Baby Work Out World

Finley's settling into a nice sleeping pattern and routinely gets up between 7 and 8. Then, he can stand to be awake for about 60-90 minutes before it is back to bed for his morning nap. This time slot is probably my most favorite of the whole day. Finley is alert, interactive, smiley, and even tempered. He can be very independent if need be, though I am usually up in his face for most of this time since I love it so much. At our last mommy and me class (for now!), our teacher referred to entertaining babies this age much like circuit training in a gym or weight loss class. Instead of a treadmill, ab crunches, and weight machines--we've got an exersaucer, a bumbo, and the floor. Here are some shots of our "training" the past few mornings.

Station #1: Bumbo

Hm..how do I get this cow into my mouth?

Aha! Took me a few days, but I did it!

Station #2: Tummy Time

Like my tummy time quilt? My great aunt Sudie made it just for me!

Mommy lets me wear just a diaper in the morning lately, it's so freeing!

Station #3: Exersaucer

What are you looking at?

Station #4: Guitar Mat

I love this cushy mat, but not as much as I love my mommy!

Now...we can rotate through all these stations and maybe throw in some Super Baby time (I lay on my back with my legs tucked in and Fin flies on my shins). Super Baby time is great and gets me lots of smiles. The only trouble is the large risk of drool dripping down onto me, but it's worth it. I wish I had a picture of this, but I haven't figured out a way to snap one yet!

After all of this and a feeding, it's nap time! Who wouldn't need to snooze after all that?

Baby Buddies

Sunday night, Sangwha and Josh came over for dinner. Well, actually--they came over to make dinner :) Who could ask for better friends than that? We are baby buddies with these guys since Eliot is only 1 month older than Finley. Eliot is a cutie who is an active crystal ball of what's coming down the pipe for Finley--she grabbed her feet last night while on her back and Dan thought it was so adorable...no pressure Fin!

We put the little ones on the floor for some dual tummy time. They were somewhat interested in one another, but more in themselves...here they are nearly forehead to forehead looking in a mirror off to the side just out of the camera shot!

Eventually, they did bonk heads and it was time to pick them up. Later, Eliot found a familiar toy in our toy box and Finley wasn't so sure about whether or not he wanted to share it.

He was a good sport though and didn't try to fight her for it :) What a gentleman!

Forseter Fiesta!

Finley's Grandpa, GG (Grandma Gilda), and Aunt Ellie arrived after his bedtime Friday night from New York. Saturday morning, we broke the news to GG and Aunt Ellie that because Finley's napmaster habits are going strong (yet are new), we would be housebound for a while. Finley woke up and then went down for his morning nap before his Grandpa even came upstairs!! Luckily, he was pretty playful before getting sleepy again.

Aunt Ellie went out to brunch with a friend and everyone else had a tasty lunch of mommy-made split pea soup. After Finley woke up and had his own late lunch, we played for a while. Finley can't do too many tricks on demand these days, but he had lots of smiles to give while the rest of us did tricks to entertain him! He really likes being read to and we're pretty sure he's following along on each page :)

Soon we left for a nice, long walk around our neighborhood. Finley was awake for most of the trek and was happily looking around at all the sites. Luckily, Grandpa and GG love to look at (and comment on) houses as much as Dan and I do. It was great!

We came home and Aunt Ellie was back! She held onto the little guy for a while and quickly learned how important it is to switch arms back in forth when you hold him, if you aren't used to the weight--it can be quite tiring! We think Finley's tipping the scales around 15 lbs, but we'll find out for sure in a week when he goes for his 4 month doctor's appointment.

We hopped into the car for a venture to the newly arrived Buffalo Exchange in Davis Square. It's a hip, vintage, resale clothing store. Lucky for Finley, Dan wasn't too interested in looking through the racks either. He was curious and looking around for a while, but the inevitable happened...night, night, kiddo!

For Grandpa's birthday, we celebrated with a delicious Indian food dinner after Finley went to bed (7:30!) and then watched 500 Days of Summer. While we are housebound after 7pm these days, it is freeing to have Fin asleep in the early evenings so we can just hang out and relax.

