Melina's blossoming vocabulary

Although she doesn't look like it in this photo, Melina is becoming quite the talker. At last count she has mastered 16 words, or semi-words. They are:

Owwwww? This means meow, and is usually followed by kitty.

Ooof! Ooof! This, of course, means dog. She hasn't quite mastered the word "doggy" yet, though she said something a lot like it today.

Mama and Dada (sometimes Daddy). "Mama" sometimes means what you think it should mean, and sometimes means "feed me." Lately she's also been saying Monnny, which might mean mama or might mean something else. We're not sure.

Iiiiii? This seems to mean ice, sometimes, but at other times it just means "gimme."

Nana. Banana.

Key. Key. Or maybe "kitty."

Hi and Bye.

Aiyyyy? (said pointing up in the air). This means a plane is going overhead.

Cookie. I think she actually learned this from Norah, the sitter's two-year-old daughter!

HowIwon.... This is the beginning of the second line of "Twinkle, twinkle, little star," and she repeats it over and over and over. And over. It means she wants you to sing the song.

Uh-oh. This means something has fallen on the floor, usually because she dropped it there on purpose.

Cool! This is the newest word. I guess I must say "cool" a lot, because now she's saying it. It's pretty funny to hear a 14-month-old saying things are "cool." Though I don't think she has the slightest idea what it means.

Ha! Ha! This means Hot! Hot! It's another thing I say a lot, but I'm not sure if she's really grasped the meaning yet.

Melina's big weekend

Melina had a big weekend. First off, she transitioned from walking while holding onto a supporting adult with both hands, to walking holding onto one hand. And then, suddenly, she let go of that hand and took three big steps before sitting down in the grass! For posterity, that happened in Eugene on Saturday, June 17. Next, she successfully left a message on Jeff's cell phone from my cell phone, without me even knowing she was doing it. And then she pushed through a new tooth (her upper left eye-tooth), clearly said "binkie" (only once!) and started learning the words to "Twinkle, twinkle, little star." (She repeats the "How I wonder" line over and over... as in "howIwunooooh, howIwonoooo..." This is when she's not repeating "Owwwww? Kitty. Owwwww? Kitty. Owwwww? Kitty.")

And that's not all. Last night she went to sleep after five minutes of half-hearted crying. She looked at Jeff sitting on the bed, figured it wasn't worth crying any more, rolled over and went to sleep. Yay! I think she's finally getting it.

Unfortunately she also had one misadventure, which was to fall over a support bar on her high chair and hit her head on the deck. After a few minutes of hysterical screaming, she was back to her normal self. I was a little worried about a concussion, but she seems completely fine. Phew!

By the way, this is a photo of her opening a birthday present. It's a few months old.

The new French tent

Here's a video of my mom putting up a new tent that she and Dad bought in France. They couldn't make it much easier...


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More progress!

Last night Melina went to sleep after 15 minutes of crying. She woke up later and went back to sleep without crying at all. Yay!

Unfortunately, she also has a bad diaper rash (due to her new habit of pooping at night), and is hoarse from all the crying. She missed me a lot when I went down to Foster City for work, so she's extra clingy as well. Poor little baby!

Progress!

We are actually making progress on the sleep front! Do I hear angels singing? For four nights Melina cried for about an hour and 45 minutes, then woke up an hour later to cry for another 30-60 minutes. It was very disheartening. Then, on Sunday, she cried for an hour the first time, then went back to sleep after about 10 minutes the second time. Then last night she cried for half an hour the first time, and 5 minutes the second time. I think she's finally getting it! I'm actually in Foster City, California, now for a meeting, so I've been missing all the action (which I do not regret). Maybe after tonight we'll be down to 15 minutes... or even less! We can hope!

Sleep Lady Shuffle

At 13 months, we have finally decided to do some disciplined sleep training, because Melina is not sleeping through the night, and, even worse, wakes up every 40 minutes between 8 and 11:00 p.m., and takes about 20 minutes to fall back asleep each time. Actually, her night wakings aren't that bad (I don't mind waking up at 5:00 to nurse her) but lately it takes so long to get her to fall asleep (and back asleep) that one of us is constantly with her in the evenings. She obviously does not know how to soothe herself or fall back asleep on her own, and it's driving us crazy.

