How much is too much?

Jaden and I have our schedules relatively ironed out now. He gets up shortly after Daddy, and heads to the kitchen so that Daddy can start to feed him his oatmeal. He patiently waits for me to groggily creep out of bed and actually manage to get the spoon in his mouth a few times instead of adding to the mess all over his face. After breakfast we go through our day alternating with feedings and diaper changes, bottles and naps, more diaper changes and feedings, and of course, Elmo. In between we fit in some songs (itsy bitsy spider and old macdonald are two of our favorites), a few hundred rounds of “patty cake,” and the “where is?” game….where is the apple? …where is Mommy’s nose?… where is Elmo? (We always get the Elmo one right). 

We are all trying to get over being sick. For some reason this particular cold, or virus, or whatever it is, has taken us all for a longer ride than usual. Jaden has been sick for almost two weeks. I got it a few days later, but it is still over a week now that I have symptoms. I felt well enough this morning that I thought I was finally clearing out of it, but by mid-afternoon I wanted to down an entire bottle of Day-Quil to stop my eye from gushing and my nose from running. Jaden is fed up with us trying to clean his nose out – he screams so loud when we approach him with a tissue or the bulb that I’m sure the neighbors think we’re torturing him. 

The night terrors have stopped for the past few days – I have my fingers crossed hoping that it is a sign of the future. We had a few scares last week, including terrors during nap hour – which is highly unusual. Maybe being sick made him more susceptible than usual. The past two nights were good sleep nights – knock on wood – I hope we have many more just like these. 

I have discovered this week that as long as Elmo is rambling on about his World on the TV, Jaden is perfectly happy occupying himself. He’ll play with his toys, look through his board books, try to get “Tickle me Elmo” to roll over, and whatever else he can find to do while he keeps one eye on the TV. If Elmo is not on, he expects me to entertain him minute by minute, which includes never leaving the room, not even to use the bathroom. So I try to save Elmo for the afternoon, when Mommy has had about as much of patty-cake as she can take and needs a moment to put her feet up and ponder about whether she’ll actually get any work done.

The big question on my mind right now: Why do I feel guilty about leaving the TV on for Jaden? I’ve heard about all of those statistics – you know the ones that people talk about but no one provides actual references for – that say the more a kid watches TV the less intellectually and socially developed they end up. I wonder if this is true? Doesn’t it make a difference that most of the TV shows for kids nowadays are educational? Maybe “they” haven’t tested the kids that grew up with the educational shows yet? I mean, Noggin or Sprout, or one of those stations actually does a 10 second (or so) bit before each show telling parents what skills the show helps their pre-schoolers develop (obviously it doesn’t help parents with their memories since I don’t remember which station it was). So this type of TV couldn’t be that bad, right? Or am I just kidding myself?  

If anyone has tips and tricks about how to keep an 11-month old entertained, without dulling his mind with television or losing your own mind, I’m all ears!

A time for firsts

This past week has been a time for firsts. We moved Jaden out of the pack-n-play and into his crib. He won’t sleep in the crib in his room, so we put the crib in our room and it has worked like a charm. I think it has even helped him to sleep better. I’m sure the pack-n-play isn’t designed for long-term sleeping comfort, and let’s face it — Jaden has been sleeping in it for two weeks, for two naps a day, and all night. Last night he slept for more than three hours in one shot – and he only took one bottle and one diaper change through the entire night. We are making progress!!! 

Grandma and Grandpa visited this weekend for the first time in 10 days. Grandma was so worried that Jaden wouldn’t remember them – but he did. He was a little wary at first (which is a good thing, IMO) – giving them the once over a few times before he would believe that this truly was his Grandma and Grandpa that returned to spend time with him- but once he was convinced it was them, he went right to them. He adores them – it is really great to see how happy he is when they are around. I’m sure spending all week with Mommy can get a bit tiring too (I even get tired of myself sometimes).  Grandma and Grandpa were a big help this weekend. Between the 4 of us we managed to keep up with Jaden’s messes and get the house dusted and vacuumed (I know – sounds like a really fun weekend for G & G). 

