mixed bag of updates

I have a headache. I think the headache is partly due to caloric withdrawal as I'm back on the wagon, the day after Christmas in efforts to drop the baby weight. The headache is probably because my body is expecting thousands of calories of cookies, pumpkin pie and chocolate to be ingested, as that seemed to be the norm the past few days. Dieting is the worst.

I do think I've tapped into something though. Originally I tried to go back to Weight Watchers because I've had some luck with that in the past but attending meetings with the little man proved to be quite difficult so I abandoned ship. I was down, but not out. I thought about joining weightwatchers.com but couldn't bring myself to pay for the service without the benefit of some little old lady weighing me in, making me feel like crap if I gained (I'm serious that's about 90% of the reason that silly plan works for me.) But upon a friend's recommendation I found www.sparkpeople.com which seems to offer all the same things as weightwatchers.com but its free, and that friends means the price is right. So I'm giving that a go. Before Christmas I lost about 4lbs using it for only a few days, then gained 2 back with the holiday gorging, but I'm back on point. Send me strength. This mommy has some baby belly to drop.

As for the sleep situation - still no sign of sleeping through the night, but I do need to continue to give Henry credit where its due. The boy is consistent. He goes to bed really easily around 7pm (knock on wood, jinx, jinx, jinx) and seems to be able to sleep for a good 5 hours. After that he manages 3 or 4 hour stretches, which aren't bad. Really. Its the 60-90 minute stretches that make me want to put a gun to my head. Three hours is a full REM cycle, which is pretty much the equivalent to a full night sleep in mommy jargon.

On the subject of sleep a bit of advice to any mom out there - ignore your friends when it comes to discussing sleep. A lot of my friends with babies Henry's age have had the delirious pleasure of a full night (as in 11 hours) of sleep. It is wonderful, sincerely it is. But it is only when I think about them and wonder about Henry that I start to get frustrated. Don't do it. Don't compare other children to yours. Henry will sleep through the night when he's able. Until then we are bonding hardcore at 4am and I'm grateful for it.

Speaking of bonding and all things baby developmental, a friend of mine recommended this book and I got it for Christmas. Its called Bright From the Start: The Simple, Science-Backed Way to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind from Birth to Age 3. I have to say there are A LOT of baby books out there and most of them I've skimmed and taken with a grain of salt, but this book is fascinating. I'm devouring it. The book really focuses on the science of the child brain and how to best nurture its development. Any new parent will agree there seems to be a silent pressure to buy into the world of baby products, all of which claim to enrich your child and prepare him or her to succeed in life. This book really seems to get to the heart of it and tell you what works and why. I find it really refreshing and even a little relieving, because of the clarity it provides. So many sources talk about what babies should be doing developmentally at any given point in their young lives. This book talks about our roles, as parents, in that development and what simple things we can do (without buying into all the baby junk out there) to best engage and even educate him or her... which quite frankly at this age has been quite the mystery to me. Highly recommend.