Sunday morning was especially exciting because we got to try a breakfast product that was shown on our favorite weekend show, CBS Sunday Morning. Batter Blaster is organic pancake/waffle batter in a whip cream like aerosol can. Funky. GG quickly made nearly 30 pancakes and we feasted during Finley's morning nap. We all agreed that they were decently tasty, but the outrageous lack of clean up made them seem even yummier :)

When Finley woke up, everyone but me left for a walk (another nearly 50 degree day) and I got some precious time to myself to tidy up, relax, and write this blog. Since we don't live near either sets of our parents, it really is a treat to have a visit like this. We know Fin's new nap schedule is quite inhibiting, but Grandpa, GG, and Aunt Ellie seemed very understanding--phew!

One of the highlights of their visit was certainly that they brought Finley a gift that was sent to him from some wonderful family friends in the UK. How great is this pillow?? Thanks Dave and Gemma!!

Napping Against All Odds

So since the weekend, we've been working really hard to get Finley to sleep on a schedule. Not necessarily a clock schedule (always at 8:30am or 12:30pm, for example), but on a wakeful to pre-nap to nap schedule. Some days have been better than others, but overall it's going well. A big nap in the morning, a big one in the early afternoon, and a catnap in the early evening is the goal. The morning one is much easier to come by so after Finley's been up for an hour in the morning, I start to think about putting him down. Ideally though, he will last two hours...so each morning I try and stretch him a bit more. Today he woke up at 7am so 8:15 was my goal, but at 8:15 he was still pretty happy go lucky. Around 8:25, I decided we should make our way to the nursery since you don't want to miss his napping window and allow him to get overtired (trust me, it's not pretty).

We walk into his room and I go to draw the blackout shades and what starts to happen, a large banging noise that basically makes the windows rattle. I peer out the back window of Fin's room and see two excavator type machines three houses over working on a lot where a house was knocked down. Here's the view:

The sound was outrageous, not to mention the vibrations we could feel. Oh lord--who could sleep in this environment??? I paced around a bit holding the little guy, not sure whether to just let him try to sleep or if I should bag it and let him pass out on me on the couch.

I walked into our room and the study/guest room to see how it sounded in those rooms with the doors shut. Our room was a bit quieter but the study was much better so...now what? The kid can't (or shouldn't) sleep on the bed solo and the floor's pretty hard...ah ha, baby bjorn travel crib to the rescue!! A generous gift from Uncle Bernie and Aunt Annette that we planned to use in Prague this summer and any other trips, but not one I thought we'd use at home!

It's super easy to set up, I was able to do it while holding Finley! I did have to put him down to put the sheet on the mattress, but that was okay. I brought in his Sleep Sheep white noise machine and tossed that into the crib and then swaddled up the sleepy dude (one arm out now!). We bounced on the ball for a few minutes and I laid him down, fingers crossed and holding my breath. I tiptoed out only to see something else troubling--another excavator coming down our block on a flatbed! Where does it stop?? In front of our house in order to dig a huge trench for our neighbors (who are remodeling their house), yeah--now there is going to be loud banging on 2 sides of our house!! I mean, come on!

I sat on the couch and thought about the ridiculousness of this situation. Being in our house was like being inside someone's mouth during a dental procedure with the occasional earthquake aftershock.

But against all odds, Finley snoozed away...and woke up 1 hr and 45 min later! Way to go, buddy! We took a short walk to an outgoing mailbox when Finley woke up and I just had to get a close up of the giant, noisy mess up the street. Serious construction, huh? Glad we live a few houses away.

As it was time for his early afternoon nap, the excavator next door filled up a dump truck and they both rolled away. Phew! The stuff going on a couple houses down seemed to take a lunch break, so I figured that was the perfect time to get him down. Isn't he cute in his construction-themed outfit? I thought it was appropriate for today :) It's a bit wide for him, but for being around the house all day it was just fine.

Here's what he looked like 20 minutes into his nap...I know it was risky to go in and snap a photo (with flash!), but the blog demanded it!

