Tag: baby sleep

The baby sleep solution days 8, 9 & 10

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Day 8: So I left you all on tenterhooks after day 7’s schedule all went out of the window.  I just knew it was going to be a bad night when Aviana woke up at 9.30 PM, just 2.5hrs after we put her down for the night.  At first we were confused where the crying was coming from because she has never woken up this early since she was 6 weeks old!  I panicked, not knowing how to handle this, especially as I had literally just finished pumping – the boob soothing option was pretty much out of the window.  Could she really be hungry?  Well she hadn’t eaten much that day, so it was possible.  Or was this the start of the 4 month sleep regression?   For some reason I crazily decided to try and soothe her back to sleep by shushing her and putting my hand on her tummy.  Unbelievably – it worked!!  Phew!  However, knowing that she wasn’t in a deep sleep we decided not to do our usual thing of what we do just before we go to bed: pick her up out of her crib in her room and transfer her to the pack and play in our room.

We decided that we would leave her in her crib for the night for the very first time. YIKES I was nervous about doing this. Why?  Because I was afraid I wouldn’t hear her cry or the monitor would break – her bedroom is upstairs and ours is downstairs so we wouldn’t hear her cry through the walls.  Of course this is also prime time for Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) , so I worry about that all the time.

Anyway…needless to say I was right.  She woke up at 2.15AM.  DOH.  Then she woke up for the day at 5AM. Double DOH.

Despite the early start, Aviana nursed to schedule, still every three hours, and napped well, with me putting her down in her crib with little to no crying. WINNER!

Day 9: Aviana woke up again at 2.30AM  for  night feed and then woke up for the day at 4.45AM. UGHHHHH.  OK so there goes the theory that a schedule with few feeds with more milk helps her to sleep through the night!  But remember we are only on step 1 of the baby sleep solution.  Today was nanny day!  I got to take a break and Aviana was on schedule with the nanny.  She even drunk 5oz of milk at bed time!  She is taking the bottle much better now.

Day 10: This time Aviana woke up at 3.15AM, a little better, but not like the few days she slept through.   The schedule went completely out of the window because I went to a baby wearing meeting in the morning and Aviana decided to fall asleep in the car in both directions.  Then I got a call from friends who needed some help with something which meant I had to leave the house, so Aviana missed her afternoon nap completely.  Today was a day that made me realise that Aviana likes a schedule because she got a little grumpy with it all, which made me a little grumpy too.

Days 8, 9 & 10 summary:  No more sleeping through the night, those two days seemed to be a one off.  But Aviana seems to be a much happier baby with a schedule and goes down for naps easily.  I think we may be able to stretch out her feeds a little more next week now that I know she can drink 5oz in one feed.

 

The baby sleep solution day 7

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She slept from 6.45PM to 5.30AM again. Whoop whoop!!!! But…..the rest of the day didn’t go quite as planned.

Well she went down to her first nap of the day with just a little whimper and then slept for 1hr 20….yey she made it through two sleep cycles!  She nursed well when she woke up and then it all went to pots after that.  I went out to a little play gym with a friend and her two children, I thought I had timed it well for Aviana to fall asleep in the car on the way there, then I would feed her when we got there and then she would play! Ummm No. She fell asleep 2 minutes before we arrived. Ughhhh.  She woke up after 10 minutes.  So we played.  She had lots of fun and so did I! (Except for when she had a melt down because she couldn’t put a big whirly ball in her mouth – this is becoming a thing that she gets frustrated over, it’s kind of funny!)

But then it was food time and she would not nurse in the play gym. She was too distracted.  I should have just fed her in the car. My bad.  Instead I thought I’d wait until we headed out for lunch.  She then fell asleep in the car again and had a proper 40 minute nap whilst I ate lunch (Yey eating with both hands!).  So this meant she was completely off schedule for feeding and napping. Oh well, let’s go with the flow.  When she woke up she just snacked again.  We drove home and she fell asleep AGAIN just before we arrived home.  The cleaners were still in the house making a lot of noise (I know….first world problems) so I took Aviana for a walk and she had her afternoon nap in her buggy.

But hey – I don’t want to live my life or hers by a strict schedule…so we just deal with it and be flexible.  She was happy, I was happy.  What were the consequences of crappy napping and snacking through the day?  Ha….you will find out tomorrow!

