Napping Problems

by Phil

It's actually quiet right now and I will be honest with you: I'm so worn out that I just want to curl up in the corner and sleep for a year. Since I have a 13 month old son, you know that's not going to happen.

When it comes to kids, all parents, at some point, say something like, "Every time you get a handle on the situation, everything changes." This week is one of those "everything changes" weeks.

Just when it was all going so well! We were like a clockwork machine of happy living. Little tiny elves sang songs about the beauty of our lives. In short, it was glorious.

In my last post, I wrote about how well he's been sleeping. I talked about how he magically points to his crib, we lay him down, and off he goes to have adventures with Little Nemo.

Well, he has decided that he doesn't want to nap. The world is too interesting and he might miss something. You know, Dad might get some work done or the floor might get swept. It's just too riveting! So even though he can barely keep his eyes open and every little thing sets him off like it's the end of the world, he refuses to give in.

The past 5 days or so, I have been treating naptime the same as I always have. I will bounce him for a few minutes to get him drowsy and then lay him down. Within 5 minutes he's babbling loudly and generally talking. His clear aim is for me to come rescue him. (I imagine he's yelling, "I'm missing precious minutes of hindering your productivity!")

Since we use the Ferber Method of sleep training, he's on his own unless he gets upset enough to cry. After 5 minutes of crying, I go in, calm him down and put him back in the crib. If he cries again, he gets 10 minutes before I will go in. The intervals increase accordingly. Up to now, it has worked like gangbusters!

The problem I'm currently having is that he will babble and protest for up to an hour with no crying! He's clearly annoyed but also (mostly) calm. Many times, after an hour the hunger starts taking over because a sufficient amount of time has passed since his bit of grub. Since I won't let him go over an hour at any single nap attempt anyway, I rescue him and give him lunch/snack/whatever. After a break of 30 to 45 minutes, we try again. He's then so tired that he's out like a light.

He's still at the point where he needs two naps a day. When we push the first nap into later morning/early afternoon, it throws the entire rest of the day off because there's not enough space left for a second nap. He gets angry and exhausted by bedtime.

It is possible that he is transitioning from needing two naps to just one. But we're in this ugly gray period where he still needs both to properly function. When there isn't a second nap in a day, things can get tantrumy (I know that's not a word) fast. My laid back kid no longer exists because his schedule is so far off! He's been replaced by some sort of angry, drama-filled alien monster child. Perhaps he's trying out for some sort of Real Toddlers of Richmond reality show. Where are the cameras?

Going in and out of the room for the times that he does cry, worrying about whether I'm doing this properly or not, and generally dealing with this angry toddler is wearing me out!

Luckily, bedtime at night hasn't been a problem. He babbles for a few minutes and just goes to sleep. I don't know what it is about sleeping in the middle of the day but he isn't having any of it.

For now, we're staying firm with the program and giving him as solid a schedule as possible. Hopefully we'll be through this phase soon. I mean, when it comes to babies everything changes, right? So this will have to change too! For the sake of my frayed nerves, I hope it's sooner rather than later. I want my happy-go-lucky child back.

Of course, I am open to any and all advice. How do we adapt to this new situation without destroying all of the sleep training that we've already done? I'm sure I could rock him to sleep every time but I don't want him to completely lose the ability to self-soothe. Grrrrrrrrr.....

Science of Blue's Clues

I'm reading a book right now that explains some of the science behind Blue's Clues. Very cool stuff. When it comes to using all available research to develop an educational program aimed at pre-school children, they say that Blues Clues may be the perfect show.

The book is called The Tipping Point. It isn't focused on children's education or even children at all. It's about social epidemics and what causes them. Why were Hush Puppy shoes so popular? Why was Paul Revere's midnight ride so successful, but his buddy's ride was kind of lame (William Dawse, who's ride was the same night, same time, same message, just a different route)? What sparked the fall in NYC crime rates in the late 80's, early 90's? If you like social science, you really should read it.