Thanks again to Uncle Bernie and Aunt Annette, what would I have done without this crib?! If he can sleep through today's events, I feel much better about traveling with him. Maybe he's becoming a bit more flexible in his old age (3.5 months!).

A Playless-Date!

So, after much planning through email and text messaging--we had a playdate all set up for today! It has taken me a while to realize that moms cannot make plans at the drop of a hat, we need days even weeks to coordinate, reschedule, and then end up calling to say that we are running late. Plus, despite having a technically wide open schedule, some days do seem to work better than others...

Anyway, two school friends and their little boys were set to come over today at noon. Hooray! I cleaned and organized during Finley's 2.5 hour marathon nap this morning. I had some simple, yummy snacks out and managed to finish Finley's baby scrapbook up through last week! The little dude woke up about 11 and was more than refreshed, he was eager to play. I wondered if he knew what day it was after such a long nap, but perhaps he never knows what day it is. We played, ate, and eagerly awaited Baby Edward and Toddler Gregory's arrivals. They arrived about 12:15 and Finley greeted them and their moms at the door, but didn't have much else to offer...in fact, after about 10 minutes it was clear that he was ready for a nap (eyes at half mast, clingy, etc.). So off we went to his room where he proceeded to sleep for an hour and a half (only crying for 2 minutes around the 45 minute mark), which was the entire length of the playdate!! Gregory needed to go home for his nap and Edward was meeting a potential babysitter at his house. Everyone left and I as I was cleaning up the snacks, I suddenly hear Finley squeaking for food (a distinct sound)...I mean, did he purposely wait for the house to be boring again to wake up?? What a terrible host ;)

So I have no cute picture of Finley playing with or even near his friends, but here is what he was doing before and after the playdate.

Before...

...and after.

Yes, he's wearing a different onesie since for all our efforts--the kid pees through whatever he's wearing whenever he sleeps more than an hour...that's potent pee.

The Amazing Finley Forseter

As you may recall, Finley first rolled from his stomach to his back at his 2 month check up back in January. He would only do it occasionally after that and it took weeks for Dan to witness him doing it. We tried to catch it on video, but Fin simply wouldn't perform when we were taping. Here's a funny video from late January during one of many attempts to capture rolling on film:

Despite his tummy time strike lately, this morning (after a very rejuvenating night of sleep, yippee!) Finley was all about rolling over when Dan put him down on his stomach. Thankfully, after about 5 rolls, Dan grabbed the camera to catch the action that you can watch below!

Hooray for the Amazing Finley Forseter!!

Tummy Time Trials and Tribulations

So...the past couple of weeks, Finley has been less and less interested in spending time flat on his tummy. Which means no more rolling over and lots of tears when put face down. Tummy time is important as babies begin to gain strength in their neck muscles to hold up their heads and it sets to groundwork for rolling and crawling...which means we can't give up trying to get him to enjoy his time down there. He has been taking evening cat naps on his belly, but when he's awake he can be rather distraught.

We can do tummy time in a variety of ways in order to get him to relax and enjoy it:

1. flat on the floor

2. propped up on a bolster pillow or the boppy

3. on our thigh/leg

4. on our bed

He doesn't have to spend a long time there, but he needs to become more and more okay with it. A month ago, we could get at least 5 to 10 minutes but lately it's been like 2 or 3 :( The best thing I have learned is that he needs to be distracted from where he is, so I sing to him, read to him, and most successfully: take pictures of him. He likes to look at the camera, so snap away I say! Looking at the pictures below, you'd never know he was so against tum-tum time.

However, my most successful tummy time experiment happened this morning after giving him a diaper change. We have known for a while now that Finley LOVES being on his changing table, so why wouldn't he like being flipped upside down on it? See for yourself!

Pretty nice looking head and neck control, eh? Sweet! And as fate would have it, I typed most of this blog around 10:30am and when he woke up we tried some time on the changing table again and then I relocated him down onto the rug in his room and what did he do?? He enjoyed himself on his tummy for a minute or two and then rolled himself over!! I guess we're on the right track and our diligence is slowly paying off...