time does Kaylani wake up, and what does she do?

During the week, its easy to say that Kaylani seems to wake up between 6:45am and 7:15am. Since that's 5 days of the week, you'd think that she wakes up at that time on Saturday and Sunday too since I don't think she has concept of weekdays vs weekends yet. Some days, I've seen her asleep still at 7:30 or later (especially on days I have to leave for work early), so its not consistently the same time. But one thing we have noticed is that there are definitely days when she wakes up and sits there. Quietly. By herself. The scary thing is that we have no idea for how long.

We have a video monitor and a sound activated audio monitor in her room. In the mornings, the audio monitor rarely goes off, which means either she's not talking, or its not picking things up. Since it works fine when we test it, its not the latter, so we can fairly confidently say she's just not talking. So that leaves the video monitor. On the mornings we wake up on our own, looking at the video monitor always surprises us because she doesn't move much, at least not enough to be picked up by the camera.

When we look closely, she's typically laying there playing with her belly button, or sitting there staring out into her room. A few days ago, she was laying there and said "I see green light" to me when I finally went to get her (which means she was staring at the camera which has a green light on it). Other days, I'll walk in and she'll just stare through her crib at me and smile until I come closer. And then other days she'll proclaim that she's still sleeping, or that Grover/Telly/other animals in her bed are still sleeping. And on some days, she'll stand up and start clapping and proudly announce (and show) that her socks are on her hands (which is pretty impressive when I think back to the struggles of trying to put mittens on by myself as a child).

What's all of this mean? It means that our little girl is quite easily self entertained, but that doesn't stop us from feeling guilty for leaving her to her own devices for who knows how long. It also means she may not be sleeping for 12 hours since she could be doing all of this in the middle of the night too. Most importantly, it means that we're used to Kaylani being in her crib for 12 hours a night which allows us to watch TV, sleep, etc. And its that last part that might come back to bite us some day. But for now, we'll take what we can get because the way it is now means we're all happy, and we've got no guilt about that.

Speaking of happy, check out new pictures I posted in Kaylani's album. They're from the past month, and include a sneak peak at her Halloween costume. More to come from that! Happy Halloween!

A Sad Ending

We were ecstatic when Kaylani learned to go from belly to back. Overjoyed when she went from back to belly. Thrilled when she went from down to sit. And happy (ran out of fancy synonyms) when she could go from sit to stand. But now, all of that just makes us sad.

Being back from vacation means Kaylani finally was in the comforts of her own room and her own crib again. It also meant that bedtime routine was back on, and we didn't have to worry about her crying at night, or putting her down in the pack and play. Instead, we could lay her down in her crib after we both said goodnight, and she would drift away into dreamland for 12 hours (hopefully). But the past 2 nights, Kaylani's been the saddest little baby in the world before bedtime, and she knows it. She almost got through us yesterday too.

After Mommy finished nursing, I went back into Kaylani's room to say goodnight. After 2 kisses from us, she gets put in her crib for the night. Usually she'll either stay asleep, or ideally she'll open her eyes, look at us, and then go back to sleep when we put our hand on her for a brief second. Last night, she looked at us, rolled over, and tried to climb out. Being firm sleep training parents, we put her back down, kissed her good night again (no easy task with the crib lowered all the way down), and left the room. This is when things get sad.

For the next 5 minutes, Kaylani cried. While that's sad, it's something we're used to at bedtime. But now, she just looks sad (through the video monitor). She rolls over onto her belly, crawls to the corner of the crib, and tries to stand up. 2 nights ago she tried to stand up and toppled over pretty badly. We of course went in to make sure she was okay, which she was except for a small red bump on her chin. Nothing too bad for 2 nights ago, but there were lasting effects. Instead of trying to stand up last night, she just sat there, in the corner of her crib, looking out at the door, and crying. Not wailing, but more like a whimpering, sad, cry, for 5 minutes.

When I went in after those 5 minutes, she still cried, but tried to stand up to see me. And when she would stand up, I would lay her back down, rub her belly (or her back when she rolled over), and try to get her to sleep. Each time, she would crawl back to her corner and try and stand up to get me to pick her up. Again, being the strict sleep training parents that we are, I would lay her back down and try again. After 2 minutes, I laid her down, said good night again, blew her a kiss, and walked out the door as she crawled back to her corner.

The next 5 minutes was more of the same. Kaylani sat in her corner, holding the crib, looking at the door, crying, with a slouched over defeated look to her. At the 9 minute mark, Mommy called me from downstairs (where she was watching the other monitor) to beg me to pick Kaylani up for a little bit. She thought "Kaylani just needed a little love and wants to be with her Daddy." As if Kaylani wasn't tugging on my heart strings enough, there was Mommy guilt tripping me into picking her up. And then, Mommy goes "See?? She fell down again!"