They say that the first nap of the day is the most important for baby, so we nailed that one at least.  And after Chris gave her a bottle of breast milk (high fives all around for her taking the bottle still!), as usual she went to sleep at 7pm in her crib with no fuss.

Day 7 Summary.  Aviana goes down for one nap in crib with little fuss, no crying.  But because we went out in the car all other naps and feeding schedules go out the window.  She definitely didn’t eat enough throughout the day as the baby sleep solution requires.

The baby sleep solution day 6

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I had the best day EVER with Aviana!  I was nervous because Chris went back to work and I wondered if she would miss the bottle and how she would be at nursing.  But I had nothing to worry about.  She nursed beautifully.  We kept to the rough schedule of feeding every 3 hours.

Oh I forgot the most important thing!  She slept all the way through to 5.30 AM…YES!  She stirred at 1.30AM and when Chris got up to go to the toilet at some point around 3.30AM, but didn’t wake up completely.

Naps…first nap of the day – NO CRYING, just a few whimpers when I put her down in the crib.  Second nap of the day, 1 round of 3 minutes of crying, same for her third nap.  She stayed awake from 3PM to 6.45PM.  No crying at bed time when she went down in her crib!

The best part of the day was how fun and happy she was playing.  My favourite part of the day was when she got super excited at the musical cow and wanted to put it in her mouth, she tried but it was too big so she got upset.  She also has started to lean forward and try to bounce herself in the ExerSaucer bouncer and grip onto the toys.  She is getting really strong at standing up too, her balance is getting better and can now stand just holding onto my fingers.  I basically had the perfect day with her on my own!  (Apart from the poo explosion in the shops but that’s just OK, I’m getting used to handling these!)

Day 6 summary.  Aviana nursed calmly, went down easily for all her naps, kept to the 3 hour feed schedule.  Slept for 10.5 hrs through the night.  This is really starting to work.

The baby sleep solution day 5

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Aviana slept from 7pm til 4.10am again!!! She went back to sleep after her ‘night time’ feed for just 20 minutes.  Doh.  Oh well. Perhaps this is part of the process! Then she snacked at 6.30AM because she had fed at 4AM she wasn’t hugely interested in eating.

She was on schedule perfectly for the rest of the day.  She went down at 8.15AM after one round of 3 minutes of crying, again at 11.45AM, similar.  This time she actually took an afternoon nap at 2PM!  Little fuss. It was tough to keep her awake between her 3.30PM feed and her 6.30PM feed, but she stayed awake, Chris did a great job.  We had friends over so we had lots of ways to distract her!  She fussed a little after bath time, but Chris coped well and she took the bottle after about 5 minutes (I’m sure it felt longer than that for Chris!).  She fell asleep at 7PM after just one round of crying…although she cried for 2 minutes, stopped, almost fell asleep by herself, then a few minutes later cried for 3 minutes, then Chris went into reassure her and she was fast asleep.  So she is almost at the brink of soothing herself within a few minutes.  But not quite there yet!

She is taking the bottle well from Chris!!!! She took between 3oz to 4.5oz at each feed.  I was pumping just before so she had fresh milk in the bottle, and at one feed I had to use milk left over from the first pump of the day (I pumped 6oz she took 4oz), so I hope my supply can keep up.  I do have a cold so may be my supply has dipped a little.  Just got to keep nursing and pumping!!!

Day 5 Summary: Aviana is on schedule with her feeds, with little fuss at nap times, extending her night time sleep already, perhaps Day 4 wasn’t a coincidence after all?

Anyone want a 45 minute timer?

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You could use Aviana as a 45 minute timer alarm clock. Seriously…this girl is to the minute almost exact in her 45 min sleep cycle. 

Just kidding…Although she makes a good 45 minute alarm clock, I’m not selling her just yet ☺️ in the past few days she has just learned how to giggle, interact and ‘talk’ with me, grab things and now she’s putting them in her mouth…it’s too cute. I love seeing her big leaps, even if it means she can be a grumpy moose in exchange of all that development!

Child development- FASCINATING!!!!! 

I keep hearing that at around 4 months this 45 min cycle will flip with light sleep and R.E.M. Sleep and she will enter her biggest sleep regression? Did this happen to you at 4 months? How did you get through it? 

(Ps. The photo at the top is Aviana after she fell asleep when I was feeding her lying down, so I took a photo opportunity and made it look like she was snuggled up in bed-that’s not how I leave her to sleep!  I promise!! She sleeps in a crib, on a firm surface, no blankets and on her back!!)