09.15.2011 Evan's sleep and milk odyssey 2

Evan's not been eating dinner very well lately.  We've tried giving him new foods each of the last few days but he seems uninterested in them.  Last night, I steamed some sea bass with carrots, peas, sweet potato, tofu, and a bit of unsalted butter.  Then pureed it.  He didn't like it and so I tried quickly steaming egg cake for him but he only finished about 3/4 of that.  He did have some steamed cauliflower but that's hardly enough.  So i gave him some milk, but he didn't drink much (maybe 2-3 oz) of that either.  This morning, he woke up just before 7 and although I tried to coax him back to sleep, and he did lie down on the bed with me, he never did fall asleep.  I even placed him back in his own crib (he didn't protest as long as I was sitting next to the crib in the glider chair) and read him some fun facts about animals.  He laid quietly but kept his eyes open.  I had to leave by 7:40 so hopefully the grandparents were able to coax him to sleep a little longer.  He did poop again (i didn't know) when I was trying to read him to sleep, so maybe that's what kept him from falling asleep quickly. 

Other than the meal thing (i'm going to try more finger foods tonight), he's been an extremely good baby, especially when it comes to sleeping at night.  Last night after the struggles with food, I gave him a bath and right afterwards put him in the crib with his tube of toothpaste (to play with).  He was wide awake but did not protest or whine at all.  After reading a book to him for about 10 minutes, he drifted off to sleep (it was only about 8:40 pm). 

09.12.2011 Evan's sleep and milk odyssey

Yesterday morning, Evan woke up around 7:20 a and was clearly still sleepy.  I put him on our bed and looked through one of his favorite books (The Moon Shines Down).  He tossed and turned a bit, but was clearly sleepy and did not pay much attention to the book.  In fact, he slapped at it, turning one page to next without really stopping to look at the pictures.  It took me a while to realize that he wanted to move the book out of the way.  When I did that, he quieted down and fell asleep (8am), and slept for another 50 minutes or so.  Having gone to bed at 8:50 pm the night before, this meant he had about 11.3 hrs of sleep, so he was in especially good mood and spirit when he finally woke. 

I put him in the high chair in the kitchen and warmed up some milk (organic whole, not formula) in his yellow straw sippy cup.  Then I gave him the bottle and had him hold it himself while he watched me cook some eggs.  He started drinking the milk and I on purposely did not look his way too often.  When i did look to see what he was doing, he was focused on drinking the milk while following my moves with the egg and spatula.  And he was drinking the milk fast!  Before I knew it, he had finished half, then a few minutes later, almost the entire amount that I had poured (~ 7 oz).  I was so ecstatic because for the past month or so, he had pretty much stopped drinking formula (and then regular milk as well).  In the end, he drank about 6 oz in the morning.  Then for lunch, I stirred about 3 oz milk with rice cereal, which he happily ate up (as long as I gave him something to grab as well like pieces of watermelon or mango).  And at 3pm (after a nap and 4th visit to Happy Hollow park & zoo), he had a serving of vanilla yogurt for babies.  And for dinner, he had about 1.5 egg and silken tofu steamed together (carrots and sweet potato on the side), so he basically had about 20-oz milk-equivalent, so plenty of calcium for once.  This morning, he had about 4.5 oz of milk, so not a bad start either.

Last night after his bath at around 8:30 pm, he didn't seem too sleepy yet but was not very attentive to the book we were going through.  After about 10 minutes, he crawled to the side of the crib and touched it, almost like he was signaling that he wanted to go in.  This was the firs time he had ever done that and I wasn't entirely sure what to do.  But since he had been sleeping so well lately, I thought I would try putting him in the crib and see what he does.  If he started crying, I would just take him out and hold him a while till he calmed down and slept.  I picked him up and slowly put him into the crib.  He did not cry even though he was wide awake.  He did not get up and stand holding on to the crib panel either.  He was on his tummy or side, one thumb in the mouth, and moving around the crib as if he was looking for a comfortable position.  He did not fall asleep rightaway.  I didn't give him much attention either, but instead I opened a book (herbivore mammals) and started reading on the rocking chair.  He tossed and turned for quite a while, I was afraid he would get up, but he didn't!  After about 10 minutes, he finally stopped moving about and fell asleep.  I gave it another few minutes and then put a blanket on him and turned out the light.  Hopefully this will become the norm and not just an aberration. 

09.07.2011 Evan's Caterpillar earth mover

Evan's favorite toy right now is a Caterpillar earth mover truck that he picked out while roaming the aisles of Costco.  At first he was a little scared of the loud noise (of the simulated engine), but soon grew to love its vibrations and moving action.   One button makes the truck move/roll. The other button makes the truck yell out "Move that dirt!" and other hard-rock-like music, he loves it!

09.05.2011 Rancho San Antonio

This must be like the 10th time we've taken Evan to Rancho San Antonio... today (9/5 Labor Day) was extremely crowded as everyone piled into the park on the last unofficial day of summer (before schools everyone reopened).  We saw a deer this time, just before arriving at the farm, which was closed today.  But we still saw a calf, goats, sheep, and piglets.  Some pics below (for all, go here).

He ate really well today, downing tomatoes, cheese, egg, mango, carrots, etc:

 

Here's a video of the animals at Racho San Antonio:

09.03.2011 Happy Hollow Park & Zoo, visit #3

About a month ago, we took Evan to Happy Hollow Park & Zoo in San Jose for the first time.  We got there at around 12 noon and it was pretty crowded already.  But more importantly, it got too warm too quickly and before we saw very much, Evan was sleepy and tired.  We did get to see some wild animals and rode in the carousel and thought it worthwhile to come back, but wasn't overly thrilled with the first visit.  A few weeks after that, we went for the 2nd time, this time getting there before it opened, just before 10am.  This second time we had much more fun as we discovered the farm animal part of the park as well as the slides.  We got something to eat from the cafeteria (not too expensive, esp with 10% member discount, but not great food) and so had lunch there.  Afterwards, we went next door to the Japanese Friendship Garden and all took a nap on one of the benches.  On Saturday (9/3), we went for the 3rd time.  We saw more wild animals this time as some of the exhibits reopened (leopard, capybara, etc).  Here are some pics from the 3rd visit:

 

More photos here.

09.04.2011 Evan crawls down from bed

While climbing up steps is fairly easy to learn, climbing down is a different story, especially if the step is fairly high, like from bed to floor.  I had showed him a few times by nudging his behind to the edge first and then helping him land on his feet but didn't know when he would actually try it.  Today, he wanted to get down and made a move that showed that he was thinking about how to go down and apparently remembered the previous lessons and so proceeded to move his body to parallel with the edge of the bed, then tentatively lowered his feet down.  He was quite pleased with himself for being able to do that.. it was like a new discovery and new-found freedom!  The video shows his 3rd or 4th attempt: