Our house, lately

I'm not sure I could drum up one coherent blog post, so here is a little update of what we've been up to.  Lets begin with sports, an obvious starting point.

Football: Carolina had its first football game and we made it through the first half.  Brady brought his helmet to go with his jersey, but Coach Fedora did not end up needing his services.

I love the picture below of Brady sharing his sucker, because it illustrates how great of a brother Brady is (always willing to share) and Jackson's personality (will freak out until he gets what he wants).



Swimming: While Brady doesn't actually know how to swim yet, don't try to tell him that.  He's become very confident (overly) which is a change from last month.  He's gone down a few different water slides by himself and he loves to jump (bellyflop) in to the water.

 

 

 

 

 

Just a little nude basketball thrown in

 

Boating: I don't think this is a sport as much as a leisure activity, but we did take the boat out over Labor Day and Eric got in his skiing fix.  We got to stay with Eric's parents and Brady was as excited about this as Eric was about the boat.

Soccer: Tonight was Brady's first soccer practice.  He was fired up.  We went to the fields, played for 5 minutes, and were ushered off the fields due to thunder.  Lots of build up for very little time.  But in the time they did spend on the field, the coach and the players were sitting in a circle, playing a game to learn everyone's names.  Brady tolerated it for about a minute, but left the group and went to shoot on the soccer goal.  He was encouraged back to the group and declined... lets just say he was focused more on the "soccer" aspect of soccer practice.  Hard to blame him, I guess.

Here's a video from yesterday:

Sleep: Not technically a sport, but equally exhausting.  I recognize the irony here.   Jackson teased me for about 2 weeks but has regressed.  In some ways, its worse than before, because the second time he wakes (any time from 4 am or later), he has zero interest in going anywhere except my bed.  Which would be no problem if he just fell asleep next to me.  But he usually spends an hour tugging my hair, clawing my face, and all together smothering me before falling back peacefully to sleep.  At which point, I am adequately awake and agitated and Brady's usually waking up. 

I was close to my snapping point a few nights ago, so I brought out a method we've used several times with Jackson.  Its called the "closed door strategy".  Here's how it goes.  I close Jackson's door and I close my door.  The end.  Lest you think I'm an awful mom, I can still hear him crying, but its much softer (to my ears, even when he's wailing) so its easier to let him cry (lower blood pressure and heart rate) and remain in a semi-dozed state.  Here was how it went last night:

10:15 pm - wake up and cry.  Not a normal wake up time...I knew the night wouldn't be easy.  Let him cry... done in 2 minutes.

12:30 am - wake up and cry.  Again, early for the first wake up, which usually doesn't come until about 2.  So I let him cry.  I think he cried about 10 minutes.  Close door method helped here...I fell back asleep quickly.

2 am - wake up and wail.  Brady hears it, wanders in to our room to sleep. I went in Jackson's room, nursed him, put him in his crib, he's back to sleep.  Go back in my bed and hear Brady say, "Pump up the ball" in his sleep.  2 minutes later, laughter.  Must have been a good dream.  I go downstairs to get an apple. I need sustenance for this night.

5:30 - wake up and cry (Jackson, not me... although I'm tempted). I pretend I don't hear, but realize sleep is probably over for the night.  After 20 minutes of on and off crying, I go in to rock Jackson for 5 minutes so he knows his mom didn't completely abandon him.  He's nice and relaxed until I put him in the crib.  Then, he lets me and all the neighbors know how he feels.

6:10 - I go back in to a sad baby and nurse him, hoping that will help him sleep.  Here the air conditioner kick on, causing the semi-closed door to slam, causing Brady to wake up, causing him to come in to Jackson's room while I'm nursing him, "because he doesn't want to be alone." Eric happens to be gone this particular night, so I promise him I'll be back.

I put Jackson back in the crib and again, he let me know how he felt about that.  Return to bed, Brady is awake for the day (but thankfully, content to lie in bed for 30 minutes).

6:30 - Jackson gives in, sleeps soundly until 7:30.

So the good news, I stayed strong and Jackson did not up in my bed.  Bad news, see above.

Preschool: Brady had his first full day in the 3's class.  On Tuesday, we went for an hour to meet the teacher, and Brady was apprehensive to walk through the door.  But then, in the dress-up corner of the room, he spotted a football jersey and football helmet.  And the year was saved.

When I asked what he did at preschool today, he said, "The bad guy was trying to get the purple bird and it was not good." I laughed, which apparently was the wrong response.  "No don't laugh," he said very seriously.  "It was not good.". But thankfully, school is good and Jackson and I can make up for the bonding time we're NOT having at 5 am.



 

That might be wishful thinking.