5 Months Old!

Siena at a Glance:

• 16 pounds, wearing 9 month clothes
• size 3 diapers, about 6 a day. 
• eyes are still glassy blue, but I can see yellow flecks in the sun.  I'll be shocked if her eyes don't eventually change to brown. After all, Korean blood runs thick.  
• starting to exert her will (for example, throws a fit if we don't let her pull the leaves off of plants or turn the pages in the hymnal.)
• still exclusively breastfed.
• suddenly stopped spitting up so much. yay!
• able to roll from back to belly, and belly to back.
• takes 3 decent naps a day- 9ish, 1ish, and 4ish.  although by blogging that I probably just jinxed it.
• bedtime is around 7 or 7:30pm. 
• starting to recognize words.  I say "doggy friends" and she looks up, expecting to see her doggy mobile. 
• starting to show mild stranger anxiety, especially around men with beards. 
• at about 4 months, she stopped sleeping through the night and wakes up at 3am starving. kinda bummed, but I'm enjoying the precious time I get to spend with her in the middle of the night :)
• at least for now, she's a bit of a loner- content to play on her belly with a few toys most of the day. 
• easily overwhelmed in crowds.
• nothing makes her laugh more than Pesto and Basil. 

My Latest Read:  I'm reading this incredibly loooooong book by Australia's "baby whisperer" (Lacey, you'll appreciate that!)  called The Dream Baby Guide.  It's not your typical sleep book with some quick fix.  It's about completely changing the way you communicate with your baby.  So, instead of always asking Siena, "Should we change your diaper?  Is it time for milk?  Do you want mama to pick you up? Is it time for another nap?" I should be leading her through simple statements that fill her in on what's to come, like, "Say bye bye to toys, nearly time to change your diaper and then get ready for night night!"  I realized that because I often lack confidence in my mom skills, I always ask Siena to guide me.  She's young right now so it's ok, but down the road it could become a problem.  In just a few days of changing my tone, gestures and speech, she's eating better and not trying to roll away as much during diaper changes.

When I first started reading, I was so skeptical that babies can even understand all this.  But then I realized that these are the same strategies, more or less, used by my dog trainer!  He told me Pesto's aggression stemmed from the fact that he thought he was in charge of the household, and that's a huge burden for a dog to carry.  Our trainer gave us lots of rules- Pesto shouldn't sleep with us, he should walk through doorways after us, he should always heel and never pull on the leash during walks, always wait to eat his food until we gave him the ok to dig in, and we should never have to ask him to do something twice. I was amazed that in a few weeks, Pesto was a new dog.  Far from perfect, but at least not biting and growling!  If dogs can respond to these changes, babies certainly can too.  I'm only halfway through, but I highly recommend this book!  All the sleep information is at the very end of this massive book.  She did that on purpose, because her point is that if your baby is clingy, anxious, and impatient during the day, it's unreasonable to expect them to peacefully fall asleep in their dark room all alone.  I love her holistic approach to sleep.  Ok, baby just woke up, gotta go!

* edit: After re-reading this, I realized it might come off the wrong way. Just want to clarify that we won't be training Siena like a dog or never let her have her own opinion or choice about things. We just want her to trust that we're the parents and she can relax and be the baby! 

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Tree of Life

For the past few YEARS, Joe's waited for Tree of Life to come out.  I've walked in on him watching the trailer at least 20 times. He's explored every nook and cranny on the movie website.  He's read every review.  And a few months ago, the excited countdown til the movie release began.    He took a long lunch break the other day and watched it, practically the only one in the theater. It did not disappoint. He said it was the most painfully beautiful movie he's ever seen, and that having his own baby made it that much more haunting.  He heard it described in one review as "a love letter to the Creator."  Goosebumps!

I think it inspired these pictures he took of Sisi this weekend :)

We're hoping to find a babysitter and get out soon to watch it together.  Only problem is, Sisi's sleep has taken a turn for the worse lately, and we don't feel as free to leave her at 7pm when she's down for the night.  She recently learned to roll over, which of course we're thrilled about, but she just can't stop rolling in her sleep!  When she finds herself on her tummy in the middle of the night, she freaks out until I come rock or nurse her to sleep.  Trust me, I'm BUMMED that we've had to resort to these methods again, since she was putting herself to sleep just fine much of the time.  And when she was down for the night, she was DOWN FOR THE NIGHT.  Like 10-12 hours pretty much guaranteed.  The first few days of this rolling fiasco, she was waking 4 or 5 times.  The past 2 days it's been 1 or 2 times, so I guess she's getting used to sleeping on her tummy. But she's been increasingly crabby before bedtime (probably due to overtiredness), and cried in my arms for an hour last night before daddy took over and sang her to sleep.  This morning's nap was rough. She's at the point now where my attempts to soothe her are too stimulating, and I honestly think she's confused about whether she's supposed to surrender to sleep in my arms or not, since every nap and sleep is different. Eventually, I put her in her crib to get her frustration out. She cried/whined for like 3 minutes and fell asleep.  She's been asleep for an hour now.

So note to self, never blog about how great a sleeper your little one is becoming, because it's sure to bite you in the booty soon enough :(  Didn't want to have to resort to sleep training, but we're praying about it now. I fugure there's a lot of crying going on anyway (both her and me, sadly) we may as well put the tears to good use.  I know many people will disagree with me and that's ok.

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