The wild popularity of Sesame Street when all of the experts thought that it should fail was just another example. Kids weren't only watching the program and entertained by it, they were retaining a lot of what they watched, they were learning. That level of retention is what the scientists in the book called "the sticky-ness factor."

It was very good stuff, but got way more interesting when they started talking about how Blue's Clues built on, and improved on, everything that made Sesame Street work. My kids never really watched Sesame Street, they watched Blue's Clues. And the "sticky-ness factor" for Blues Clues was off the chart. It is, in fact, the sticky-est show ever stuck on TV.

So much about the show that seemed so natural and easy is actually very deliberate. Here are a few of the most interesting items.

Each episode repeats 5 times a week. That's on purpose. For preschool children, retention is a process. As far as retention goes, 5 times seems to be the perfect amount. Fewer viewings results in less retention, more results in a loss of interest.

Story format. Where Sesame Street is a mish mash of skits, each episode of Blue's Clues is a story, which has the effect of holding a child's attention longer.

Mystery aspect. The mystery aspect to the story actually increases their attention as the show progresses, lengthening attention spans. And helping to figure out what Blue is talking about engages them much more than a show that is just being shown to, or unraveled for them.

Plain language. The table is named Table. The salt and pepper shakers are named Salt and Pepper. Apparently, preschoolers retain better when plain language is used like this. They can find it confusing if the salt and pepper shakers had other names too, like Maulder and Skully. When plain language items that a child already has a name for, like mailbox, are then given another name, there's less sticky-ness.

Nothing is geared toward adults at all. it's all for pre-schoolers. Sesame Street gives a lot of winks at the adults that either confuse or bore kids, or leave them uninterested. Monsterpeice Theater was one example.

Loooooong pauses. the pauses that Steve and Joe take when waiting for the child at home to respond to something are pre-school pauses, not grown up pauses. They're awkward and excruciating to sit through sometimes, but they're on purpose.

They didn't touch on the comparison between Steve and Joe to see which is better, probably because everyone knows that it's Steve. From his remote location on Noggin, he babysat my children many times while I tried to grab a 20 minute nap.

Grown Up Time

Something very interesting happened this weekend. Stacey and I had a night where we got to be grownups. And we didn't have to be in New York to accomplish this.

I'm sure an explanation is in order (otherwise, this would be a really short journal entry).

This past weekend was a (long awaited) wedding for a couple of our friends. Festivities included camping out (and having some beer) with them and several other buddies. Now, normally, this is the type of event that would probably wouldn't happen for us, because we have Brady. It's hard to relax and have a good time with friends when half of the time, we're running around trying to keep her out of trouble.

If this was something that was happening back on the East Coast, the solution is simple: ask one of our parents if they could watch Brady (Ask? Nine times out of ten they're practically shooing us out the door so they can have their granddaughter to themselves). However, that option is out of the question, since we're back in Utah.

So, we decided we'd ask her "big sister" (her babysitter, who also happened to be going to the wedding, but wasn't staying) if she'd be interested in watching Brady that night. Not only was she okay with that, she asked if she could take Brady to the county fair that evening.

I'll admit, I was a bit nervous when that was asked. It was not that I didn't trust her taking care of Brady. I think it was really just that flash of parental "holy crap! My daughter is going to a big event...without us?" Plus, there was a tinge of sadness, in that Brady really is starting to grow up.

I said that was totally fine, just double-check with Stacey. She had no problem with that either.

So, we all went to the wedding, and had a good time. Then, it was time for the girls to head out. I put Brady in the car, and gave her a hug. And of course, she was already thinking of having fun at the fair, so Mom and Dad were (once again) relegated to Chopped Liver status.

And they were off. And we got to go back to the party. This time, as adults, not as parents.

It was a lot of fun, though once in a while, I'd hope that things were going okay with the girls. It didn't help (or perhaps it did) that we had no cell service at the camp site. So, we really had no choice but to loosen up and relax.

Turns out there was nothing to worry about. They had a wonderful time at the fair. Brady got to have fun with her Big Sister (and vice versa), and there were no problems at all once they got back to our home.