I own 5 or 6 sleep books. Here's a summary of what they say, or at least how I interpret them:

Dr. Sears Baby Book. Co-sleep until the baby doesn't want to co-sleep anymore, or until it drives you crazy. "Cry it out" methods break the bond between parent and child and are unnecessarily harsh.

No Cry Sleep Solution. Agrees with Sears; offers different ways to get the baby to sleep without any tears. (We tried these, but either we weren't doing them right or they didn't work for Melina. They require a huge amount of discipline that we probably don't have.)

Good Night, Sleep Tight: The Sleep Lady's Guide to... something or other. It's a long title. Basically this one says it's OK to let the baby cry as long as you are right there suffering along side her. Gradually you move yourself away from the crib until you're out the door and the baby is sleeping through the night. You're supposed to apply the "sleep lady shuffle" (waiting with the baby) every time she wakes up during the night.

Sleeping Through The Night: This one says to let the baby cry it out by herself, with you checking on her occasionally, but you only need to do it the first time she goes down every night.

Ferber: can't remember the title of the book (I don't actually own this one), but it's the oldest of the "cry it out" manuals and has you go in to check on the baby at regular intervals while they cry, then space the intervals out longer and longer.

Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child: This one is has the strictest approach, called "extinction," which kind of gives me the chills. You put the baby in her room, close the door, and let her cry without checking on her until she falls asleep.

After reading all of these (or parts of them), we made up our own approach. For the last three nights we've been putting Melina down at 8:00 or so (her usual bedtime). We sing to her, rock her, etc., until she's almost out, then put her in the crib. Then we wait in the room about 5 feet from her. Jeff usually watches soccer with his headphones on and when I did it tonight I started out reading by her crib and then moved over to the bed to work on the computer. Actually she seemed to cry less when I was further away and when I didn't look at her. Anyway, for the first two nights I didn't think I could take crying, so I went out shopping and bought an extremely expensive bra at Nordstrom (what was I thinking??) and two installments of Lord of the Rings DVDs at Borders. (It's probably good that I was on duty tonight).

Anyway, we're doing this only until 11:00 p.m., instead of all night. It may take a little longer since we're not doing it every single time she wakes up, but since we are both working it saves us from becoming sleep-deprived zombies. I figure if we do it consistently every night, she WILL learn how to put herself to sleep, and that will carry through to the night wakings.

For the first two nights, she cried for an hour and 45 minutes each. Tonight, with me on duty, she cried for an hour and a half. Actually she didn't cry the entire time, but fussed a bit and sat quietly for a while too. Finally she just laid down and fell asleep. It's kind of disappointing that it didn't take 15 minutes tonight, or three minutes, as other people have experienced, but at least it took LESS time. So maybe we're getting somewhere. It's hard to be very hopeful when it still takes more than an hour to fall asleep.

The only thing that really helps me through this is that I know it will help her (and us) in the long run to know how to fall asleep, and during the day she has been the same happy, talkative, social little baby she always was. I haven't noticed any difference at all in clinginess or temperament, apart from being a little more tired.

I'll keep you posted about how it goes for the next couple of days.

New words

Melina is very clearly saying "kitty" these days, and today she pointed at a banana at the grocery store and said "nana." It's a veritable verbal explosion!

E-nagger: The Garage Project

In order to gently encourage Jeff to make progress on the building of our garage, I've decided to post some photos as the garage progresses. This way, he will be shamed into working on it if several months, say, pass without any change to the photos. (And he agreed to this!)

So here's a photo of Jeff cutting trenches in the driveway pad with a rented backhoe. Unfortunately I can't find the "before" picture I took, but this is fairly early in the process.

Here's the pile of dirt that's been sitting in our backyard for a month or so now. Note the weed growing out of the dirt.




And below is Jeff trying to figure out how to use a saw that he borrowed from a friend. He bought a 10'x10' canopy to protect him from the elements while he's out working. Yay, Jeff!

Tune in soon for more progress!