sleep – On An Even Kiel

In March we took back to back trips to see family. The first one was to Reno (via plane) and the second one was to Chattanooga (via car). We hadn’t flown with Gerrit since he was 3 months old. Needless to say, I was worried about it! So I thought I would blog about what worked for us, what went poorly, and what I would have done differently.

Reno

First up was our trip to Reno! I was very apprehensive about this trip, despite Andrew telling me I had to just relax. He likes to remind me that “we can’t just stay at home forever.” I am horrible about worrying things to death before they even happen.

I packed for Reno without a list. That’s a big deal for me! I think as Gerrit gets older, there are fewer things to pack, and obviously space is limited with air travel. And Andrew always tells me that “if we forget something, we can buy it there.” And it’s true… there are few things that we pack that can’t easily be purchased at our destination. So that’s #1: If you forget something, you can almost always buy it at your destination!

Thankfully we had an afternoon flight, so there was no major rushing around the day of our trip. We had to drive to Raleigh for our flight, which is about an hour away. I was hoping Gerrit would take a little nap, and he did… 15 minutes before we got to the airport. So typical of him, haha. He was awesome for everything leading up to the flight though: taking the shuttle to the airport, standing in line, going through security… anytime there’s a lot going on, Gerrit just wants to sit and watch everything and everyone.

Gerrit loved watching the planes! That was the best distraction while we waited for our flight.

Andrew is adamant about safety, especially on planes, so Gerrit had his own seat on the flight so he could use his car seat.

We tried to keep him entertained in there as long as he could, but he wanted to get out, so Andrew and I switched off holding him in our laps for most of the flight. We brought quite a few books to entertain him, since he usually likes books more than toys. My #2: Bring things they like! They worked for awhile, but a 5 hour flight is REALLY long for a 1-year-old. He wanted to nurse on and off, which wasn’t a big deal when he was a newborn. But at 16 months? Either his head or his feet were sticking out in the aisle, so we sat pretty scrunched up most of the time.

We had a layover in Vegas, I think, which was great for Gerrit to stretch his legs. Being in such a confined spot was hard for all of us! The last flight was short, and Gerrit slept for about 45 minutes of it. By the time we arrived in Reno, it was about 7pm there… which was 10pm back home. So Gerrit was going on about an hour total of sleep, poor kid.

You’d think that minimal sleep would mean more sleep at night, but that’s not how Gerrit rolls. That first night in Reno he only got 8-1/2 hours of sleep. We tried to keep him on a consistent schedule, but I really feel like any major disturbance for Gerrit shows up in his sleep. We did our best to do #3: Try to replicate home for sleep. We packed sleep sacks, our sound machine, a night light, his blankets, and Lamby. I don’t know if it’s just a different location or if he truly hates the Pack N Play, but sleep was still crap while we were in Reno. Maybe all the stuff we packed would have been enough to help the average kid, which is why I recommend trying to replicate home.Our flight back to North Carolina was early in the morning. Gerrit and I had had a particularly bad night with minimal sleep the night before, but he did sleep for a bit in the guest room bed while Andrew & I packed up. It was a long day though. My exhaustion did not make me a very happy traveler. I was literally falling asleep while reading books to Gerrit on the plane! I think he took two 45 minute naps all day (one of them being in the car on the way home from the airport). We had a really rough night that night too. This is why I hate traveling! I love seeing family & friends; I love having fun with them. I hate that it affects Gerrit’s sleep so much.

So the next day, I did a bunch of laundry, then we repacked our suitcases for our road trip to Tennessee! The thing I like about road trips over plane trips is 1) flexibility with time, 2) no limits on what you can pack (you know… within reason!), and 3) you can stop as much as you want! But car trips are l-o-o-o-o-n-g. I usually end up in the backseat with Gerrit at some point to entertain him, so we pack a lot of books! Toys are great, but there’s only so much a kid can do in a car seat. I spent most of my time entertaining Gerrit with books and songs. I was SO ready to arrive at our destination.