Jaden has decided he likes Elmo so much that he cannot get close enough to the television to watch him. Last week he crawled right up to the TV stand and managed to pull himself up on it before I could say “no” and get over there. Of course he insists on doing it now every time Elmo is on the television – so I couldn’t resist getting a picture.  Never mind the long term damage to the eyeballs – I’m worried he’ll knock the TV over onto himself. So now our family room has a giant mess in front of the television, designed so that he cannot get close to the TV. We have a diaper bag, a couple of backpacks, the changing table caddy, the super seat and a few other odds and ends. It looks like a tornado hit the room, but has been effective at preventing Elmo attachment. If anyone else has a better idea, please let me know. 

I love Elmo

Now have an excuse to go buy that television that mounts to the wall that we’ve wanted to get for eons but could never justify the expense.  

The other problem with this new found mobility is that we are realizing there are more and more incompletely-baby-proofed areas in our house (notice the cord in the above picture – it insists on moving in front of the TV stand no matter what we do). It seems Jaden went from rolling only, to crawling slowly, and now crawling faster than you can say ‘get away from that tv’ in record time. Starting this weekend(on Friday) he has been doing his best to try to walk without the walker. We’re dizzy trying to keep up.

Last week Jaden sat in his Pooh chair that his ‘excited godmother’ gave him (at the baby shower)….

Watching Elmo... again

When we first brought him home he wasn’t strong enough to sit up in the chair, but viola, he can do it now. Bobble-head is completely cured. No, that is not the actual remote for the TV. We gave him an old unused remote to distract him from the real one. He likes anything shiny or silver – which exactly describes our remote (although it doesn’t help us to find it any quicker when we lose it). My Mac laptop is shiny and silver too, so it is impossible for me to work on the computer while he is awake (he’s napping now, in case you hadn’t guessed). 

On Thursday (10/23) he managed to go from a sitting position directly to a crawling position. He keeps trying to reverse it – it’s so cute to watch him try to throw his leg behind him so he can sit down again, but he hasn’t reached it yet. If he only knew he had about an inch more to go before he gets his butt on the floor again.

On Friday (10/24) Jaden decided he wanted to check out our back stairs. These are the carpeted set of stairs so I figured I’d just stand by and make sure he doesn’t bump his noggin anywhere, but let him venture out. After he pulled himself up and then about a dozen attempts to get his knee up on the first step, he did it! The first step is the landing at the bottom of the stairs, so once he was up the landing he momentarily figured he’d try getting up the next step. Momentarily being the key word here …. as he started to pull himself up again, he gave the stairs a once over, looking up to the top and then back to the bottom of the thirteen or so steps he was about to challenge, and it was as if a light went on in his brain and he was thinking “maybe I’ll save those for another day.” It was hilarious, but I’m sure you had to be there to really experience the comedy of it all. 

Let’s see – what else… today was the first time he was able to put food in his mouth by himself. I gave him a Swieback toast –  I put water on it to soften it up so it gets nice and mushy, and then I usually have to break little pieces off for him because he couldn’t manage to put it in his mouth himself. He will just sit there passing it from hand to hand (making a lovely mess all over the carpet and floor), and eventually drop it if I’m not careful enough to catch it when he lets go. Today I was giving him pieces and the next thing I know (I guess i wasn’t fast enough again) he stuck the end of it in his mouth and took a bite off. Of course then I had to go fishing in his mouth because the piece was too big, but the point is that he’s learning to feed himself. Maybe he’ll make it with the Cheerios next. He’s still getting the ‘pincher’ thing down – most of the time he just tries to grab them with his whole hand and sends them flying everywhere. 

 

 

Jaden is teething now – he is cutting his 5th tooth. I know that’s part of his difficulty with sleeping right now. Last night after we put him down he woke up every 15 minutes for about an hour until we put the orajel on the tooth and he finally slept solidly for a few hours. I can’t believe we have to go through this for 27 more teeth. Ugh.

I have some more pictures to share — I’ll try to get those posted this week. Tonight I have class so I’m off to finish preparing for that. Have a great day!!!