Warming Up To It

Dash and Liam are getting closer and closer to becoming little crawlers, getting more comfortable on their tum-tums.

It makes it a lot easier to play with their toys, too!

Dash was the first to roll onto his tummy and still does it every now and again, but it's not a big habit. I still have to put him on his belly to practice.

These soft blocks are perfect playthings. Sean keeps calling them "balls"- our boys may have trouble learning shapes...

But they won't have trouble being cute!

Liam started rolling over a couple weeks after Dash and has become a rolling fiend. I rarely set him down without him flipping over.

And he almost exclusively sleeps on his tummy now- he just flips right over when I set him on his back. This of course makes me fret but there's no way I can stop it from happening. I guess he likes to cuddle with his mattress.

And I like to cuddle him!

Panel of Experts: Naps... again

The Battle of Sleep has begun. Sean and I are embracing the ways of the book, On Becoming Baby Wise. It's a strategy for sleep training babies, to get them on a schedule/routine and to get themselves to sleep. This move really comes out of necessity, because we (both babies, Sean, and I) have GOT to get more sleep. I dread the mornings because I'm exhausted from only getting a fews hours of sleep at a time that don't even add up to a full night's rest.

So we're letting them cry. It stinks. Majorly. I know its a means to a very good end- the boys can learn to soothe themselves and we all get better sleep- but it's so hard to not rush in there when they're wailing for mommy and daddy. It's especially hard with the twins because the non-crier will get woken up, so then two babies are screaming. The worst part is making myself leave quickly after I've checked up on them- all I want to do is stroke their faces until they sleep again. But then that'd be working against our goal, wouldn't it?

Marci is the one who first mentioned Baby Wise to me. Marci's family lived in Illinois for a while and we were in Young Women's together. Years later, I came upon her blog. Then I moved to Houston which happened to be where she was living. And she and I finally got together a few days ago. It was funny, since we're blog friends, we already knew exactly what was going on in each other's lives. But it was lovely to meet her son (who showed me how very non-babyproofed our house is) and I think she enjoyed time with a couple cute babies. She's a wonderful mother of three and blogs all the time, you should check it out. Loved meeting with you Marci! Thanks for driving out!

Ok, back to sleeping. So the idea of not rushing to their side at every whimper at night is one of the points of Baby Wise. Another is instilling a schedule of Feed-Wake-Sleep repeat. So they should have their wake time right after they eat and nap after that, until it's time to eat again. Before, I'd let them nap anytime after they ate, so we're working on that.

There's two things I want to discuss:

1) I read in the book that if they wake up crying, it means that they didn't get enough sleep. Is that really the case? Because they always wake up crying from their naps. I'm thinking if I try to get them back to sleep (which involves more bouts of crying) after their typical 35 minute nap will help consolidate them and make them more restorative. Yes?

2) Any tips on "crying it out"? Does it really work? I'm hoping for some miracles in the next couple days.

G&G B

Needing a quick baby fix, Sean's parents zipped over for a little visit this past weekend. It was spent watching General Conference (Elder Ballard's talk was like the intro of my thesis. Do you think I should look into plagiarism? Kidding)...

...going on walks (those boys love the Bjorns!)...

...and a whole lot of playing!

Let's first feature Grandpa Bradley with his favorite grandkids.

That's a face of absolute glee, isn't it?

Or maybe that is. No matter the case, the boys adore Grandpa.

The party doesn't start until you're playing on the floor!

I think there's some love there.

Now it's Grandma Bradley's turn.

You could tell that she was just itching to get her hands on these babies.

Grandma's a perfect cuddling partner.

(I wanted to put in this picture to show her great hair style)

Party time!

Practicing his standing.

I think there's some love there.

After all that playtime, the boys have been downright bored with me this week. We're all aching for another visit!

Hangin in the Big Chair

They...

...are getting...

...so big!

ilovethemsomuch