So one of the biggest perks for us at the house my parents rented was that my little family got the master bedroom. And it had a king size bed. If you have never shared the bed with your toddler, you won’t really appreciate the space in a king size bed. But with Gerrit sleeping so poorly, I opted to bring him to bed with me when he just wouldn’t settle back to sleep in the Pack n Play. King size bed = enough space for us all!! I actually got some sleep with Gerrit cuddled up next to me. So here’s #4: If you tend to bed share, make sure you get a king size bed! It made nights so much easier for me, even when Gerrit didn’t want to sleep.

#5: Try to keep to your child’s normal schedule. When we were in Reno, this was tricky, because there was a 3 hour time difference. But Chattanooga was the same time zone as us, so that made it a bit easier to stick to our normal time frame for things.

It didn’t always work for us. For example, Gerrit napped on the way home from church on Easter, and he wouldn’t go down for an additional nap because of that. We also left the zoo early when we went with my family, hoping to get back to the house for Gerrit’s nap.

Unfortunately, he fell asleep in the car for 45 minutes and, once again, wouldn’t go down for an additional nap. Ugh… car naps! But a short nap meant that he had a good stretch of sleep first thing that night, so that was nice!

The trip back to North Carolina was really pretty: so many flowers and trees in bloom!
Gerrit took a good hour-and-a-half nap on the way home, but I still had a long afternoon of trying to entertain him in the car. I don’t feel like Gerrit eats like the average toddler (he doesn’t eat a lot and likes to nurse frequently), so do what you want with my #6: Try to keep his/her belly happy. For me, that meant nursing Gerrit while we drove. It’s kind of uncomfortable for me (you know, leaning over the car seat), but it keeps him happy and assures me that he’s getting something in his stomach. We tried Cracker Barrel (no luck with dinner) and Jimmy John’s (I think he ate a tiny bit), but Gerrit is just not a good eater, especially when we’re traveling. My recommendation would be to have favorite snacks packed and ready, and give them a cup of water to have available.

When we got home, we had a rough night! Gerrit fell asleep for 45 minutes in the car, and after we got home we hurried him through a bath and our normal bedtime routine. He had almost a 4-hour stretch to start, but lots of wakings after that. He had another rough night following that, but then settled back into a 3-4 wakings a night trend (which was good at the time).

What do I wish I had done differently? I wish I had just relaxed and been able to “go with the flow” a bit more. I get so worked up about Gerrit’s sleep that I miss out on fun things. I will always look back and wish I had not obsessed over this or that so much though. That just seems to be part of my personality, and it’s something I will probably always have to work on.

So good luck to you if you plan on traveling with your toddler. For us it wasn’t the worst thing in the world, but traveling with kids never seems to be easy. I feel like it gets a bit easier as Gerrit gets older, but it’s never my favorite thing to do. It certainly hasn’t kept us from traveling all over and seeing family & friends though! 🙂

Seriously, Gerrit is halfway through his 2nd year already?! This year is just flying by. I was so excited for him to turn one, since I love this age, but I feel like it’s kind of slipping away. I try to savor all the little moments, but, man, they go by so fast!

You’d think getting a good picture would be easier as they get older, but someone wasn’t particularly cooperative the day he turned 18 months!

Age: 18 months on 27 April 2016
Weight: 25.5 lbs
Height: 33.07 inches
Teeth: 11 with 1 more about to come through
Clothing Size: 18 months
Diaper Size: size 4 in disposables
Milestones: can say more words, although they are not always easy to understand; starting to do some ‘pretend play;’ can identify nearly every body part; beginning to understand emotions (he can sign “happy,” “sad,” & “mad” appropriately); beginning to understand time (first we will do this, then we will do that); can complete simple puzzles & shape sorters; shakes head “no” and nods “yes;” can pull off pants once pulled past his butt; dances; spins in circles; can throw, catch & kick a ball; can brush his teeth (rudimentary); showing affection/empathy

