In the Moment

I am loving every moment with this boy.  In fact, life with Yogi is so consuming that it's hard to create the space for reflection and recording.  Not a new problem, but a persistent one.

At five months Yogi is all smiles.  He laughs, he flirts, he giggles.  I love how much of a ham he is.  If his eyes are open, he is in full throttle engagement with the world around him.  People, dogs, other babies, ceiling fans.  All of it is thrilling.

These days we hear him start babbling in his crib somewhere between 6:30 and 7:00 in the morning.  Fairly soon after waking he gets his first bottle with 5oz of breastmilk.  The day is filled with lots of playing on the floor with toys (his Atom and Horsey are favorites), helping out in the kitchen with Mama (done from the comfort of his swing), long neighborhood walks with Baker and eating about every three hours.  We are beginning to get out of the house to do things like play dates, but the bulk of our outings involve trips to the grocery and library or lunch with Mommy at Panera.  When she gets home from work around 5, Yogi eats again and soon after it's time for bed.  My wife does this part of the day and the ritual includes rocking with a few books, a little bit more milk and then settling into the sleep sack for the night.  Every three nights or so the boy gets a bath, which he seems to enjoy.  He is down to one feeding during the night which usually comes around 3 or 4 o'clock.

If you're doing the math this means that Yogi gets something like 12 hours of sleep at night.  This is fabulous as something you might have noticed is absent in the preceding paragraph is any mention of the word "nap".  I'm not sure where my easy-peasy napper went, but I haven't seen that guy in weeks.  It is not the case that he gets NO sleep during the day as he often naps in his carseat or in the Bjorn, but he is opposed to the crib when the sun is shining.  This has been bothering me for awhile, but this weekend I've come to the end of my rope on this front.  Time for action.  I have declared next week Nap Week.  My main goal for the week is going to be to establish a napping routine.

Based on what I've read, he should be taking two naps that run from 2-3 hours in length.  That strikes me as a ridiculously high bar and I will feel successful if we can get two naps IN THE CRIB of any length by the end of the week.  I've been skimming my Baby Whisperer book again and I plan to approach nap time the way my wife has been approaching nighttime sleep.  I'm sure this should have been obvious to me, but I had imagined nap time to be more casual, much less of a production.  The word "nap" conjures an image for me of just going back to your room and lying on top of the comforter for a little while.  This is clearly not the way that Yogi sees it.

So....this week there will be more rocking and stories and even a sleep sack.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Posted in: Five Months