pitter patter diary

my journey to motherhood & beyond. my inspirations, fears, hopes, frustrations, and joys, documented.

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i need to remember this after a doozy of a day. 2 teething babies who are not taking good naps = no bueno.

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My little loves are 8 months. Life lately...

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Is this not the cutest nursery ever for a little girl?! I love the color palette and pretty much everything about it! Absolute perfection. So for anyone who's preggo with a little miss, you're welcome. :-)

See more pics here.

Sigh. If Lyla ever has her own room, I might just have to model it after this. Aren't those wall decals fab????

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Sleep

Thanks for the input/tips I received about the schedules/sleeping! I always love to hear what works for other mamas!

What I decided to do was cut back to 2 naps a day. Here is what my schedule looks like lately. And this is what I aspire to, because it sure doesn't work like clockwork every day!!

twins wake up 6-6:30am, bottle

solids 7:30-8am

nap go down between 9-9:30am. 

up 10-10:30, bottle

solids noonish

nap go down 1:30-2.

up 2:30-3-ish, bottle

solids 4:30ish

baths, books, bottle 5:45

bed 6:15pm, usually asleep by 6:30

We've just started transitioning to 4 bottles a day versus 5. So I now give them 4 (7oz.) bottles a day. They are not used to going that long between bottles so some days I have to give them their bottle before their second nap. And I just started adding an extra serving of solids. We'll see if it's too much. 

So many people are surprised by how early we put them to bed, but we followed their lead early on and they were always ready to go to bed early. My husband gets home from work at 5pm. So we spend some family time together, put them down, and then have a nice quiet dinner together. It's actually pretty nice. Gives me some ME time in the evenings which I desperately need. 

Bryce is now teething, so he's been uncharacteristically waking up sometimes a couple times in the night wanting to be soothed. I'm guessing this teething thing is probably going to throw a monkey wrench into our schedule pretty soon. Just when you get it figured out, right?! ;-)

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Why oh why didn't I know about this months ago? I'm so sick of scooping on demand! ;-)

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What a cool idea. Minted has art prints now for kid's rooms. I was perusing and saw this. I'm thinking of doing this for Bryce & Lyla.

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Sleep Saga

I've been going through the most difficult stage EVER with my twins' sleep these past few weeks. They are almost 7.5 months and after successful sleep training a couple months ago, they're now screaming again at nap time. Sometimes at bed time, but mostly it's a nap problem. They sleep through the night, once we put them down, so no issues there. But the naps are killing me.

The crying. The thrashing. The fighting me. Ugh, it's so hard. It gives me the worst anxiety.

So now I'm ignoring my cry it out training method and going in and picking them up to soothe them. It doesn't help with Lyla. In fact, in seems to piss her off more.

I don't know what to do. I don't know what schedule I should be following. 2 naps a day or 3? How often should I be formula feeding them? Should I sleep train again? They don't have any teeth yet and I constantly think they are teething, but still no teeth. I just don't know.

The problem is that I have two of them. Bryce could sleep anytime, anywhere. But his morning nap has been super short lately - like 30 minutes. She is much more alert and wants to stay awake longer. She can take a long time to get to sleep, but once she falls asleep, usually will sleep at least an hour. I really want them on the same schedule because I want a break!!! And their crying in their cribs is starting to really disturb the other one and then cause a chain reaction.

So I'm curious to hear about daily schedules for other 7 month olds. How many naps? How many bottles and when? How long can they stay awake? What time is bedtime? What time do they wake up in the morning? Do you have a set schedule or does it fluctuate?

I'm so frustrated with this nap situation. I'm exhausted and have NO BREAK. It's constant fussing and battles to go down and then short naps and staggered naps. HELP!!

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Bryce & Lyla are 7 months! They are keeping me busy and on my toes. My heart is full & my house is chaotic. Just the way I always wanted it. Life is good. I just love these two so, so much!

[oksonowwhat]

[shelleyplusthree-deactivated201]

😂

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Lol

[thresca]

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Bryce is 6 months!

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THE REGULATOR!!