I feel like I need to expand on all of his milestones! Things Gerrit can say: Mama, Dada, Papa, Mimi, dirt, bird, ball, bubbles, bowl, no, baby, nose, elbow, Lamb, nut, blue, green, orange… I’m sure I’m missing some. A lot of these are very rudimentary, and only I can understand him sometimes. But as soon as Andrew hears how Gerrit says something, he understands too. I’m so thankful Gerrit is patient with us, haha! I know some kids get really mad/frustrated when people can’t understand what they’re trying to say, but Gerrit is quite good about repeating himself and complying when I say, “I don’t know, Baby, show me.” I love how he tries to say “lemon” (I posted a video on Facebook), and his newest one that makes me smile is how he says “orange,” which I’m pretty sure is his favorite color right now.

Gerrit and pretend play? So freaking cute. I love his little truck and airplane sounds, I love seeing him kiss his stuffed animals, and I love watching him “cook” with his bowls and spoons. It’s just so much more fun to play with him as he understand more of what it means to pretend. One night, Gerrit was very busy making a puff ball concoction before dinner, and Andrew brought it to the table to include in our dinner (seriously, how adorable is that?!). So we had our dinner plus Gerrit’s “puff ball salad.” We all kept taking more helpings of it (including Gerrit asking for more constantly), and we all pretended to eat it, Gerrit included. We were impressed that he understood that we were just playing and that Gerrit “contributed” to dinner that night.

Gerrit knows so many body parts now: head, hair, forehead, nose, eyes, ears, cheeks, chin, neck/throat, arm, elbow, shoulder, armpit, finger, thumb, nipple, belly, belly button, penis, leg, knee, foot, toe, butt, tongue, teeth, nostril, back… he constantly wants to know what things are and likes showing that he knows what different body parts are. And he remembers everything! I think we talked about our nostrils one afternoon, and when Andrew asked Gerrit where his nostril was the other day (not knowing that I had showed Gerrit where they were), Gerrit promptly pointed out his own and ours. Smarty pants!

I was so impressed when I started seeing Gerrit use sign language for emotions. I know emotions are really tricky for toddlers, and I try to label emotions frequently to expose him to them. He has actually appropriately used “mad” when he was frustrated by something. That surprised me! He is starting to recognize emotions in others. Gerrit will give me a snuggle when I say I’m sad or show him that I’m sad. It’s so sweet. I have not seen a really terrible temper tantrum from Gerrit yet. I don’t know if that’s just his personality, or if it’s all my hard work and effort and being calm with him and trying to help him understand his feelings. 🙂 If he hurts me (on purpose or accidentally), he’s quick to hug that area. He accidentally hurt my foot the other day (I think he dropped a book on it), and he gave my foot a hug… too funny. If he stomps on a stuffed animal, he then picks it up and gives it a cuddle. And did you all see my Facebook post about me singing “5 Little Ducks?” Oh my gosh, his tears when the sad mama duck goes out to find her babies just broke my heart! Emotions & empathy are tough things to learn, but I feel like he’s doing really well so far.

Sleeping: January (14 months) was a rough month. Things slowly improved in the sleep department in February & March, although we had some bad nights when we traveled, which is nothing new. Our worst night was 9+ wakings the night before we flew home from our trip to Reno. It was pretty rough! Eventually I just laid in the guest bedroom with him to get through the night. He was so restless; I don’t know if either of us got much sleep. Our best nights were 3 night wakings, which really isn’t great. But compared to the “bad” nights, I’ll take it!

On average, Gerrit got mostly 9-10 hours of sleep at night from 15-18 months. According to the experts, it’s really not enough, but it’s clearly all I could get from him at that time haha. Total sleep was 12-13 hours at 15 months but only 11-12 hours at 16 & 17 months. Seriously, when I read how much sleep kids are supposed to get at Gerrit’s age, I worry that he’s chronically sleep-deprived.

Naps… one thing that I usually don’t have issues with is naps. Gerrit normally gets at least a 2 hour nap, although he’s had some short nap days. When we traveled to Reno, Gerrit refused to nap on the plane, so that was almost a no-nap day. But in February, he also took a 4 hour nap! When this kid wants to sleep, he sleeps! Too bad it doesn’t happen very often haha!

