It has been a while since writing any new posts here. So much has happened these last few months. Just an update of our life, Finn is a little over 2 years old and we just had a baby girl 7 months ago. We named her Wren. She is the sweetest baby ever. Finn is such an amazing big brother to Wren, he is just so sweet! His favorite word to say now is “bae” (Baby) He wakes up looking for Wren every morning and he always give her kisses. Isn’t that the sweetest thing?
isn’t she so tiny and cute?
My favorite tiny humans
Sometimes I forget how lucky I am to be their mother. When I don’t get enough sleep, when they both crying at the same, when they refuse to eat everything I make for them..I forget how lucky I am to be their mom. But moments when I see their sweet faces, their smiles, their little giggles, their hands reaching out to mine where I just can’t help but just ball and feel so grateful I get to be their mom and watch them grow each day.
I have been thinking a lot about whether to close down this blog or not. I’m really bad with writing in journals so this blog was created as a way for me to write a few things down so I could look back. Well, I’m back and rediscovered something that’s important to me and I think is interesting to share. Recently my Mom visited us and stayed over a few times. We spent time together, just her and me, and enjoyed each other’s company. Our time together reminded me of the old days, when she would tell me her life stories, which I always loved listening to. Listening to her stories again reminded me of the old days and how many of the stories I’d forgotten. So I decided to write a few posts about her life. So the next few posts I will write about her and her stories. Thanks for reading along.
I transitioned my 18M old from his crib to a bed a few weeks ago and I have to say that was one of the hardest things I’ve done as a parent so far. I’m sure there will be many harder things later on like potty training (I’m not too excited for that though), but I’m so glad that he is finally get used to his new bed. First of all, we needed to be sure he was ready to transition. The reason why we decided to move him to a toddler bed is because he was beginning to try climbing out of his crib and the lowest setting for his crib didn’t seem so low anymore for him. Sleeping in the crib became unsafe. We are also expecting another baby in a couple months so we thought there was no better time to switch him to a bed.
1, Prep for before the Transition.
We moved the crib out from his bedroom and bought a twin size mattress and a bed frame for him. We also bought new footie sleeper that allows him to walk better because we know that he will likely jump out of his bed and walk around his room. He is so attached to his old sleeping sack so we let him keep it in his new bed like a comfort blanket.
For the first few weeks, I recommend removing everything distracting in your kid’s room. We removed the book shelf and toys out of Finn’s room because we know that he is going to play with them instead of sleeping.
We bought a toddler bed rail bumper guard to prevent him from rolling off the bed (We only bought one, and just used our body pillow for the shorter side) This really helps him feel more secure but he still can get down and get up to bed.
2. Progress leading to Finally Sleeping in Bed.
Finn has always slept in his own room since he was 3 weeks old, so we thought that the transition wouldn’t be as hard, but we were wrong! He struggled a lot for the first 5 days.
The first night, we did the same routine. After a bath he plays a little, we brush his teeth, read him a book then put him to bed at 7pm. He cried a lot and got out of the bed many times. He kept sitting in a corner, which made my heart ache so much looking him through the monitor, but I knew that we had to do this. A lot of times we had to go in to put him back into his bed and comforted him. He took advantage of us staying with him for a few mins to comfort him and he screamed even more and just wanted us to hold him and play with him instead. At that point we knew that it wouldn’t help if we kept doing that, so every 15-20 mins we would go in to his room and put him back on the bed and just left the room. We did that probably 20-30 times until he finally fell asleep (it took him 2.5 hours to fall asleep). He slept until 4am and woke up crying and screaming, and of course he got off his bed and sat in the corner of the room near the door. We continued to go in to his room and put him back. He fell asleep again and slept til 6:30am.
The second night got a little better. He cried for 30 mins then fell asleep on the floor near the door. We had to go in and put him on his bed. He woke up at 4:30am and cried then fell back to sleep again til 6:30am.
The third and forth night were worse than the first 2 nights. He screamed and cried even more. It took him forever to fall asleep. He woke up crying every 3 hours and he kept sitting in the corner of the room nearest to the front door. As a mother, my heart hurts so much seeing him like that. I felt like I abandoned him every time I left his room. I was so tempted to put the crib back in his room but I kew that the crib is no longer a safe place for him to sleep in so we just pressed on.
The 5th night is when things started to get much better. He only complained when we first left the room but didn’t try to get off his bed. He played on his bed for about 10 mins then fell asleep until 6:30am in the morning. When he woke up he got off from his bed and played with his stuffed animals until 8am.
Let’s talk about nap time. Before, he used to take naps around 11am, but the first 3 days of the transition when we tried to put him to nap at that time, he wouldn’t take a nap at all, which made him so fussy during the day. So we decided to change his nap time to to 12:30pm after his lunch time. This slight adjustment helped him take naps on his bed.
Now after almost 2 weeks since the transition, he gets excited to sleep on his bed. He doesn’t cry when we leave the room. We are so glad that we did this, and are so proud of him. Again, only transition them when they are ready and when you are ready. I chose to let him cry it out on some days but each child is different. Do whatever you feel is best for your child and you. Let me know if you have any questions.
