Bless You!

Everyday Ryan discovers something new that's funny to him. But he's fickle...whatever was funny will only be funny for about a day and then it's up to us to come up with new material. Here the simple act of saying "Bless You" is HYSTERICAL.

What Goes Around Comes Around

This afternoon, Justin, Ryan, and I just took our first walk around the lake near our house. Seeing as we were only going for a short walk, we didn't bring the diaper bag. I mean why would we need to? What could possibly go wrong? Well...

Halfway through our walk, a bird pooped on Ryan. It got everywhere... his hand, his leg, his sleeve, the stroller. It was quite the bird poop. I used his sock to wipe everything down and convinced him the whole way home NOT to stick his hand in his mouth which if you've met Ryan, you know is quite difficult. I guess it makes sense though, he's pooped on us enough, it was about time someone pooped on him.

A Perfect Day

Last Saturday Justin, Ryan, myself, Joshua, Rachel, Zach, and Bhuvana spent the day in Lexington. We went for a nice walk on the bikepath, got fro yo and yummy iced beverages, and then sprawled out on a blanket in the middle of the park. We topped it off with an impromptu bbq at Bhuv and Hyder's. In essence, the perfect spring outing. During this time, Rachel took this beautiful photo of Ryan which I completely adore.

My Kind of Town

Ryan had a great time meeting all of his Chicago relatives last weekend including my dad and grandmother (Umagi). Here Ryan is testing out Umagi's oxygen supply. Weeeeee! Ryan also enjoyed getting lots of kisses from his cousin Avani. On Saturday my sister and I took my mom and the babies to the portrait studio to get a picture of all of them for Mother's Day. Ryan had his first studio shoot and did pretty well. The harder part was getting him and Avani to sit still at the same time. All in all we had a lot of fun and can't wait to go back for another visit!

First Attempt at Solids

This has been a busy week for Ryan - first plane trip, Ferberization, and now the first step towards eating real food: rice cereal. As you can see by the look on Ryan's face, he didn't exactly find it appetizing. Or maybe it just freaked him out. Today we mixed it with water instead of formula and he may have swallowed a teaspoon full. Not sure since about a tablespoon went in and slightly less than a tablespoon ended up on his bib. Next week we're going to try pureed carrots and see how that goes.


Click here for more pictures from Ryan's First Solids and our recent trip to Chicago.

Ferber - Night #2

Ferberization is going well... Ryan cried for about 10 minutes last night before falling asleep and then stayed asleep all night. He woke up about an hour early, but instead of crying, he just rolled over and whined a bit. All in all, a very successful evening!

Ferber - Night #1

Ryan has always been a good sleeper, particularly for his age. At the risk of being shunned by all of our fellow new parents, I'll tell you that by 1 month he was sleeping 6 hour stretches and now goes about 8 hours before waking up to eat. BUT... we realized recently that he has developed a habit of needing to eat to fall asleep (naptime and bedtime). We had a good bedtime routine that ended with him falling asleep on my breast and me carefully moving him to the crib. We thought this was great until we realized that when he randomly wakes up in the middle of the night, the only way he can fall back asleep is to nurse. He doesn't wake up every night, which tells me that he doesn't NEED to eat in the middle of the night anymore. So we have decided to try and break this habit by implementing the Ferber method.

Last night we changed things up on Ryan. I fed him an hour before he went to bed. We did the rest of the bedtime routine, and then Justin put him in the crib. He cried for 5 minutes, Justin went in and put his hand on him, stayed for a minute, and then left. He cried for another 7 minutes and then fell asleep. Although it was hard to hear him cry, it didn't take long for him to fall asleep so we were pretty excited. Then he woke up at 4:15 am and the misery started.... Justin and I listened to him cry for an hour, following the method by going in at different intervals to try to comfort him without picking him up, rocking him, or nursing. It was torture. The worst part was when you went into the room and he'd realize you weren't going pick him up, and he'd cry louder and angrier. We almost gave in a dozen times, worrying that he really was hungry, but eventually he fell back asleep.

In the morning, we felt SO guilty, but he didn't seem to remember the commotion at night and greeted us with a huge smile. I know this has worked for a lot of people, and although it felt mean and selfish, I know in the long run it will be better for everyone, Ryan included. But wow, was that tough. Tonight is round 2...