They had a good time, and so did we.

Acclimation and Regression

by Phil

Over the past month my son has acclimated to our new apartment surprisingly well. Really, overall, he handled all of the stress from the move like a pro. My wife and I were worried that he would regress some from all of the upheaval.

The last few days that we were in our old apartment, he could tell something wasn't quite right. When we were packing, he would crawl around the apartment looking at the boxes with a suspiciously. An 11 month old with a suspicious look is super cute. He wasn't exactly keen on the movers who came to load up our stuff either. His poor little world was upside down.

For his first year, we took daily pictures with little updates on a dry-erase board. It was a fun project that really evolved as it went along to become a sort of photo baby book. Below are the last three days in our Tucson apartment. He looks happy and goofy in the photos but it's fairly easy to get him to smile for photos. Just do your best pig or chicken impression. Otherwise, he was visibly uneasy those three days.

Yes, our son wears the same pajamas two nights in a row.

Then came the traveling across three time zones. It included hotel stays as well as the homes of two different family members- one in Michigan, one in Ohio. By the end week, his schedule was nearly destroyed and he had a harder and harder time falling asleep as the days passed. Before the trip, he was a baby who slept through the night. Through this period, he woke up at least once, if not twice a night, often for an hour or more. Removed from his comfort zone, he was unraveling a tad.

Apparently, it wasn't much better when they first arrived to our new apartment. (I say "apparently" because I still didn't arrive for another five days. You can read my last post for that fiasco of a car repair/road trip schedule.) When I would talk to my wife on the phone, she would tell me how he was overly clingy and wanted to be held constantly. This was the kind of behavior we were afraid of.

All of our work with sleep training and such was being undermined. But, of course, we couldn't blame our son. It was totally understandable that he react this way. We just had to work with him to get gain back what progress we has lost.

And that brings us back to the first paragraph of my post. He has rebounded as if nothing ever happened plus more. He naps twice a day again and sleeps through the night with no problem. In fact, he's so good at sleeping that, after just bouncing him for a few seconds, he actually points to his crib. I imagine he's saying, "Put me there, please!" It's completely adorable. Although, my wife, who works all day and misses him, laments the fact that she doesn't get to snuggle with him for longer before he wants to be put down.

We just rewound to an earlier point in sleep training and stuck with it. A little while back Steve wrote about co-sleeping vs the cry-it-out sleep method. We are a strict cry-it-out household. We let him cry for 5 minutes, then go in and sooth him. If he cries again, we give him ten minutes, then go in and sooth him, etc. It has worked for our son, who now goes to sleep without much complaint and sleeps through the night. Consistency, as with anything when it comes to babies, was the key. Getting back into the old routine, the old rituals and recognizable comforts worked magic on his little brain.

An addendum- When I just sat down to write, this wasn't the original subject I was going to tackle at all! Well, you'll just get this week's subject next week then. It will make a good follow up, I suppose.

Like father like daughter

by Carlos

There used to be a commercial that showed how they made Superman look like he was flying on TV. I don't know why, I guess some kids were jumping off of buildings or something, but I couldn't accept that a flying Superman was some kind of TV trick. I was 3 yrs old and I would turn the volume down on the TV, stick my fingers in my ears and sing 'la la la' until it was over (back then we only had a few channels to watch so I couldn't just change it).

TV is an influence and somehow I love it. I love movies that just draw me into another world and there, I live for a while. I get a little sad when the movie is over I have to return to reality.

For me, I don't mind the way that I am with movies. I have to respect for their power over me, though. I can't stay in TV land for too long anymore.

But when I see it in my kids, it disturbs me a little. I don't let them watch a lot because I know how addictive it is to me. We don't own cable so the kids just watch videos and I know exactly what they're watching (we don't have the bunny ears either, as if they worked as well when we were kids).

