The Shoulds

Have you ever met the Shoulds?

The Shoulds are a malicious bunch. They like to hold me hostage, back me into a corner, and squish the shreds of parenting dignity I have left beneath their crusty leather boots. Then, as a more acute and awful form of torture, one of them reads a list of my parenting transgressions: not paying enough attention to my kid, saying "damn it" when his octopus arms are busy grabbing my piles of freshly folded laundry, letting him slip underwater while I try a few acrobatics in the pool. . .

Then they stand around and recite their creed: "he Should be night weaned by now!" "he Should be in his own room!" "you Should be using time out!" "he Should be watching less movies and reading more books!"

Just when I feel about to succumb, my kid does something great like eat chicken (we've been convinced he's vegetarian!), or learn all his primary colors (plus black, purple, and orange), or recite 15 letters of the alphabet (out of order), or sit nicely through church (eating raisins).

Such things intimidate the Shoulds the way a patronus does a dementor! And they make me feel way better, too!

~Nichole

Crafting with Cephalopods

Here's the thing.
I don't quite know how it happened.
I don't know quite when it happened.

But sometime between 18 and 19 months of age, my son left babyhood behind and went into full-on toddler mode. He walks with a very purposeful toddler walk. He acts like he's the boss of everyone. (And everything.) I have never seen a person more self-possessed than a toddler!
Recently, I read a blog post that compared flying on a plane with a lap child to trying to hold an octopus still for a few hours.

Did you know that that is exactly what trying to do a craft project with a 19 month old running around is like?

I did the nice version of my tutorial here. Here's the real story.

We started in the morning. When he was extra wiggly. And prone to climbing every climbable surface on the planet.
He "helped" me measure and mark my button holes.

He climbed on the table about eleventy hundred more times. He modeled my fabric.

He grabbed all my tools from me, injected himself into every task I performed. He "helped" me make the buttons.

He ran around and generally caused a ruckus all over the household. Insert break for going to buy foam - during which the heat of the car and the noonish hour brought on a (too short) nap - which made the day all the more interesting.

Insert second break for lunch and chasing and redirecting and pulling a kid off all sorts of high-ish surfaces.

My octopus used his tentacles to grab and shake loose the legs of my once-sturdy table, at which point this octo-mom lost her patience and started using my own tentacles to pull him away much too forcefully and impatiently.

I called reinforcements in from outside (i.e. made his dad come and watch him while I operated the compressed air stapler).

Finally, about 12 hours after I started, I finished. We couldn't get one of the four corners of the legs to seat correctly thanks to the vigorous octopus shaking it received.

Oh, and it took about 4.5 seconds for my kid to stick his little tentacles under one of the tufted buttons and snap it right off. See for yourself:

Just keeping it real, folks. This is the side those cozy online tutorials won't tell you.

By the way, if ever I am tempted to attempt a project like this again with a toddler underfoot, remind me of this, will ya?

~Nichole

Toddler Discipline

Parenting a toddler is what I imagine being bipolar to be like. You're never quite sure how much that bump will hurt and whether it will elicit a cry, and at what point redirection will cease to work and major meltdowns will ensue.

To be sure, with each new developmental stage, parenting (and disciplining) a toddler feels most like being out at sea, never quite sure exactly which direction you should be heading in next.

Look up toddler discipline, and you'll get all sorts of directions. Brazelton has his way. Sears has his. There are time outs (which I honestly can't imagine for this age). There are "secret" methods. But all agree that consistency is key.

My approach, before I had kids and before my kid was a toddler, was simple. It involved a two-pronged attack of Redirection and Choosing Your Battles.

But, as my son tries harder and harder to gain independence, he has stopped listening. He has started testing limits. And I have started raising my voice and not wanting to get up 50 times to redirect (both of which I am working on).

With potentially dangerous and gross things like toilets and the fireplace, I've tried smacking hands or his butt. With the hands, he is completely unphased. And he is fascinated by his butt, so he thinks it's funny and when I say "I'm gonna spank your butt" he puts his butt out, pats it and says "butt". Which I think is funny.

I am learning right along with him. I try out one tack to see what works and even though I am supposed to speak with some sort of authority, some days I feel completely at a loss for what to do next - totally in the middle of the ocean.

How about you? What do you do?

~Nichole

19 Months

19 months!

And we have entered the stage where he's so adorably cute one second (that little voice singing in the back seat or trying to say every thing I say - you should hear him say his name. or haircut. or the letter "F".)

And then the next moment, you're out to dinner and he's an unholy whirlwind of terror, threatening to hit his head on every living surface in the restaurant (glass tabletop! tiled walls!) or pierce the ears of fellow diners with his fitful crying.

But mostly, the cute thing.

I love love love love this kid! I love love love love being his mother. It's the most awesome job in the whole world, crazy bits and all!

~Nichole

On Mothering

I have been thinking much lately about mothering. And what it means.

I confess I do not have any particularly stunning or profound insights.

