I have now officially had a baby for the same length of time it took to grow said baby. Nine months in, nine months out. And my least favorite part, “it took you 9 months to gain the baby weight, so give yourself 9 months to lose it.” Bah. It took me 9 months of sitting on my butt eating french fries to gain this weight, it’s going to take a lot more than 9 months of sitting on my butt eating french fries stroller workouts to lose it. Especially since I only started working out at 6 months postpartum and only SERIOUSLY working out in the last three weeks. I still somehow managed to lose 35 lbs and am only 2 lbs away from what my doctor has listed as my starting weight. Which means I have 12 lbs to go to get into my old jeans and 32 lbs to go to get down to a weight I’ll be happy with. I’m not even going to tell you how much I’d have to lose to get back to my lowest college weight since it’s both ridiculous and impossible. All I want is to not look like I ate the fifth bridesmaid when I’m in my friend Erin’s wedding in September.

Baby Evan on the other hand, may actually have eaten a member of our play group without my noticing. His official weigh in is on Monday but I’m betting he’s around 24 lbs and OMGwhatareyoufeedingthisbaby?? ounces. I’m expecting a very interesting conversation where I explain to the pediatrician he’s not really eating solids yet and the pediatrician calls me a liarface, but I plan to bring some Cheerios along to prove it. Then again, Baby Evan did manage to eat most of the hummus I gave him today, so our attempts at real food must be starting to work. Apparently I was just going about it all wrong , trying to get him to eat normal things like applesauce. I should just start offering the most obscure foods available. Tabouleh? Caviar? Kimchi? Lukefisk? Ok, maybe not those, but I think I’ll try some avocado and sweet potato oven fries this week.

Development-wise, I think we’re right on track. Besides the pulling up and cruising, he’s started letting go and E SWEARS the baby even took a step the other day. I didn’t see it though, so it doesn’t count. Just like E never hears Baby Evan say “Mama” so we haven’t written down “first word: Mama” in the baby book. Actually, the whole first word milestone is total bullshit. He says “haaaiii” when we say “hi”. He says “mama mama” and “daaad” but just at random times. His babbling has increased to multiple syllables that SOUND like sentences but he’s definitely not using actual words. I guess “first word” really means “the first time he says a word and actually knows what it means”, in which case I think it’s going to be kitty. Or maybe Brutus. Actually, at this point it may be TOUCHDOOOOOWN!!! but I’ll explain that later.

Milestone Chart from BabyCenter

Mastered Skills (most kids can do)
• Stands while holding onto something – All the time
• Jabbers or combines syllables – Yes
• Understands object permanence – Boy does he ever. Take away anything he wants (power cords, balls of dog hair, the cat) and he’ll scream for it back. Hiding it behind your back doesn’t work anymore either.

Emerging Skills (half of kids can do)
• Cruises while holding onto furniture – He can make it from the bookcase to the radiator to the ottoman to the couch to the rocker to the chair to the post to the highchair to the dog and back again.
• Drinks from a sippy cup – Sort of? He knows HOW to drink, I just don’t know if he does. He has a sippy of water he loves to put in his mouth and chew on but it’s impossible to tell how much is leaking and how much is getting swallowed.
• Eats with fingers – Yes, he is capable of putting food in his mouth with his fingers.
• Bangs objects together – I haven’t seen him do it.

Advanced Skills (a few kids can do)
• Plays patty-cake and peek-a-boo – No patty-cake, but he’ll play peek-a-boo if you put something over his/your head.
• Says “mama” and “dada” to the correct parent – No. Damnit.

It’s sort of terrifying to think we’re 3/4 of the way to a year already and in a couple months I’ll have to start thinking about what to do for my KID’S BIRTHDAY PARTY. Maybe we’ll just send him to Grandma’s and go with a beer and spa treatment theme.

At least he's finally starting to earn his keep around here.

If only the food could be absorbed through his head we'd be all set with the eating.

OH DID I FORGET TO MENTION THE TEETH? Top and bottom now, with the next two top ones about to pop.

Zombie Baby!

Ok, I'll look cute for your website photos...

...but don't forget who's in charge around here!

ONE HOUR.

One hour is exactly how long I made it on my first attempt at night weaning before I gave up and nursed the baby. Although by that point he was so far gone into angry exhausted screaming mode that even a few minutes at the boob didn’t help and he kept whimpering long after he was sound asleep. It was sucky and awful. I certainly didn’t get any more sleep than I normally do and poor E got significantly less. But even so, I think it was a success.