Eating: Back and forth, back and forth… Gerrit eats well, then he goes through a few days or weeks of not eating well. It seriously drives me nuts. I wouldn’t necessarily call him a picky eater, because when he DOES eat, he eats almost anything. Sometimes I think it’s teething, sometimes I just don’t know.

Things we can normally count on him eating: scrambled eggs, fruit, pasta with sauce & meatballs, Goldfish crackers, and Cheerios. He used to LOVE meat, but now he is hit or miss with that too. Some nights he loves broccoli, other nights he won’t touch it. He’s done well with peas, carrots, and corn here and there, but nothing consistent.

Gerrit is still very actively nursing both day & night. This goes up and down as well. Sometimes I think, Wow, maybe he’s starting to wean! And then he goes back to wanting to nurse every hour or two. Sometimes I think he’s genuinely hungry, because he just doesn’t eat enough solids. Other times I think it’s primarily for comfort and affection. I do think the nursing increases when he’s teething, but giving pain reliever doesn’t seem to do much for him, so I guess nursing is what helps.

(Andrew took this sweet photo of us while we were sleeping)

Any night wakings are still dealt with with breastfeeding. I’m very back-and-forth on pushing Gerrit to night wean. My heart wants to continue waiting for him to do this on his own. My head tells me that this is really hard on my body. It’s hard on my body to not be sleeping enough for this long. So we’ll see what happens over the summer… stay tuned!

Mommy Update: I have good days and bad days. When Gerrit is sleeping better and eating well, my stress level is lower and I’m feeling pretty good. When things go downhill, I feel exhausted and frustrated. I get impatient and angry. But maybe that’s just parenthood!

A few weeks before Gerrit turned 18 months, I started working out. I was hoping the exercise would be enough to start losing some weight. When the numbers on the scale didn’t budge, I started making healthier food choices. Still nothing. I knew that it could be hard to lose weight while still breastfeeding, but I found out that it can be very hard to lose weight if you’re not getting consecutive hours of sleep at night. So for now I’m still working out, still making healthier choices… but I guess I won’t be surprised if I don’t see any changes for awhile.

20160330_195105 — This momma turned 31 in March!

I also made the decision to start selling Usborne books in April! I’m still learning a lot and figuring out how all of this works, but Gerrit loves the books, and I love that I can get him and other kids access to them!

Best Moments: From now on I’m going to combine this with our Memorable Events (down below)

Likes & Dislikes: Gerrit really likes “helping” us. He likes helping us unload the dishwasher, and he is actually getting really good at remembering where everything goes. Although he started out not being very helpful, he actually does make the job go faster now! He also likes helping me vacuum (he’ll use the attachment I’m not using to vacuum the floor near where I’m cleaning), wash up spills on the floor, and do laundry (he tells me who each item of clothing belongs to haha).

He also loves being outside! It’s definitely one of his favorite things to do. He loves coloring with chalk, digging holes, making and playing with mud, splashing in any water he can find, and just exploring.

He loves the garden! We have to watch him to keep him from playing in the dirt, damaging any plants, etc, but I’m pretty sure he thinks that is HIS garden!

When he sees the little onion plants, he shrieks, “Bee-bee!” (baby) since I first told him they were baby onions growing in the dirt. He loves checking on the progress of the poblano peppers and the tomatoes, and he has learned which plants he can pick (salad greens) to sample from the garden. I hope we can always have a garden, because I think it’s a great way for him to learn about plants and growing your own food.

Gerrit dislikes coming in from outside, haha. Usually I have to suggest that we go in for some Goldfish to get him to agree to go inside without tears. He also dislikes getting his diaper changed. I don’t think he so much dislikes getting a new diaper, he just doesn’t want to stop what he’s doing to get changed.