Kaylani didn't fall down again. What she did was lie down and fall asleep, in her corner. It happened right at the 10 minute mark, and before Daddy could give in and pick her up to give her a big hug and let her know she shouldn't be the saddest little monkey in her crib. It's about that time now tonight again, so here's to hoping she stays asleep, or closes her eyes after she sees us when we put her in her crib. I'm not sure I can handle 15 minutes of the saddest baby ever waiting for her Daddy to come rescue her from her crib.

Reaching for the Animals

For $45, Kaylani has had nightly entertainment for the last 5 months. That turns out to be about 25 cents per night of entertainment (actually it turns out to be free since it was a gift from Madrina Maria). I'd say that's a pretty good deal and if I could have nightly entertainment at that price, I'd sign up right now (of course as adults, we're a bit pickier and anything that costs 25 cents per night or free probably isn't worth it). But soon, Kaylani's entertainment might get cancelled. Temporarily.

In case you're wondering, Kaylani's entertainment is her mobile. It's a wonderful array of 5 animals (rhino, giraffe, elephant, zebra, and chick) that just hang above her. Some nights she'll talk to them (we're unsure if they talk back when we're not here), other nights she'll just lay there and stare at them. On rare occasions they'll sing music to her, but that's only when we crank them up which is hardly ever. Watching her interact with them has been very touching, but lately, it's been that touching that causes us concern.

Some times when we look at Kaylani "sleeping" through her video monitor, we see her reaching high in the air trying to grab one of the animals. She's pretty smart about it too because she'll even roll onto one side so she can stretch her little arm that much higher. Although it's far away, we're pretty sure she can put her finger tips on at least one of them. And that's not a good thing.

Imagine if she reaches up and grabs an animal (let's use giraffe as an example because he's the tallest, even though all the animals are at the same height, but it would make the most sense for her to be able to grab the tallest one right?), gives it a good tug, and then the entire mobile comes crashing down on her. The possibility of that happening is enough to make us come up with an action plan. Unfortunately, action plans need time to work.

Our action plan is to lower her mattress. Upon further review, lowering the mattress requires taking the matress out, unscrewing 4 screws and rescrewing them back in. I know, it doesn't sound like a lot of work, but that has to be done between Daddy getting home from work and Kaylani going to bed, which is usually less than an hour, of which 30 minutes is used for dinner. So needless to say, that hasn't been done yet. The alternate plan is to remove the mobile for now, but our concern there is that without her nightly entertainment, she may not sleep as well as she does currently. And when 2 of the 3 past nights have involved her sleeping over 11 hours straight (last night was the 2nd time), it's hard to justify changing things now.

So for now, nothing's going to be done. Since she likes sleeping on her belly we're kinda just hoping she doesn't reach up for the animals and that the animals don't try and reach down to her. Maybe this weekend Daddy will stop making excuses and lower the crib. But until then, let's hope Kaylani listens to those famous words from Casey Casum: "Keep your hands on the ground and keep reaching for the floor." Well, something like that anyways.

Paternal instinct or crazy?

Last night, Kaylani slept in her room. She slept in her crib. Most importantly, she slept alone. Its been 10 days, and she slept alone, in her room, in her crib. And I'm not talking about for a few minutes either. She stayed there for 3 hours, woke up to eat, slept for 2 hours, and then did that again. It was AWESOME! I know some kids who are way older than her that have never done that before!

Now you would think that all of that means I got a great night sleep. And its true, I did get some good sleep, but it wasn't a great night. After about an hour, I kept "hearing" her cry. Thinking that our monitor wasn't working, I kept getting up and moving closer to her room everytime I "heard" her. The first 6 times I checked, she wasn't crying, but that 7th time, I was right! So is it paternal instinct, or I am just a little bit crazy?

Now the argument towards crazy is an easy one to make (it always has been when it comes to me), but don't you think there is such a thing as paternal instinct? I do. I don't believe that her actually crying on the 7th time was simply because it had been 2 hours and it was time for her to wake up. I don't believe that I made so much noise creeping towards and opening her door that she woke up. I truly believe that I've developed paternal instincts.

I can't wait to see what other senses I'll develop! I hope its something cool like invisibility. I have heard some dads talk about how their kids don't even know they're there. They also say their kids don't even hear them when they talk, so maybe that's another developed sense. Either way, must be cool to have these "new" senses...right?

Speaking of cool, new pictures are posted. No paternal instincts required to view.