Up until now I have never been interested in what the experts call “sleep training”. I believe forcing a baby to self-sooth and sleep through the night at a young age is a modern Western ideal and biologically unreasonable at only a few months old. But you know what else is unreasonable? Nine months of being exhausted. Nine months of being the only person doing the night feedings. NINE MONTHS of feeding on demand despite my nagging suspicion he’s not actually hungry at all. Even the anti-sleep trainers all end their advice with the little disclaimer that being a good parent is really more important than how you put a baby to bed. Nothing about spending all my night feedings resisting the overwhelming urge to just shake the baby off, leave the room and walk out of the house forever makes me a good parent. Being too tired during the day to play does not make me a good parent. Using up every ounce of patience in my body before 6 am and spending the rest of my day seconds away from yelling does not make me a good parent. It also makes me a lousy wife and partner, especially because my other nighttime routine is thinking over and over how much I resent being the only one who feeds the baby and therefor the only one who gets up with the baby. The little ball of resentment and anger is like a popcorn kernel in my tooth that I focus on and pick at and poke until it’s sore and red and all I can think about. Getting divorced simply because I’m breastfeeding definitely does not make me a good parent. And so, night weaning has begun.

Baby Evan has always been a pretty good sleeper. He transitioned easily from co-sleeping to the crib and from napping in the swing to napping in his room. Our established night time routine of bath, boob, book and bed is successful and usually all he needs to fall asleep is a few minutes of cuddling and rocking. He often wakes up, finds his blanky, rolls over and goes back to sleep on his own without needing to be soothed. But the night feedings are frequent and constant, every 2 or 3 hours all night long, mostly due to habit not hunger. My ultimate goal is to get down to ZERO feedings between 7 pm and 7 am but for the next few months I’d settle for one 2 am feeding and someone else to rock him back to sleep every few nights. Sunday was our first try and it went like this: Baby goes to bed, Baby wakes up wanting to eat, E tries to get him back to sleep with absolutely no luck, I try to get him back to sleep with no luck, consider letting him cry it out for a few minutes but can’t bring ourselves to do it, give up and let Baby nurse for less than 90 seconds, baby passes out, wakes up again, cries for two minutes, passes out again.

The whole thing took an hour and a half but then he slept from 1 am to almost 7 am without a sound. He woke up the same happy, smiley baby he does on the nights we don’t have an EPIC BATTLE and has been fine all day. No signs of permanent psycological or emotional damage. I think he might be nursing a little more than usual – or maybe I’m just offering more often because I’m afraid I starved him last night – but that just means he’ll be less hungry tonight.

I’m giving it a week. A week to get to a point where I can wake up rested and refreshed and feeling like a normal person instead of a grumpy monster. If he’s still not even close to a full night’s sleep by then I’ll take a break and go back to surviving on naps and caffeine for a while until I can work up the energy to try again. Or maybe I’ll just be exhausted for the next five years. That sounds like fun too.

While going through the toys and stuffed animals my mother had saved from my own childhood, I came across something that I think TOTALLY explains my current obsession with babywearing and baby carriers.

It's a baby backpack! For babies! To carry baby dolls!

So he wasn't as OMGSOEXCITED! about the backpack as I was, but he didn't mind posing for the pictures either. Hopefully in a couple months he'll actually like playing babywearing. Then his dolly can be handy any time he feels the need to pull her hair out with his teeth.

And here’s one more vintage photo of my aunt “wearing” me when I was a baby. It’s really a frame carrier, like the one I have in the guest room closet just in case we every decide to go hiking (AHAHAHAHAHAHA), but everyone in my family seemed to like it. My dad said he “wore” my brother all the time but I couldn’t find any pictures. That’s what happens when you’re the third child.

We were at Old Sturbridge Village. Bonnets were so hot right then.

Oh wait, I almost forgot this:

Overalls: Daddy's Baby carrier.

Check out my new BabyHawk, a Christmas present from my wonderful husband.

Blue side! With a pocket! I know the beige straps aren't the most practical for keeping clean but I wanted something neutral that wasn't black.

Back carry! I even got him on by myself.

The only drawback to a back carry.

And this is the gorgeous pagne my sister sent me from Africa. You wear it by just wrapping it around you, folding down the top and tying the bottom.

The instructions my sister sent me for the pagne.