2 Months Vaccinations
Eli turned 9 weeks yesterday! He had his 2 months vaccinations on Saturday. He was very brave- only cried for a little bit when the doctor was giving him the shots. He seems to like the grape flavor oral vaccine because right after the doctor gave that to him, he stopped crying. We are so very proud of him! :) He didn't have any negative reaction from the vaccines either. He was extra tired and sleepy for the rest of the day and night so he slept a lot.
Play
Eli loves it when I read to him. He looks at the pictures and he talks back and it's like he knows exactly what I'm talking about! He is a chatterbox that's for sure.
Feeding
Eli has always been a slow eater. As a newborn, it would take him on average 40 minutes to finish his bottle. When he is really hungry, he would finish it within 30 minutes. He also spits up a lot so we don't mind him eating so slowly since it's suppose to help with his spit ups. We used playtex drop-ins because it's supposed to help with spit up. Also, their slow flow is VERY SLOW... so as a newborn, we noticed significant improvement in terms of spit ups when we used Playtex.
This past week though, he has been extremely fussy and unhappy during his feedings. He just seems angry when he eats! Because of his fussiness, it takes him at least 45 minutes (sometimes up to an hr) to finish his bottle because he would drink a little and then he would stop to express his anger lol. After talking to a mommy friend, she said her baby (same age as Eli) takes only 10 minutes per feeding! He is on the medium flow right now. So I decided to give playtex medium flow a try on Saturday morning. Turns out that the medium flow is way too fast for our little Eli. As he was eating, there was milk dripping out of his mouth lol. Frustrated from the hour long feedings, we decided to try using other bottles/nipples because other brand nipples' slow flow (level 1) is still going to be faster than playtex. We already have BornFree level 1 bottles at home so we decided to give that a try. Eli finished his feeding without fussing, at a record breaking speed of 20 minutes! Needless to say- we were over the moon. Now the challenge is... is he going to spit up? Turns out that he didn't have any excessive spit up either. So I did more research and decided on buying Dr. Brown's natural flow bottles. It's suppose to be best for spit ups and their level one nipple is very similar to BornFree so it's a good speed for him. The only down side is that there are many parts to this bottle and it takes a long time to wash. Eli has been using Dr. Brown (sometimes BornFree because Danny likes BornFree better- it's smaller and I think it's much cuter haha) and his feeding time is between 15 - 20 minutes! Thank goodness for that... because he eats 6x a day... I am saving myself and him a lot of time by switching nipples/bottles. Now he finishes eating within 20 minutes or so and the rest of his wake time he gets to play :)
Sleep
We moved Eli's bedtime from 7:30pm to 6:30pm because he seems to be overtired by the time we finish our bath and bedtime bottle. So far the new time is working out. He sleeps from 6:30pm all the way till 1am ish for a bottle and then usually wakes up around 4am for a diaper change and wake up around 6am for his morning bottle. I do sneak in a diaper change around 10pm or so before we head to bed so he is comfy and dry (and so we can snooze a little longer). He is usually dead asleep and won't even notice.
His daytime naps are still inconsistent. Some days he would have long naps (1 - 2hrs)... while other days he would catnap all day (20 - 40 mins). He usually takes 4 naps a day (2 morning naps and 2 afternoon naps). If he doesn't sleep enough during the day, he gets extra cranky toward 5pm and it's really difficult to soothe him. Luckily, I know I get a break after 6:30pm because he almost always sleeps well at night. It's really nice to know, no matter how cranky and irritable he is, I know that I can give him a bath at 5:45pm, a bottle at 6pm, and by 6:30pm or so, he is down for the night and I can breathe.
Sleep Training
I've been reading up on sleep training for weeks now. Eli's daytime naps are just horrible. He gets so grumpy when he doesn't nap well. I've been doing everything I can to set up a nap time routine and put him down when he is sleepy but not overtired. Just as I think there is improvement, he would prove me wrong. It's quite frustrating. We plan on sleep training him at 12 weeks so when I go back to work/school after Thanksgiving (he will be 15 weeks by then), it will be easier for my in-laws to take care of Eli. It sucks to hear him cry and he is just so darn stubborn, but perhaps it's the only thing that will work.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Sleeping Through The Night Soon?
Eli lasted 8 hours last night in between feedings! We've been having our bedtime routine at around 6 PM the past week... but we realized it's too early for him b/c he would wake up after 45 minutes thinking it was just a nap. But when we start our routine at around 7PM, he would sleep through fine. So we started our bedtime routine at 7 PM last night with a bath, lotion, bottle (7:30 PM), swaddle, white noise, a song... He fell asleep around 8 PM and started fussing at about 1:45 AM so I quickly changed his diaper... then he woke up crying at 3:15 AM to eat! That's almost 8 hours! We were so surprised and not sure what had happened. Usually he would only last 5 - 5 1/2 hours at night. Now the challenge is to get him to drop this 3 AM feeding. I wish he would either feed before midnight or in the morning.
Should I wake him up before midnight to feed? Or should I just let him naturally adjust himself as he gets older? Either way, we are super happy! We get to eat dinner peacefully and had some alone time together :)
Should I wake him up before midnight to feed? Or should I just let him naturally adjust himself as he gets older? Either way, we are super happy! We get to eat dinner peacefully and had some alone time together :)
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Life with a newborn
Phew! I haven't blogged for so long and it's because Eli is a handful to take care of lol
Doula
Our doula left three weeks ago and it's been a struggle without her. She was setting Eli up for failure by holding him 24/7 and rocking him to sleep. Eli wasn't even sleeping in his crib toward the end of her stay! We knew something has to be done so I asked her to leave early. Boy was it tough without her! We were so happy that she left but yet at the same time... things were so rough without an extra pair of hands around the house.