Memorable Events: I feel like February was a pretty quiet month for us. The only “exciting” thing to happen was our switch to cloth diapers! I had wanted to use cloth when Gerrit was a newborn, but that time in our lives was super stressful. I was so overwhelmed with everything (breastfeeding, sleeping, my crying baby, preparing to move), that I thought adding in learning how to cloth diaper would just be too much. I told myself that once we got settled at our new home, I would give it a go. By the time we were settled into our house in North Carolina, Gerrit was nearly 6 months old. And I thought, Well, it’s too late to switch to cloth diapers now. How silly, right? I was talking to someone about how I wished I had cloth diapered Gerrit, and she said, “Well… why don’t you do it now?” So I bought some inexpensive diapers from Amazon and we gave it a shot!Overall it has been a smooth transition to cloth diapers. We get leaks occasionally because Gerrit has a tendency to “flood” (he holds his pee and releases it all at once, and the diaper can’t absorb it fast enough) his diapers once in awhile. But I’ve just gotten more diligent about checking for wetness so I can change him more often.

I have a good wash routine, and I’ve only had one little hiccup (we needed to switch to a stronger detergent) so far. We still use disposables at night, not out of necessity, but to get through the big box of size 4 diapers Andrew bought! Overall I am glad we switched: I love that we are not going through so many disposable diapers, I LOVE the cute designs, and I’m hoping it helps Gerrit with potty training when the time comes.

March was a busy month for us! In the middle of the month, we boarded a plane headed to Reno to visit Andrew’s parents. Traveling with a 1-year-old can be a little crazy, but our time in Reno was a lot of fun! Andrew’s parents LOVED their time with Gerrit and made some cute memories with him. Gerrit notoriously sleeps terribly when we’re traveling, so I slept in most mornings. But that was fine, because Gram & Gramps had a great time entertaining our little guy. 🙂 Andrew’s mom got a lot of fun books and toys for G to play with, and Gerrit loved playing with Andrew’s dad on the pool table and exploring outside with them.

Another exciting thing happened while we were in Reno: Andrew found out that he was accepted into Officer Training School for the Air Force! He had applied earlier in the year, and it was great timing that he got the call from his commander while we were at his parents’ house so they could celebrate with us! He leaves for OTS this summer, and we will be packing up to move again sometime this fall.

Right after we got back from Reno, we unpacked and repacked our suitcases to drive to Tennessee to spend time with my family for Easter! It was a little hectic having back-to-back trips, but I figured if Gerrit’s schedule was going to get off track, might as well just keep it off track, right? My parents rented a house that would accommodate all of us coming in from out of town not far from their house. It was great! The house we stayed in had lots of room for the kids to play, a nice kitchen with a dining table that could fit all of us, and enough beds for all of us and our kids. Plus it was out in the country, so it was quiet (minus the frequent trains passing by haha) and pretty with all the plants blooming.

20160326_200354 — Rub-a-dub-dub, 3 babies in the tub! Gerrit, Lexy, & Nolan

The day before we headed back home to NC, we went to the Chattanooga Zoo with all the kiddos. I feel like the zoo was just the right size for Gerrit (and toddlers in general): we saw lots of animals, but in only took a couple of hours to get through the whole thing.

It was a fun outing with my mom, sisters, nephews, and niece! The weather was pretty much perfect that day too.
As you can see, we’re still getting a lot of use out of the ring sling. Gerrit still loves it, and gets excited anytime I tell him to “go get the sling” so I can carry him around with me.

I think the memorable part of April was getting outside! The weather was beautiful, and Andrew spent a lot of time building raised beds for a garden in the backyard. Gerrit wanted to help with all of it, of course, but he really just enjoyed being outside.

Gerrit would stay outside all day if he could! We’ve gotten him a slide and some outdoor toys. We’ve also gotten him some plastic gardening tools to play with.

Of course the beautiful weather quickly moved into hot weather. I got Gerrit a little sprinkler to play with, but he’d much rather let the water turn our yard into a muddy swamp than run through the water!

So that wraps up months 16, 17, & 18! Gerrit continues to grow and learn, and we love watching him figure out new things. He is becoming quite the handful (toddler terror!), but he is also very sweet and loving. I love that I am still able to be at home with him, and I try to cherish all the special moments we have together!