Assembling my mom portfolio

Since it is a not-very-well-kept secret around here that I frequently toss Owen a few slices of deli turkey and an apple and call it dinner (which is a big improvement on the times he gets a nutrigrain bar and a yogurt)I thought I would submit some photographic evidence that mealtimes are not a complete mom fail all the time around here.







It's egg train toast!On a scale of 1 to original, it's definitely a -3 but Owen seemed impressed. He even said "chugga chugga chugga chugga CHOO CHOO!" which is high praise from a 2 year old. He then of course proceeded to eat one bite and announce he was all done. Oh well. It was fun to make, anyway.

New Family Photos

Sadly, I can't post them, because I don't own them. But, if you'd like to see the professional photos we had taken today, you can go to www.portraitsimple.com click on "atrium" location and then click "online portraits" we should come right up. The password is 2803. It's going to ask you for a name and email address - all that does is add you to their mailing list so to avoid having to do that, just put in my name and email.

I think they do a really nice job at portrait simple, given that it's a mall chain. I get a little annoyed when they try do whatever their seasonal schtick is (right now it's red sox, at valentine's day it was rose petals, easter it was bunnies etc.) but then when they talk me into just letting them do the shots and I see the results, I always think it's cute. Given how into baseball Owen is, the ones with the ball are particularly appropos.

I didn't buy very many because they're expensive, but also because I seize up when I have to choose prints. I love them ALL. How can I choose? So I end up fearing I'll buy the wrong one, and don't want to have buyers remorse, so I don't buy any. So, I'll put it to you: which ones do you think I should buy?

Team Cox Win

We implemented the plan Dr. Ferber sent home with us, with one small modification - we tried a 9pm bedtime instead of 10pm. This is because one time, Owen had the worst day in the history of his life - honestly a 12 hour meltdown, and I'm not exaggerating - and the only thing we could determine was different on that day from other days was that he had been up until 10pm the night before. So we're a bit gunshy on that front. However, we did everything else in the incredibly detailed plan for the past two nights: the suggested nightime routine, the baby gate protocol, the checking schedule. And amazingly, (amazingly!) both of our children slept 1)in their respective assigned beds 2) all the way until morning (which for Eli was 5:40am, but hey I'll take it because he went down at 7:30) 3) in the same room. Major win! I am a happy mom this morning. We're building good-schedule momentum here, I can feel it.

The Famous Dr. Ferber

yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. It's been awhile. Frankly, my blogging has succumbed to faraway friend syndrome. You know how it goes - you have a close friend you don't see often. You try and talk regularly, maybe once or twice a month. But then things get busy and a couple months go by, and you keep thinking to yourself "oh, I have just GOT to call so and so". But then you realize you only have about 10 minutes, and that's not nearly enough time to catch up, so you put it off until you have "enough time". Then they call you, but you're just about to run in to an appointment, and you really want to chat for an hour but will have to get off the phone in in five minutes, so you send the call to voicemail....before you know it, you haven't talked to your friend in a year.

It's kind of like that. So, I've decided to just pickup where we are now, and if months 2 and 3 of Eli's life are lost to posterity, so be it.

Anyway, today Owen and I went to Children's Hospital for our appointment with Dr. Ferber. It's not every day you meet a world renowned child-rearing expert who's last name has turned into a verb in common parlance, so I figured it was worth blogging about. We certainly didn't leave with a silver bullet for Owen's sleep problems - it was more of an intake than anything else. Turns out working with Dr. Ferber is more of a process than one stop shopping. In retrospect, I should have realized this - what did I think he was going to do, give me a sleeping potion?

Before I go on, I have to tell this little Dr. Ferber story. A friend of a friend of mine works at Children's. She signed up for the same post-pregnancy core strengthening class as I am taking, and last Monday after class I mentioned we had this appointment with Ferber. She told me that one time, she was at an all-hospital event of some sort, and she was seated next to Dr. Ferber. When she realized who he was, she started talking immediately about her 6 month old, his sleep habits, what they had already tried, etc. She said that Dr. Ferber turned to her with a tired, bored look and said "Really, I don't...." he did not finish the sentence but apparently it was quite clear that the final word in that sentence was "care." And he referred her to his book.

So, yeah. Our appointment was a bit like that.

On the one hand, I see where he's coming from. He didn't say anything that isn't clearly deliniated in his book, which I have in fact read cover-to-cover twice and consult on an as-needed basis often. He probably spends 90% of his time telling parents with exactly the same problem the exact same things for the past 20 years. And by the same problem, I mean, they didn't read his book. He probably IS pretty bored. He's a board-certified pediatric neurologist, and his main function is telling parents to put their kids to bed later and stop giving them a drink of water if they wake up overnight.

On the other, being as we have read his book, and have been implementing the techniques faithfully for the better part of a year, I was a little disappointed. His message to me was that we just weren't following the directions in the book closely enough, because if we were, Owen wouldn't still be having sleep problems. Well, maybe. It's true, he did identify some small areas in which we were being inconsistent, and he did show me a pretty interesting chart explaining the amount of total sleep a child of a given age needs in a 24 hour period. But still, I think Owen's sleep problems are pretty resistant.

Ultimately, Dr. Ferber gave us a chart to record every minute of sleep/awake time Owen had for the next six weeks along with directions to keep a sleep log/journal about what we did, what he did, and how he slept. We're to go back at the end of June and he'll look at the charts, assess the situation, and I guess we'll go from there.

In the meantime, he suggests a bedtime for my 2 year old of 10pm. This seems wild and crazy to me, but he claims that most people wildly overestimate the amount of sleep children need and a 10pm bedtime is perfectly normal. Given that about 90% of my friends with kids are putting them to bed by 8 at the latest, this seems a bit suspect to me, but I guess Dr. Ferber would know.

After all, he did, well, write the book.