The Time Has Come

"The time has come!" The mommy said,
"To eat some solid things.
Of barley, and oat, rice cerial.
Not Cabbage yet, Or Burger Kings!
And nothing that is boiling hot,
Or Red Bull (it might give you wings...)."

"But wait a bit!" the William cried,
"Before you give me that.
For I only like to drink my food,
And it's enough to make me fat!"
"No hurry!" said the Kylie mom,
he thanked her much for that.

*adapted from part of The Walrus and the Carpenter

Yep, we decided to try rice cerial. William was watching us intently while we ate and was smacking his lips :) I was a little too excited to wait till exactly 6 mo. But William didn't accept the cerial as well as I thought he would. He digested it fine, and accepted a few feedings, but kind of gets mad at me when I try to feed it to him now. I think that's because I'm making it too cold... I don't know, we're still in experimental mode right now. I'm just trying to figure out what I'm doing :)
You can watch the video of the first feeding on facebook (it takes too long to put in on here).

Another update: William sits very well on his own! Plus he prefers this much more to tummy time, and it kind of satisfies our need for a new development :) So fun stuff!

To Sleep or not to Sleep....

When I was pregnant I read a book (who doesn't?), and it said that babies had the ability to sleep through the night by 9 weeks of age if you provided some structure and regular feeding times to their day (along with some self-soothing etc.). I thought, I'm totally going to have a baby who sleeps through the night by 9 weeks. No problem.

HA

As it turns out it's not that easy... LOTS more complicated with more variables than I thought. Actually William did sleep through the night by 8 weeks for 2-3 nights. Then it was never again. Dairy issues happened which = tummy trouble at night... then Christmas vacation happened with two weeks of go with the flow, whatever works.

But NOW we're home for three straight months before we live at someone else’s' house for the internship this summer, and I've decided that it is the opportune moment for what is commonly called sleep training. I know that to some, this has a negative connotation, but after talking to a variety of moms who had either done or not done sleep training, I decided that it was worth a try for me (plus this is my experimental child right??).

Anyway, this is night 6 of the "training" and while he is not continually sleeping through the whole night on his own, he does go back to sleep on his own almost right after he does wake up, AND he sleeps for a longer stretch without feeding now (8-9 hrs!). So I put him to bed for the night with a final feeding at 7:30/8pm and usually don't have to go in there anymore till 4:30am where he receives another feeding and diaper change for the final stretch of 3 hrs :) So I think I can say it's been successful for us, but as we start solids and he goes through teething and growth spurts, I'm sure changes will inevitably come and the victory will be short lived. All part of the parenting experience we signed up for :)

Look he survived his first night! (This is us that morning)

Then we also went for a walk (still sunny here for some reason...)

Then he survived the second night too :) which was actually the hardest.

On another note, Adam has decided to start comparing William to every baby even remotely close to his age. Cousin Alice is a whole TWO MONTHS or so older than William and is a roll'n, scoot'n, sitting girl these days. Daddy wants his boy to be achieving these skills overnight... I tried to explain the developmental difference. THEN we met a little girl a week YOUNGER than William who's roll'n, scoot'n and groov’n too... As we look at William who's wiggling on his back like he has for the past.. his whole life. lol. I have to admit that this made me have the same feeling, come on William, do a new trick! I know every baby is different, but it would be nice to see him satisfy his own need for entertainment soon. But I think I've settled on providing opportunities and knowing he'll get the hang of it when he has the right motivation.

Tis the Season

We had a great holiday season this year and enjoyed all the festivities! First off Adam was very relieved to have the semester over and to find out he received the A's he worked hard to get. Then we had our own little Christmas on the 19th just like we did last year :) Adam received a book he had asked for, a golfing glove, a picture I had painted for him, and a "hospital" mug (since he was always stealing drinks from mine). Adam surprised me with a work out video I had wanted and a very cute, black, pea-coat! William got some Thomas the tank engine movies for the future.
Anyway, after opening presents and going to church, we headed straight for the Remund Family Christmas party in Salt Lake and didn't even have to stop once for William (yay!).
Then we spent some time in Utah (my sister and I even tried on our old wedding dresses and cheer uniforms!)...

...flew on a nap-less flight with Ben and Maura to WA, and got to spend a whole week with Mom and Dad Brewer and ... everyone else! (luckily, after some grueling questions, security let me fly without my driver’s license!)Here's us on the plane!

It was great to see friends and family.

It was actually pretty comical when everyone was at the Brewer household for four days straight. Babies were napping (or crying) left and right, Sprout TV was on for everyone's entertainment, and we created a wind tunnel in the basement for baby sleeping purposes... lol. Golf and ping pong were played of course, and then some sicknesses seemed to end the fun just as it had begun :(
Actually, the day that Adam was home sick we got to go to the new Vancouver Library and check out their children's discovery floor (my own name for it) It was awesome! I wished William was old enough to apretiate it. They had a music game that had pipes inside and you'd put balls in and turn it and the balls would come out and hit the pipes and make certain notes... you just had to see for yourself...

Then, you could turn knobs to move 12 shapes that would make almost every letter of the alphabet! (I didn't know that before)

And.. well, lots more! But I'll jsut show some pics:

And then the day came when we had to fly back to Utah (this time I had had my driver’s license mailed to me so I could be confident in my departure plans).
William actually took a nap on the plane this time (under the seat in front of me (like some luggage!)), and was told he acted like a seasoned flier by our fellow passenger :)
Then it was some more family fun with the Remund side again where we got a whole basement to ourselves and some good relaxation and movie watching.

We even got to visit Grandma Brewer in the recovery center. And Willam enjoyed Grandpa's bed :)

Now we're home (in sunny Rexburg??) and Adam has started his new and final semester here at BYUI. We're going to try to savor our last few months here!