Night Time Sleep
Eli needed to be held constantly and we were both so sleep deprived and stressed. Slowly but surely though with some patience, he got better each day. Now we have our bed time routine and if we are lucky, he is in bed in his crib around 7 - 8 pm and he would feed every 5 hours at night and his wake time would be around 7 - 8 am.
Daytime Naps
Eli is a wonderful sleeper at night but he is a terrible napper during the day. At first, he would fall asleep in my arms and wake up wailing only a few minutes after I put him down in his crib. It drove me insane! I couldn't even eat during the day. But now, things are much better. I would go through our nap time routine (swaddle, white noise, a song, holding and soothing) and I would put him down in his crib sleepy but still awake... most of the time he would drift off to sleep on his own! It's happening more and more frequently. This is resulting in longer naps because when he wakes up from his nap prematurely, he is able to soothe himself back to sleep (half of the time anyway).
He used to only catnap (15 - 30 minutes) during the day but now... he would wake up 30 - 45 minutes into his nap, fuss at bit, then drift back to sleep on his own. I stare at the monitor like a hawk because I have to mark down his wake time so I know when to soothe him back to sleep for his next nap. Needless to say, taking care of a baby is a full time job. I can't really nap through out the day because as soon as he fusses and makes a sound, I have to see if he is waking up or he is going back to sleep. It's like he has a built in radar.. as soon as I start to fall asleep.. he would fuss and wake me up!
It is so draining to care for a newborn but luckily he is getting better each and every day. He will be 8 weeks old tomorrow and we can't wait till he drops his nighttime bottle. We are hoping that he would stretch it out for 6 hours between feedings this week... we'll see how that goes.
Feedings
Eli needs to feed every 3 hours or so during the day and 5 hours during nighttime. He eats about 5oz each time. He is a very slow eater though... on average it takes him 40 minutes to finish his feeding including all the burps etc. When he is REALLY hungry, he drinks it all in 20 minutes. He loves to fall asleep during feeding. We try to feed him when he first wake up so he is more alert and we've been trying our best to keep him awake since it's a bad habit to have... but it's just so darn hard to keep this baby awake when all he wants is sleep when he eats!
Play
Eli is definitely getting more and more fun when he is awake. He loves to smile, coo, and even attempts to talk back to you. It's really a lot of fun when he is awake. He loves his play matt and spends a lot of time on it playing by himself. He also likes his mobile a lot... when he wakes up in the morning I would catch him laughing at the mobile by himself haha
It's so hard caring for a newborn but we are slowly getting the hang of things and hoping all of us will adjust well eventually :)
Doula
Our doula left three weeks ago and it's been a struggle without her. She was setting Eli up for failure by holding him 24/7 and rocking him to sleep. Eli wasn't even sleeping in his crib toward the end of her stay! We knew something has to be done so I asked her to leave early. Boy was it tough without her! We were so happy that she left but yet at the same time... things were so rough without an extra pair of hands around the house.
Night Time Sleep
Eli needed to be held constantly and we were both so sleep deprived and stressed. Slowly but surely though with some patience, he got better each day. Now we have our bed time routine and if we are lucky, he is in bed in his crib around 7 - 8 pm and he would feed every 5 hours at night and his wake time would be around 7 - 8 am.
Daytime Naps
Eli is a wonderful sleeper at night but he is a terrible napper during the day. At first, he would fall asleep in my arms and wake up wailing only a few minutes after I put him down in his crib. It drove me insane! I couldn't even eat during the day. But now, things are much better. I would go through our nap time routine (swaddle, white noise, a song, holding and soothing) and I would put him down in his crib sleepy but still awake... most of the time he would drift off to sleep on his own! It's happening more and more frequently. This is resulting in longer naps because when he wakes up from his nap prematurely, he is able to soothe himself back to sleep (half of the time anyway).
He used to only catnap (15 - 30 minutes) during the day but now... he would wake up 30 - 45 minutes into his nap, fuss at bit, then drift back to sleep on his own. I stare at the monitor like a hawk because I have to mark down his wake time so I know when to soothe him back to sleep for his next nap. Needless to say, taking care of a baby is a full time job. I can't really nap through out the day because as soon as he fusses and makes a sound, I have to see if he is waking up or he is going back to sleep. It's like he has a built in radar.. as soon as I start to fall asleep.. he would fuss and wake me up!
It is so draining to care for a newborn but luckily he is getting better each and every day. He will be 8 weeks old tomorrow and we can't wait till he drops his nighttime bottle. We are hoping that he would stretch it out for 6 hours between feedings this week... we'll see how that goes.
Feedings
Eli needs to feed every 3 hours or so during the day and 5 hours during nighttime. He eats about 5oz each time. He is a very slow eater though... on average it takes him 40 minutes to finish his feeding including all the burps etc. When he is REALLY hungry, he drinks it all in 20 minutes. He loves to fall asleep during feeding. We try to feed him when he first wake up so he is more alert and we've been trying our best to keep him awake since it's a bad habit to have... but it's just so darn hard to keep this baby awake when all he wants is sleep when he eats!
Play
Eli is definitely getting more and more fun when he is awake. He loves to smile, coo, and even attempts to talk back to you. It's really a lot of fun when he is awake. He loves his play matt and spends a lot of time on it playing by himself. He also likes his mobile a lot... when he wakes up in the morning I would catch him laughing at the mobile by himself haha
It's so hard caring for a newborn but we are slowly getting the hang of things and hoping all of us will adjust well eventually :)
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