11 months: Talking Time

This week has been pretty exciting.  Miles is on the brink of talking.  He's so close.  He's said "Mama" reliably a few times today.  He also seems to be saying ball when referring to the new balls we bought for him.

Miles is eating a lot more.  He's also switched over to whole milk from formula.  Big developments!

Sleep training has been going pretty well.  He's usually asleep in 5-15 minutes after we put him in his crib at nap time or bed time.  He still cries before falling asleep but he falls asleep relatively easily and stays asleep for longer periods of time.

Here is our nearly one year old this week:

"So Big"

Loves selfies, just like his mama.

Pantsless in the evenings.
This is the life.

He's watching TV.
I'm watching him watch TV.

New Haircut

Hug, hug zebra.

Just walking across the quad.

Future college student. Hanging on the lawn.

Playgrounds feature pretty heavily in Miles' life right now.

This ball may be a bit too big.

These are just about right.

Bike safety is super important.

YOU wear the helmet now.

Bonus Video

Our internet was slow over the weekend so I couldn't upload this video.  But it's pretty cute.  So you all get a bonus update this week:

11 Months: Learning to sleep

We are currently sitting in our bedroom, down the hall from Miles' room, listening to him cry.  Sleep training.  It has gone better than I anticipated.  Thinking of Miles as a persistent and stubborn boy, one who works hard to solve problems, no matter how silly (like pushing the recycling bin all the way across the kitchen), I thought for sure this boy would be crying for up to four hours the first night of training.  But he cried only one hour.  And his night wakings and naps have lasted 10 minutes or less, sometimes even less than a minute.  
What is sleep training?  We're really training Miles to learn to go to sleep by himself.  Without rocking, shushing, bouncing, sucking or feeding.  Since the day he was born he has never gone to sleep on his own.  Not once.  And in the last month or so, putting him to sleep has become an ordeal.  It takes longer and longer to rock him to sleep.  He would either fight to stay awake while we were rocking him or wake up crying as soon as his head hit the mattress.  This was true for both naps and night time wakings.  He would wake at night up to four or five times.  I had originally thought it would be fine to bring him into our bed around 4 or 5am, especially since we coslept for the first seven months.  But 4 or 5am turned into 3am and then 2am and more recently, 1am.  
So we're using the Ferber method of sleep training, something I swore up and down before having a kid that I would never, ever do.  We do a nighttime routine: bottle, bath, book.  Then we kiss him, tell him goodnight, put him in his crib, and leave the room.  At which point he starts crying.  He cries on and off for a while, an hour the first night, 45 minutes the second night, 20 minutes tonight.  And we check in on him at set intervals.  The first night it was at 3 minutes, 5 minutes, 10 minutes and then 15 minute intervals until he's asleep.  Each night we lengthen the time before we check in on him.  And each night he's gotten to sleep much faster and easier.  When we check on him, we're not picking him up or making him stop crying.  We're letting him know that we're around and didn't abandon him.  We're in the room for less than a minute.  
I didn't like this method before we had sleep problems because of all the crying.  Some people imply that you can permanently damage a kid's psyche because you're abandoning them.  You're breaking the trust cycle that he's built.  He used to think he could cry and we would come.  Now he cries, and no one comes.  But the lack of sleep is weighing on me hard.  The last few weeks have been brutal.  Absolutely brutal.  I feel like a zombie at work, grasping for words that slip away like sand between my fingers.  I'm grumpy, short of patience and generally fatigued.  I've gained weight and can't seem to pull myself out of bed to exercise before work.  Basically, it's gotten real bad at the Kennedy/Carscadden residence.
And in the end, I don't think Miles is being damaged by this process.  During daytime hours we respond swiftly to his every complaint.  Even at night we respond to his cries, just on a set schedule.  Ultimately, the little boy has to learn how to go to sleep and now seems like the right time.  A doctor friend of mine at work says that she still drives her nearly four year old around in the car EVERY night to get her to sleep.  That was a good dose of perspective just as we were embarking on this sleep training journey.
Here are the pictures and videos of our sleep master this week:

Cat fishing... again.

I'll be cute.  Can I play in the trash now?

Two scoops of double fudgerooni in a cone, please.

No biggie.  Just trying to jump off this stair.
I don't quite get gravity yet.

Hey. It's nice outside. Let's sit on our stoop.

Sleepy guys. Sleepy zebra.

Hanging out with the neighbors.
Julie and Frankie.

11 Months!

It's spring time!

A little dubious of the shorts.

Hanging on the corner.

The cherry blossoms bloomed!

And then fell off the trees.

Exploring.

More exploring.

Heading off on an exploration.

He's gone too far.  Returning from his exploration.

I swear I wasn't torturing the cat.

This would've been a good picture...
if it hadn't been blurry, Lucas.

This is sometime between 8p and 1030p on
Wednesday night... Miles was not interested in sleep.
Sleep training can not start soon enough.
Update on that process next weekend.

Bath time!  Spiky hair time!

Back to his old tricks.

What? They don't belong ON the shelf, Mom.

Ah, so much better. Someone is always putting them BACK on the shelf.

This is my family.

Sunshine.

Cutie Pie.

10 Months: Our little big boy

I turned 31 this week.  I chose to age gracefully by making Miles look older too.  He got his first haircut.  After his locks fell away I regretted my decision.  He looks like a real little boy now.  Not so much a baby.  But the haircut has grown on me and I think he's maintained his super cuteness.

before

after

before

after

before

during

Miles now gives hugs! The sweetness of this is just overwhelming.  He will walk back and forth between Lucas and me giving hugs (mostly in the evening).

Mom hugs!

Dad hugs!

We went to Easter at the Carscadden's house last Sunday.  There was bubble fun and good food and sick people and putting babies in boxes.  It was great!

Bubbles!

He seriously stood like this watching Jim
make bubbles for a half hour.

A family that loves bubbles together, stays together.

The Carscadden Men.

Miles has met little milestones this week.  He can place an object in a bucket, he can give you an object and let go of it into your hand, he can throw an object forward and he can meaningfully point at things (as opposed to aimlessly pointing).  Then, or course, he made a big leap forward in his mobility: he climbs stairs.

Miles also went to the baseball game this week.  Let's Go O's!

Brooks and Miles hold hands at the game.

I want out!

Okay, I'll eat a french fry and watch the game.

Cutest baby at the game, hands down.

Here's the rest of this weeks' pictures of our little boy:

I think I'll just dip this strawberry in the cottage cheese.

I'm just reading a book.
All by myself.
I don't know if you heard, but I'm a big boy.

Big boys climb on diaper boxes
so they can reach the cat.

Cute little man, hiding under the water table.

Miles' first carousel ride.

Wheeee!

Cute!