I know only this: I love being C's mom. And I am learning a lot about prayer and faith and patience and trust as I pray for the blessing to work less or not at all someday in the near future. It is my fondest dream to spend my days with my boy, taking him to swimming lessons and storytime and picnics at the park.

In the meantime, I am trying to do my best with what I have. I like what Kelly had to say about her mother's recordkeeping. And about the most beautiful thing. And her utter honesty about her struggles with infertility. What I am saying is this: this week, Kelly's beautiful little blog is where it's at if you want some profound or stunning insights about mothering. She gave me something to think about several times this week.

~Nichole

A Letter

Dear C,

Pretty soon - four days your dad tells me - you will be 18 months old. You are amazing! Your language skills are exploding. Just today I told you we were going to the doctor and you said "Dot-ter?"

Your little voice and the way you repeat words with the upward tilt of a question - I could listen to that all day long!

Your little face is thinning out and you look more and more like a toddler and less and less like a baby each day. I love to run my finger along the curve of your cheek down toward your chin.

And your brown eyes! I can't even put a coherent sentence together about those beautiful browns!

Oh your laugh! And how you are so silly and take such delight in finding things to be silly about just so you can laugh. It's all so delightful and fun and it just makes life worth living.

I tell you all the time that you're my best boy ever, and that's the truth if ever I heard it! You are pretty great! You're smart, and you are a good listener and you are just the funnest person to be around.

The only only only thing I wish were different is . . . I'd really wish you'd poop. Because adding words like "suppositories" and "enema" to my SMS words is kind of crazy if you ask me.

Love,

~Mama

Always Go Back In

This morning began at the early (but used to it now!) hour of 7 a.m. with my baby next to me in his raised up toddler bed - screaming and ranting and just generally unhappy*. Now that he's all toddlery, he goes through these spells every now and then. Sometimes at 3:30 in the morning, but you know, why should that matter to us vampires? (Because I seriously think that's what parents have to become in order to cope with all the sleep deprivation . . . )

He rejected my soothing advances, my attempted caresses of his back, my calming tones by becoming rigid and frenzied, arching and tossing himself backward, and trying to get as far from me as possible,which is kind of hard to do when his sleeping quarters are designed to keep him within my reach.

I left him alone, writhing there and fussing. During such times, I usually say out loud, to no one in particular, "Well, kid, I don't know what to do for you."

And inevitably, when I stop trying to soothe, his frustrated crying gets worse. And inevitably, I take this as my cue to get back in there, get up to my elbows in fussy baby, and try again.

This morning, I asked M to bring me a sippy of milk. I laid C down on my chest, reclined back against my pillows, and as he calmed down and snuggled against me, I made a mental note.

Always get back in there.

No matter what. No matter how much the initial rejection stings. No matter if he's 17 months or 17 years. Get back in there. Get up to your elbows if need be. Because just when they think you're not what they need, you're exactly what they need the most.

(*Later, when happy and smiling and laying semi-still for a diaper change, I noticed the pointy white peaks of 1, 2, 3 teeth trying to come in. If I were cutting three teeth at once - and all molars, too! - I think I, also, would be a mite cantankerous . . . so, he gets a get out of jail free card. Who are we kidding: he always get a get out of jail free card!)

~Nichole

Time for Two

It is at the risk of entirely inflating my mom's hopes and getting her prematurely excited that I write this post.

My baby is 17 months old. As he becomes more and more independent, not a day goes by that I don't think about when to have another. "When" is a question that does not currently have an answer, since we are working to put some things in place and want to let the dust settle so we can see the picture clearly.

I've read plenty of articles about the ideal spacing for children. Everyone has their opinions. Even my mother-in-law, who once said "You guys are so funny. We never talked about when to have children or how to space them. We just did it."

If only.

Some people still take this approach. I am not one of them. But I am not getting any younger, people! (Are you?)

Some people say spacing of between two to three years is perfect, others say waiting longer (3, 4, 5 years) is better, still others say having them as close together (between one and two years apart) is the way to go.

What say you? What is your ideal spacing? Is it something you decided on purpose? Or are you one of those chosen few who have faith enough take them as they come?

~Nichole

Home Again

We've had to get creative with the sippy cups - straw cups are no longer fascinating (and he would flick the straw and milk caught inside would get all over the place, like, say the backseat of my car), so last night he picked out insulated sippy cups with cars on them instead. Went down with one last night, but was really not having it when I tried to slip it in there instead of a bottle overnight.

But my real source of frustration is not with bottles or sippy cups. It's with the fact that I thought 1:00 church was the answer to our Sunday nap time conflicts, and that I have (very sadly) been mistaken.

When we were at 11:00 last year, one of two things would happen. We would delay his morning nap (10:00/10:30) and he would fall asleep before we even left the parking lot after church, which meant he only took one nap that day and we had to grin and bear with a cranky kid; or he would get his morning nap and sleep for 2 or 2 1/2 hours and I would miss church.