The other day, I was watching them watch the classic Fantasia (great film!). In Dance of the Hours, some ostriches are playing with fruit. As the ostriches came out, Damai claimed that she was the lead ostrich. The other girls picked out their ostrich. At one point, the lead ostrich wouldn't share her grapes, while the other ostriches are tying to pick the grapes out of her mouth. Remember, Damai has claimed that she was the lead ostrich, so Anna leans over and asks Damai, "can we have some grapes?" Damai replied in an authoratative tone, "No, they're mine." And they went back to watching the ostriches.

How precious! My girls are just like me.

Time

So, I recently purchased a PS3.

This was something that I had thought about doing for years, but just never got around to doing.

I don't seem to play a lot of video games anymore. Turns out that there's a lot of things I don't really do anymore. At least, Stacey pointed it out to me recently. I guess I've been so busy with things, I hadn't noticed.

And that right there is the problem: I just haven't felt like I have time.

It doesn't make sense, when I think about it, though. I used to do a ton more things in a day, and still manage to get it all done, hang out, play games, and generally relax. What could have changed things so radically?

Oh, right. Parenthood.

The thing is, it's not parenthood that's the issue. Not directly, at least. It's the schedule change. See, I used to be much more of a night owl than I am currently. I would do most of my art and comic work (which turned out to be my most creative time) well into the night, crawl into bed around four in the morning, sleep until 10 am, take care of house stuff and other projects, hang out with Stacey when she got home until she went to sleep, and then get to drawing. I'd even manage to sneak in a quick game on my PS2 here and there. It was a pretty functional schedule.

That changed pretty abruptly once Brady came around.

Now, I couldn't work as late as I used to, mostly because sleep had become a precious commodity. The late night routine got thrown out the window, replaced by working when feasible, and sleeping when possible.

Yeah, that really threw me for a loop. And what's funny is that it has continued to throw me for a loop, even as Brady as grown older. That's because I reached such a level of acceptance of the chaos, that I never actually tried to remedy it. So, the chaos festered, and it grew. My schedule just became more haphazard. Whatever semblance of discipline I had faded. Time became shorter. I would try to crunch as much work as I could into the small amount of time I had. A lot of time, it meant that my work time would bleed over into Family Time; I'd pass Brady off to Stacey, and hole up someplace with my computer, and squeeze a few more minutes or hours to just try and catch up. And when I did spend time with the girls, I was so stressed about lack of time, that it almost became another chore. Anything I used to do to give myself some semblance of sanity or balance was thrown out the window. I just didn't have time.

It wasn't fun. It was making me stressed and miserable. And I haven't adapted since then to make things any better.

I think a big part of my problem is all these years, I've been trying to convince myself that this is the proper way to do things. That this is how parenthood is supposed to be. In other words, because this is how other stay-at-home parents do their thing, then I should be doing that as well. I'm not sure why, because doing it their way wasn't making me any happier or more relaxed. I was trying to force myself into a mold that didn't fit my line of work, or how I generally do things.

I think along the way, I forgot that I can do things my way. It's not impossible to mold things so that they are conducive to both work, family, and "me" time. If my best artwork is produced at night, work at night. If I work late at night and still need to get up early to get Brady to school, it can be done. It is possible to get my responsibilities taken care of, without sacrificing time away from family.

So, I'm trying to fix that problem I put myself into. It's not easy, mostly because I've mentally conditioned myself to handle work and things a certain way. But, work is getting done (slowly, but surely), and I'm spending quality time with the girls. And that no longer feels like another item to check off my list (something both Stacey and I appreciate).

And I'm making sure I find time to relax once in a while. In a way that makes me feel normal.

So, I recently purchased a PS3.

A Prolonged Separation

by Phil

I apologize for my protracted absence from the blog. As a penance, have a ridiculously long post.

The past month or so has been pretty crazy for my family. We've made the move from Tucson, AZ to Richmond, VA and are starting to settle in. It was an adventure to finally reach this point though.

All of our stuff was packed onto the moving truck and departed Tucson on June 28th. Whenever a moving company is involved in a cross-country move, they give you a window for when your stuff should arrive at the new location. Our estimated time of arrival was between the 6th to the 11th of July.

