Fourth time is a charm!

After waking three times during night three, last night Oscar made it from 8pm to 7:30am in the big boy crib! Yay, bee! And Mommy only woke up once to check on him. Or was it twice?

We met up with friends Katya and Kyra at Mommy and Me yoga today. We were thirty minutes late thanks to some projectile pooping, and Oscar cried through most of it so Mommy didn't get to do much yoga, but we're going to try again next week and see if we do a little better.

Here's a photo of my thumb sucker in his swing last week.

Life in da crib: night two

We did a little better last night. Oscar made it 7 hours in his crib (8pm - 3am), but woke in a panic once again. Nelson brought him to bed, Oscar nursed and stayed in bed with me until he woke again around 7:30. Nelson has a theory that Oscar was waking in the night when we were co-sleeping, but because Oscar knew I was right next to him, he felt comforted and when right back to sleep. I did a little research on this theory and (of course) Nelson was right! Babies have an amazing sense of smell, so when they startle awake in the night (which they often do) the scent of Mom is so comforting to them that they just go back to sleep. The article suggested leaving a mom scented object in the crib with baby so if they wake, they will still feel that sense of comfort. Isn't that too sweet?

To be loved

This weekend, at our friend Javier's birthday party, I realized how lucky Oscar is to have so many people who love him so much in his life. Oscar was a little angel as always, laughing and flirting with everyone that held him. He's such a good tempered, happy baby, although he wasn't shy about letting us know when it was time to go home. And no one wanted to see him go - everyone had to give him on last squeeze. He was so exhausted that he came home and slept from 7:30pm to 7am!!! Nelson and I didn't even know what to do with ourselves - too bad we were just as exhausted from our big day. This photo was my favorite of the day - Uncle Regis and Oscar making silly faces at each other.

Who's a big boy?

Last night, Oscar spent his first night in his crib, away from Mom and Dad. Nelson and I definitely had trouble going to bed without him, and I checked him three times before I was able to sleep myself. We decided it was time to move him because Oscar had started kicking his leg over the side of his co-sleeper, and he kept trying to rotate around and his co-sleeper was just too small. It was limiting our little wiggle worm's range of motion!

He woke up around 2:30am, crying in a panic - I think because he was in that big crib all alone - so Mommy to the rescue! He spent the rest of the night in bed with us. In all, he made it 5.5 hours in the crib and 5 hours with us. Maybe he'll make it a little longer tonight. Oh, and when I went to get him, he'd rotated 180 degrees around, so his head was where his feet had started out! That's my wiggle worm!

Pot o' Gold

A friend of mine recently reminded me how incredibly lucky I am to have such a wonderful, loving, devoted husand and a beautiful, healthy baby. So, just because I love them, here's a shot of my two handsome boys.

Introducing Ella!

Oscar got to meet his cousin Ella (three weeks his junior) for the first time this weekend. They hit it off great! Here's a photo of the two of them - Oscar giving us his Elvis grin and Ella looking pretty exhaused from having Uncle Nelson and Aunt Jenni take so many photos of her.

Isn't she a cutie?! Look at all that strawberry blond hair. How lucky are we to have such a cute niece?

Holy diaper rash Batman!

Our poor little man has been waylaid by diarrhea and diaper rash, courtesy of the nasty antibiotics he's taking for his cat scratch. I've literally been up to my elbows in baby poop all week. Only 3 days left on his meds, then he'll be back to his cheerful, silly, once a week pooping self.

On the upside, Oscar has done two very exiting things this week. The first is that he's sitting up with help! He grips my fingers and I help him pull himself to sitting from a lying position. The second is that he smiled because he thought something was funny! He usually smiles in response to some one's smile, but today I was sticking my tongue out and blowing raspberries and he started grinning! Sweet boy!

Baby Drama

It happened. Our first ever baby injury. At a friend's house this weekend, Oscar was scratched in the head by their cat.

I was changing Oscar's diaper on the couch, and he was crying. Veloceraptor style. The cat peeked around the corner of the couch and retreated. Then, before I knew it, he was back and hissing and going straight for Oscar's head. His little eyes got so big, and I screamed - the cat ran away. I screamed again when I saw the blood and grabbed him into my arms.

Nelson cleaned the scratches (five of them, on about a half inch from his eye), and I rocked him and nursed him and Oscar was back to his smiling cooing self in a half an hour. We called the pediatrician and they prescribed Oscar some antibiotics to prevent infection, which we picked up this morning. FYI - apparently cat bites are much worse than cat scratches.

Accident over, baby safe, I could not help but feel like I should have been more vigilant in protecting my baby. I was up half the night riddled with guilt (Oscar, as the saying goes, slept like a baby.) I have never been more distressed in my life than when I saw my baby bleeding and heard him crying in pain - it was like a physical ache in my chest. I wish that I could absorb every hurt he's ever going to feel. I'd take that cat scratch for him in a minute. And all the scrapes, bumps and bruises he will undoubtedly experience through out his life. I'll even take the heartache.

But, I know that growing up isn't easy and that these experiences will help to build his character and make him a stronger person, blah, blah, blah. I hope that I can learn to get over all his boo-boos as well as he has!