It is so hard to dress a baby up; they move so much and never cooperate for good pictures 😬 I was so busy and didn’t really have much time to prepare a lot for his first Halloween, so I just dressed him up using what I had around our apartment. There are so many cute costumes I wanted to dress him up as like a Lion 🦁 elephant 🐘 Well, there are many more Halloweens ahead so I saved those ideas. I love Japanese anime movies like Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro… So I had to dress him up as something from the movies before he starts having an opinion about what he wants to be 💁🏻♀️ So here are a few pictures of his first Halloween that I want to share.
No Face.
Oh gosh! He looks more like a scary No Face than the cute No face we wanted him to be 😱. But this costume was easy to do. I just used a black shirt for the costume. Then I made my own face paint by mixing baby lotion and corn starch and applied it to his face. I used eye liner to draw the black marks on his face. This was the most tricky part. HE WONT STOP MOVING 🥴 I didn’t get any good pictures of him, probably because he hates being No Face I think 🤪
Okay, you get it! He hates being ” No Face”
Totoro.
He is much happier being Totoro. I took these pictures the same day as the No Face costume.
This was an easy costume. I bought this off of Amazon, it was only about $7. I’m a house plant lover so this costume is perfect. He enjoyed it much better than No Face 🙃
Last one. He dressed up as me. How easy is that? This has got to be my favorite one 🙂
When I first heard about “sleep training,” I was like what is that? I thought sleeping was a skill that comes naturally. Apparently it is not! Even though babies sleep a lot, they don’t know when to sleep and how to sleep. Sleep training helps them go to sleep without needing mama to soothe them every night and helps them know when it is time to sleep as well as helping them sleep longer. Plus sleep is SO IMPORTANT for babies. Their development and growth needs sleep. Not just them but all us mamas need sleep too, right?
Finn usually put to bed at 7pm every night. He wakes up 1am in the morning to eat and goes back to sleep until around 8am. Some nights, he sleeps 10-11 hours straight without waking up to eat!! I love those nights!! I will share a couple tips that we think has helped him sleep longer at night.
First of all, I’m not a sleep training expert. I’m just sharing what’s worked for me and my baby. So here are some tips:
ROUTINE
Our 1st 4 weeks with Finn was so hard. We were new to the whole parenting thing. We didn’t know anything, so we just went to sleep whenever he slept. Most of the time, I couldn’t sleep well since Finn woke up every 2 hours. We weren’t consistent with his sleep schedule. There were some night we put him in bed at 10 pm, or 11pm.. I was so exhausted all the time.
When he was 4 weeks old. I decided to read more about sleep training. I found this book that is very helpful called, “Get Your Sleep on” by Christine Lawler. You can also find her on instagram @thepeacefulsleeper (you are welcome! :)). What I love about this book is it is only 98 pages long and super straight to the point! I bought it off of Amazon.com for only $14.99. Click on the book below to see the Amazon listing.
It is very important to develop a routine when they are young.
Finn’s routine starts out with feeding him at 6:30pm. Then we give him a bath (which is his favorite). We lotion him and put him in PJs. Once in his crib, we usually read a book to him. I know that he probably doesn’t understand anything, but we do it anyway 🙂 I usually read to him for about 5 mins, then we give him a kiss and tell him “night night” and leave the room.
When I first began training him at 4 weeks old, I used the “cry it out method.” This method involves letting your baby cry until they fall asleep once they’re in the crib for the night. The first night he cried for 20 mins then fell sleep. The second night 15 mins. On the fourth night he fell asleep after 5 mins of crying–a pretty drastic change! Now he doesn’t cry anymore. He just falls sleep after we leave his room.
There are many different opinions on the “cry it out method.” You definitely don’t have to use this method if you think it is not right for you. I used it since it worked for us. Another thing to point out is that the book recommends to begin sleep training your baby at 4 months old. I began training him at 4 weeks old. Again, every parent is different in raising their child. Do what works for you! I’m glad I trained him when he was that young. Finn is now a really good sleeper, and I’m a happy mama.
2. FIND A GOOD SLEEPING SACK
There are so many sleeping sack option out there. We tried so many of them and none of them really worked well. When Finn was 6 weeks old, my friend introduced me to a sleep sack brand called Dreamland. After hearing about this awesome product, I bought one for Finn right away. This sleeping sack is different than other sleeping sacks. It is a whole body weighted sleeping sack, almost like a weighted blanket. It makes your baby feel like they’re being hugged when worn. The first night Finn used it, he fell asleep so fast and he slept much longer than he used to, even with sleep training. He still wears it every night. I couldn’t be happier.
Click on the picture below to see the Dreamland sleeping sack. Use code SKY15 to get 15% off your order if you choose to get one yourself.
These two things are what has helped Finn fall asleep on his own every night. Again, you don’t have to do the same things I do with my baby. If you are the kind of parent who likes to rock your baby to sleep, or nurse him or her to sleep, there is nothing wrong with doing so. Just do whatever works for you and your baby. Sleep training really saved me and my sleep. I love how Finn always wakes up so happy because he gets enough good sleep at night. This mama need as much sleep as she can to function well 🙂
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