Sleep Training Part 2Little Beanie having some tummy time.

So, as I have mentioned in my previous post, I have started Beanie on sleep training, and the first night went well.

That was just a fluke. For the next 4 nights, I think I'm the one who is being sleep trained, ie: how to survive with less than 4 hours of sleep at night. It was so bad that I was having a constant headache during the days and was on the verge of running out of my house and to let Beanie cry and fuss at nights... ...

The 2nd night was the worst, she kept me up from 2.30 am till 5 am. Thankfully Hub was around during the weekend and I managed to nap in the day. Things are s-l-o-w-l-y getting better, for example, last night she still woke up twice in the night, but she only fussed for 15 mins at about 2 am without any feed, and at 5 am, I decided to give her a quick feed and she went back to sleep immediately after that.

I really do hope that she can clock at least 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep soon, so that my headache and eye bags can finally disappear for good!

Home alone with Beanie

Although I am Beanie's main (more like the ONLY) caregiver, I cannot possibly carry her all the time. However, Beanie's attention span in her baby gym is about 10 mins on good days, and more often than not, 10 seconds.

So I usually end up either putting her in a sling and sling her around while I do my housework or put in her stroller and push the stroller around the flat.

Guess these are better alternatives than a screaming baby. Sometimes I wonder whether am I spoiling her by slinging her around all the time. Hmmm, textbooks call this method "attached parenting". According to my mom, I'm spoiling her rotten. But my mom is not the one who has to deal with a screaming baby 24/7 ALONE. So, I'll do whatever it takes to save my sanity.

Anyway, I started sleep training for the 3rd time last night. The first 2 attempts failed miserably where I had to deal with a screaming Beanie for 2 solid hours ALONE at 3 am in the morning. After 2 traumatic nights , I simply do not have the courage to try again until last night.

I noticed that Beanie now has the capacity to sleep up to 6 hours at a time, but she will still wake up at 2-3 am for a comfort suck. So last night, I refused to nurse her and gave her a bottle of water and pacifier instead.

Of course, she was angry and screamed as usual, but after 30 mins (just when I was just about to give in), she started to whimper and within minutes, she actually dozed off.

WHOOHOO!

She then woke up at 6 am, gulped my milk and happily made cute "ah-goos" until about 8 am, and dozed off again.

I will stick to this sleep training routine and hopefully she can start to sleep through the night from 730 pm to 6 am.

Wish me luck!

Pictures Galore!

Beanie was about 2.5 weeks in the above pictures.

Beanie at 1 month

I found a free app that allows me to make picture collages via my iPhone. So guess what have I been doing for the whole of this afternoon? ;)

Looking at all these pictures made me realize how much Beanie has grown... and in less than a month's time, I will be back in office. I'm going to so miss my little Beanie!

If I were a boy... ...

I thought Beanie looks quite girly with her big, pretty and expressive eyes... but every time I bring Beanie out, in her PINK romper, PINK booties and PINK mittens (without her signature headband though), I still have strangers coming up to me "ahh, so cute, boy huh?"

Eh... Auntie, already all pink, and you think my daughter is still a boy??!!

So, being rather bored this morning, I put a blue beanie hat on Beanie and see whether does she look like a boy...

Hmmm. Haha, she does look like a boy huh?

Beanie likes dressing up

Hub bought a few pretty dresses for Beanie from H&M and we had a good time dressing our little doll.

Ahh... the joy of having little baby girls.

As for Beanie, she definitely enjoys the attention whenever we go gaga over her newest outfits. ;)

Professional pictures from D

A dear and talented friend, D came over for dinner and being shameless me, kept bugging him to take some pictures of Beanie because he's a really good photographer!

Ahhh... such beautiful photos!

Beanie and me

Took me quite a few shots to finally get her to look at my iPhone. First mother and daughter picture! ;)

Uninterrupted Sleep... ... Yeah, right.

That's a picture of Beanie when we went for our very first walk in the stroller. She enjoyed the walk a lot, so much so that I'm trying to make a point to go for a walk everyday, as long as the weather permits.

The idea of bringing her out for walks is to expose her to sunshine and fresh air, so that she can differentiate between day and night.

Day -> Fun and sunshine, milk and butterflies, songs and dance, happy mommy and active baby.

Night-> Snuggle and sleep, lullaby and pillows, huggies and whispers, sleepy baby and contented mommy.

Unfortunately, it is not the case.

Beanie is still waking up at least 2 times a night on good days and on bad days, every freaking 2 hours. Since I am on both day AND night shifts, the sleep deprivation is driving me crazy.

So, a few days ago, I sent out a SOS signal and got my father-in-law (FIL) to help out a bit. My FIL took her out for a walk in her stroller and I immediately jumped to bed, looking forward to an uninterrupted sleep, even if it was just a nap.

There I was, drifting happily to sleep and suddenly I heard... "Waaaaaaah Waaaaaaah Waaaaah" and that was Beanie screaming at the top of her lungs.

I must be dreaming... *ignore*

"Waaaaaah Waaaaah Waaaaaah Waaaaah Waaaaaah "

Geez, that was indeed Beanie and she was wailing at the void deck and since I am staying on the 2nd floor, I could still hear her cry.

Sigh, so I headed down to the void deck below to carry a grumpy Beanie.

So much for an uninterrupted sleep.