Updates

The time change transition is going really well.  We are 15 minutes away from changing their bedtime, so by Sunday when we suddenly change the clocks they will go to bed at 7 pm like they always have.  Right now they are going to bed at 6:15.  It seems to be going better than last fall.  Of course Chris and I are completely off right now with them doing everything an hour earlier.

Charlotte is walking around the house all the time now.  She is starting to prefer walking to crawling and can walk from her bedroom out to the living room without falling down.  She loves to carry all her toys from place to place.  Cooper is starting to walk from one piece of furniture to another or to a toy.  I'm still not used to seeing them walk all over!!

Charlotte is really starting to jibber/jabber.  It's adorable because she's also adding in tone of voice.  She really watches our mouths and lips to try and mimic sounds.  We've been working on the oh part of uh-oh.  Right now they both purposely drop something and look at us and say uh-uh-uh-uh.

We have been working on taking turns and sharing.  Charlotte loves to share things with Mommy and Daddy, but not so much Cooper.  We'll say, mommy's turn and she'll give us whatever she's holding and then we say, Charlotte's turn and she'll take it back.  However, if we give the item to Cooper and say, Cooper's turn, she yells and grabs it away from Cooper and then resumes the taking turns game with us.  At least it's a start!

The suggestions from the No-Cry Sleep Solution seem to be helping Cooper sleep better.  Cooper no longer nurses all the way to a deep sleep, which helps when he wakes at night and isn't really hungry.  He is able to full back asleep with a few pats on the chest or back.  He also prefers to fall asleep on his own in his crib.  Sometimes it just takes a few pats on the chest, other times he will just fall asleep. 

The best part is that we have reduced the number of night wakings.  At the worst he was waking every hour from 9 pm until 5 am and eat every.single.time.  Since we would co-sleep, I was getting some sleep but I was still groggy--not to mention this can't be healthy for Cooper either.  Now he wakes at 11 pm and 5 am (or if I'm lucky 1 am and 5 am), eats, pulls off and goes back to sleep.   The last two nights he has slept through the night (first since he was 4 months old) and only woke up at 5:00-5:30 am to eat!  I still co-sleep for part of the night, but we are both actually sleeping!!

I'm not sure it's shortening the amount of time it takes to put him to bed, but we're being patient.  Hopefully in a few months it won't take 45 minutes-1.5 hours to get him to bed for the night.

I have to say that I love co-sleeping when we are both sleeping.  He loves to cuddle next to me.  His latest thing is to put his head on my pillow and then his hand on my cheek and sleeps all night cupping my face in his hands.  I love it!  (Even though I'm hoping in a few months he will sleep through the night consistently and we can  transition him out of our room and into his own when we move to a bigger place.)