There's no point in going right to Richmond just to wait around for our stuff for a week. So the original plan was for Angie and our our son to fly to back home to Detroit on June 29th to see our families. I would take the car and do a road trip across the country with my mom for 5 days and meet her in Detroit. We would have a nice little one-year birthday party for our son and then depart together to our new home in Richmond!

Well, the car accident a week and a half before we were supposed to move put a giant wrinkle in both the car and our plans. Because the damage wasn't enough to total out the car, they had to repair it. However, the damages were so bad that it was going to take weeks to fix. Weeks. But we only has a week and a half before our move.

Change of plans!

They told me with complete confidence that the car repairs would be finished by July 8th. Not to worry! July 8th is your date. I believed them.

I bought a round trip plane ticket and flew with Angie and our son to Michigan to visit our families instead of driving. We had the first birthday party. It was fun. I'll write about that soon. Here's a photo.

At that point there was some uncertainty because of the conflicting date ranges. The car would be done in Tucson on July 8th. All of our possessions would be in Richmond some time between the 6th and 11th. Angie's dad valiantly volunteered to drive down and meet our things with Angie and our son. (Thanks again, Dad!) That's a 10 hour car trip with a one-year old. Valiant. Stuff of legend.

On July 5th, Angie got a phone call from the truck driver in possession of all our worldly goods would reach Richmond the next day. I waited around in Michigan for two days, ready to fly out on the 8th and get our car. It was perfectly timed so I could leave the airport, pick up the car and leave town again. My mom agreed to go with me on the road trip because it was going to be fun. Lots of sight seeing and cool times driving Route 66 and the Santa Fe Trail. Good Times!

You know that's not how it went, of course.

I got a phone call on July 7th, the day before I left, that there were part problems. Everything was fixed but when they test drove it, some of the parts were wonky (my term, not there's. If any mechanic ever used the word "wonky" to describe anything on a car, I'd immediately find a new mechanic. I, however, am not a mechanic and can throw wonky around willy-nilly.) They had ordered new parts and were hoping that they'd still have it done by the evening of the 8th.

Of course the parts didn't arrive on the 8th (a Friday!) so I had a weekend to sit around in Tucson and wait. So my mom and I made the best of it. We did all the touristy stuff that I always meant to do but never got around to.

We went to Tombstone. Oh, look, a gunfight.

Oh, more gunfights.

We saw the Titan Missile Museum.

The Pima Air and Space Museum.

At that point, I was pretty antsy. I enjoyed seeing all these attractions. I'm glad that I could finally get around to it and my mom and I had fun. But I was separated from my family by thousands of miles just waiting for a stupid car to get fixed. While I made the best of the situation, I was ready to leave Tucson and get back to my family.

Monday rolls around! The parts were to arrive on Monday and I can finally move on!

Except, they didn't arrive.

I was pretty grumpy Monday night. I was also watching all of the planning I did for our road trip slowly erode to nothing. With the condensed timeline we were looking at, we were going to have to really haul to get to Richmond in a decent timeframe. I was assured, again, that it would happen on Tuesday.

Making the best of it, again, we went to see more sights. We drove up Mount Lemmon and it was stunning.

I was alternately grumpy and in awe all day.

I was also in awe because of the houses with castle aspirations. Did you have any idea Tucson has at least three houses that dreamt so big? Are there more? I don't know!

Finally, Tuesday night, the car was finished. They even had someone stay late so we could pick it up. That night, we drove the 4 hours to Flagstaff, AZ.

From there on, Wednesday through Friday, we drove 12 hours a day. It was a grind. We began fairly early, around 8 am, everyday, determined to squeeze in at least part of the sight seeing that we originally had planned. It put us into our hotels late every night but I was going to make an attempt to enjoy the drive.

We saw a lot on this trip.

A lot of beauty.

Some craziness.

The sign on this defunct hotel says "70 Years of Continuous Hospitality."

A wild fire outside Albuquerque, NM.

Ghost town of Two Guns, AZ, possibly the craziest place I've ever been.