Then 1:00 church rolled around and all seemed perfect: he could get his 2 hour nap in the morning and we'd make it in time for sacrament meeting, and leave church just in time for his afternoon nap! Then, he became a one-nap-a-day toddler. He still goes down around 10:30 or 11:00, and sometimes have little more flexibility on when we lay him down, but he sleeps for 3 to 3 1/2 hours, which means he sleeps right through church and then needs lunch right after he wakes up.

I have missed more Sundays now than I would like to count. And it's getting old. This past week I had lunch with a friend. Because C woke early that morning, I put him down early, knowing I would have to wake him up at 2 hours in if we were going to make our lunch date. He did really well on the drive and during lunch, but threw an ever-loving toddler hissy when I tried to get him back in his seat to come home. Then, he refused to lay down again that afternoon and was an absolute bear the rest of the day, complete with whining and writhing around on the floor. (I have witnesses.)

I thought maybe the same approach, if it worked, might be an option for Sundays. After a cranky Thursday afternoon, I swore it off. But this morning, I thought it is much better to deal with a fussy toddler than not to go at all. But then he refused his nap at 10:30 and all bets were off for both getting a decently rested kid and getting there on time. He was still wakeful as we edged toward church time, albeit in a crankier and crankier state of being. He took a bath, rubbed his eyes, fussed and cried and climbed up into his bed while still naked under his bath towel.

Needless to say, I lost steam on fighting to get him (or myself) ready. He was asleep by 1:10.

All you moms out there consider this a cry for help. How do you make it work when nap times and church times conflict?

~Nichole

Bye Bye Bottle - Take 1

When C was rounding the big Uno, I started feeling a lot of indirect pressure about getting him off the bottle. His ped mentioned it in passing at his one year wellness visit. Books I had read all mentioned it too.

12 months was a huge transition point with lots of other hubbub to keep us busy. He was just starting to walk, cutting more teeth, becoming more verbal, transitioning from breast milk to cow's milk. . . . it was a busy time. So, I didn't worry about the bottle overmuch.

Plus, I had tried every sippy cup known to man and he was not really interested. We started with a Nuby bottle to cup contraption, tried a Gerber Graduates cup with the valve in and out, then a Nuby spout cup, and finally a Tilty, which he loves, but only to make sprinkles with.

But mostly, I put it at the back of my mind and figured we'd try it when he was ready. He naturally went to only having bottles before naps, before bed, and once during the night, with water during the day.

At his 15 month visit, the doc talked more at length about getting him off the bottle. She said it's better for babies' teeth and for their development to get off the bottle. I asked her what she suggested. She said they are really into straws at this stage and suggested a straw cup. She also said try giving him milk in a cup and a "drink he doesn't like" in a bottle. Hard to do when the kid's only drinks are milk and water. He drinks his water from a Funtainer thermos. (Remind me sometime to tell you about the time we left that $15 thermos at a restaurant and when I went back to get it, the waiter-kid said "I don't know what a thermos is".)

So, for the last month, I have been slowly making some small changes. He's really into cars, so one day while looking at cups, he saw one with a car and that's how we chose the Nuby insulated straw cup. If he wanted milk during the day (if he missed a nap), I would offer him this cup before the bottle and he would usually take it, refusing only if he was way too tired to put out the effort to drink from it, since the straw is typical Nuby-engineered and harder to drink through than your average straw.

Then, a friend suggested the Nuk learner cup, which I initially thought might be to "young" for him (and which he initially rejected) but it has turned out to be very helpful. I read several articles about stopping the bottle and toddler transitions to a cup.

If I know I am going to be out and about during the day and run into nap time, like I did yesterday, I pack the Nuby straw cup and the Nuk learner cup and give him his choice. Yesterday, he refused both. I knew he was very tired and probably would have accepted a bottle if I had one, so I put him in the car, turned on the music and he was out in 2 minutes.

When he woke up, I fed him dinner and offered him milk with dinner in his Nuk cup - which is new and different, since I only offered water during the day to try and keep his total daily milk consumption around 24 ounces (another thing I've worried too much over!) - and he loved it.

Today, for nap time, I offered him the Nuk cup. He drank 4 ounces, handed it to me, and tossed and turned himself to sleep. Again at dinner time he drank milk from the Nuk, water from the Funtainer, and homemade orange julius from the Tilty. At bedtime, I decided to try my chances and offered him the Nuk again. It only holds 5 ounces and sometimes he takes 7 or 8, so we needed a refill to get him to 7, but it worked!

The only bottle he will likely be getting if we can keep this up is his overnight bottle. And I know (I know!) babies are technically supposed to sleep through the night without waking to eat. . . and I've read the pamphlets the ped has given me about training him to do that. But, I haven't been willing to pick that fight just yet. (Besides which, he has been cutting a lateral incisor and the last few nights have been miserable already!) Not that I haven't thought about it. And read about it!

It's just one thing at a time around here: first transitioning from co-sleeping to his own bed, cutting more teeth, and now getting off the bottle. Definitely next up is night weaning, so we can move his bed further from ours and start the transition to his very own room!

~Nichole