Now I get it...

Hey All!  This is actually from last week 2/11...  Forgot to post!

On Papa's chest

Weekly update here, and I have to say that I was really excited to get to this week's blog.  We have had a really good week, and in my mind things are starting to form.  My random solar system smattered with dots of light is starting to swirl around and come into being...

Waking up is tough!

As I said it in the new mom class earlier this week, I feel like I am transitioning from a place of reactive into proactive.  Not always, mind you, but I've really tried hard this week to anticipate and plan a little ahead of where Wally is.  I really felt like for the entire month of January, I was just constantly walking laps around the house.  As soon as I'd sit down, I'd need to get right back up to change a diaper or answer the phone (which was never near me), or get a glass of water, or let Hazel out, or calm the fussies, etc.  It was just one big blur of never being in the right place.  Plus, I feel like weeks 3-5 when Wally was waking up more, he was just constantly fussy when he was awake.  But then as soon as he would calm down or stop fussing, I'd be trying to get up to get something done...which would just put him right back into crabby.

So this week I've been modifying my game plan.  As soon as he squeaks, he gets put right on the boob.  Feed on demand.  And as soon as I see that he is getting sleepy, I try to lull him into a nap.  Why this didn't occur to me 3 weeks ago, I'm blaming on sleep deprivation.  For most of last week he would cry all morning, but we have now had three mornings in a row of napping!  Plus I'm just getting use to the crying, so it doesn't really throw me into some primitive panack mode like it did at first.  Andy calls it "baby white noise."  Yep, we've reached that point...

I've been reading that at 6 weeks babies start to orient themselves more.  Melatonin kicks in, which helps develop day/night differentiation.  So hopefully he'll start sleeping longer at night.  Up to this point, we usually are up once between 11-12:30 and again between 2-3:30, and then by 6:00 we're just up.

Another big development is the social que.  This is the really fun part!  Wally is really starting to look at me more, or even look for me (if he's on the changing table and I walk away).  He is on the brink of smiling, so I think in the next week we'll start to get more of that.  When he is awake, he seems more content.