But I also learned a lot about myself. I'm not the same person I was a year ago. I've changed in ways so gradually that I never even realized it.

I'm no longer the ultra-independent person that I was 12 months ago. And I don't see that as a bad thing. I was separated from my family for a combined total of 10 days and it was fun for the first few. Really, there was a certain level of fun during the entire thing but as the trip went on, I was feeling a pull towards my family that I can't explain. By the end of Friday, I couldn't wait to get home- a term I'd already attached to a place I've never really been. But it's where my family was and that meant home.

In the past, before the kid, my wife and I would need to spend time apart for things- conventions, conferences and the like- and, while it bummed me out, it was okay. We're both adults with a certain level of independence. We miss each other but manage nicely.

With the addition of the kid, there's a whole other level of pull for the family. This 10 days was the longest I've ever spent away from him. And there were several layers to the desire to get back. I knew that my wife was having to deal with the unpacking and house preparation alone, on top of caring for the kid. That's a lot to put on anyone and I felt a certain amount of guilt for not being available. But on top of that, I just wanted to see my family.

I realize now that I've willing let go of a certain amount of independence. Getting away for a few days is fine and dandy still. Any prolonged separation, though, and it suddenly begins to feel like I'm not a complete person anymore. There really is something missing in my life if my wife and son aren't in it. Intellectually, I knew that before. This trip, however, made it very real emotionally and physically. I felt their absence. I feel bad for making my mom put with my increasing grumpiness as the trip went on.

By the end I was sore and I ached for a few days afterward- the price paid for sitting in the same position, driving, for hours on end for several days straight. But I'm glad it wasn't any longer. I fear I would have gone feral within a few more days. Speech would have left me and I would have ended up as some horror movie version of a high plains Mogli, hunting rabbits and ripping into them with my teeth without even cooking them.

Having kids can drive you crazy. It turns out, once you have them, being away from them can drive you even crazier.

When will they ever learn??

by Carlos

As a professional teacher, we used to talk about Mastery. If a child could perform a task with such and such accuracy, we said that the child Mastered that skill. So, how can I judge if one of my children has Mastered a skill? I would have to give them an assessment; a test, right? But testing my kids is not something I really want to do over and again. It actually seems a little cruel in some respects.

Should I test my children by wetting their feet and seeing if they'll run across the bathroom tiles after I told them not to? (why do we put tiles in there in the first place?) Should I put a lighter out in front of them to see if they play with it after I told them not to? Seems cruel, eh? But I wonder if it's necessary.

My little girl Anna ran up to me yesterday crying. "Papi! Papi! A gollen gobe i tuck in my ose!" What?! "A gollen gobe i tuck up my ose!" She's pointing to her nose. Lani runs up and tells me that she said, "A golden globe is stuck up my nose." How is it that children who are still learning to speak can understand and translate for each other??

With a flashlight pointing straight into her right nostril I can see an orange sparkly ball. I don't know what a golden globe is, but I'm pretty furious. I'm not mad that she got something stuck up her nose one time. I'm pissed because she got something stuck up her nose TWO times! She did this before!! We actually talk about this often. 'Don't STICK anything up your nose!' How many times do I have to say that?! (I sound like my parents when I was a kid.)

The last time this happened, we tried a slew of techniques to get it out. I even tried blowing through her mouth to pop it out of her nose and even sucking out her nose with my mouth. Do you know what comes out of a child's nose when you suck on it?! Apparently not the seed that she put up there, but everything else imaginable.

So, what possessed her to put this 'golden globe' up there this time?? The world may never know. But there it was. This little orange sparkly ball was up her nostril taunting me. It was saying, 'Nah nah nih boo boo, you can't get me!' like it was the ginger bread man. The last time, we had to go to the hospital. It was really embarrassing and a total time warp.

The little bead, AKA golden globe, came out easily this time. I think all the crying produced some good lubricating snot and she blew it out her nostril. It came out like a rocket bouncing off the floor, shiny with boogers.

So, has she mastered the skill of not putting anything up her nose? No.