We call this beast the giant prune, because it never fails to cause my babes to take a giant sh*t every time they're in it! In fact, she might be releasing her bowels in this very photo! Sorry, kind of gross. HA!

On another note, look at that peach fuzz coming in!! Poor girl, needs one of these. (You MUST click for a good laugh. Yes, they really make these.)

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Lyla is 6 months!!

My sassy little girl, Lyla Calise, turned 6 months on August 6th! Tear....Where has the time gone?! So we had a fun little photo shoot in her crib when the afternoon light was streaming in perfectly.

I recently upgraded to PicMonkey Royale, but this online photo editing software also has a completely free version, minus some of the tools. I love the eye brightening tool. Did I overdo it? Do her eyes look too glowy? 

Overall, I really like how these turned out. Next up, a 6 month crib shoot with my boy!!

I need to post some updates soon!! Their 6 month check up is next week!!

Looking at these make me feel better, b/c today was ROUGH. Miss thang was fussy ALL FREAKIN' DAY. And my sweet little boy had an upset stomach or something and projectile vomited - all over the floor, my hand, and my feet. Then, he outright refused his bottle, which is unheard of! Boy has NEVER refused a bottle. Thank goodness, he did drink his bottle before bed, as I was getting worried. But both babies are now sleeping and I'm sipping on my fave Watermelon Wheat beer, so things are looking up. ;-)

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Solids!

My love bugs had their first taste of solid food and AVOCADO it was! They weren't sure what to think and made some pretty funny faces. I just mashed it and served it. Next time I think I'll water it down with formula to make it a runnier consistency. I'm not sure how much they actually ate, but it was a practice run. And so fun to watch!!

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Mama told me I'm trying avocado today - my first food!! I hope I get a bigger portion than sissy. 🍌🍐🍓👶👶

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I'm officially obsessed with these headbands!! My husband joked the other day that her look was a little Tupac-esque. Maybe it was a little low on her forehead or something! Ha! I also got that it was reminiscent of Aunt Jemima. Whatevs, I love her look!! California love! ☺

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Sleep Training Sucks

So remember when I was all "hip hip hurray, my babies put themselves to sleep?!!!" Just kidding. Sick joke. Lyla woke up an hour later screaming and we, being the suckers we are, rocked her a$$ back to sleep.

So fast forward, and after the past 2 days of beyond shitty naps (they've gone from an average of 1.5 hrs 3x a day to 30 minutes this morning and 45 minutes this afternoon & to get them to nap was beyond hard!!) and ridiculously grumpy twins come bedtime, I put my foot down today and decided to do CIO tonight. I'm using the tips from this blog, but have modified the CIO "wait" times.

Yeah, yeah, I suck. Whatever. I have 2 infants to deal with and this is the path I'm choosing.

So, I'm keeping Lyla in their shared room during our sleep training and we've set up Bryce in the Baby Bjorn travel crib in our room. This way, they won't disturb each other for this boot camp. :-/

After napping for only 1hr 40min TOTAL today (normal was 4-5hrs), Lyla was absolutely zonked tonight and kept falling asleep during her before-bed bottle. I woke her while burping her because I don't want to put her to bed asleep (I need her to fall asleep by herself). I then put her to sleep very, very drowsy and she was out in less than a minute. It's now been 2 hrs, so we'll see if she stays asleep. I'm not sure this night counts.

Bryce fell asleep on his own after some crying. I put him down. Set the timer for 5 minutes and let him cry. Went in and soothed him (rubbed his head and put my hand on his stomach) and then left the room. Set the timer for 7 minutes. Went in and soothed him. Set the timer for 10 minutes and he cried again. But by the end of the 10 minutes, he was asleep. So this whole process with him took 22 minutes. And I white-knuckled my margarita the whole time. Not fun to hear your baby (ies) cry!

So yeah, sleep training blows. But rocking them both to sleep (and back) a zillion times a day just wasn't working for our family anymore.

I guess I'm supposed to tackle the night time sleep situation first and then attempt the naps. Those should be fun! :-( Wish me luck.