Emma at 8 Months

Typing up the title “Emma at 8 Months” just blew my mind a little bit.  Like, when did THAT happen?!  I mean I guess technically she’s not 8 months old for a few more days (on the 21st) but still.  She is such a sweet little girl and she’s learning to crawl right now.  She’s *almost* got it!  Still no teeth, despite me thinking about 5 times already that she’s teething, lol.

Going into motherhood, I felt very overwhelmed with the idea of putting Emma on a schedule.  Which is shocking most of all to ME because I love a schedule and I am a planner, but I just felt like there were so many other things that I needed to figure out that I just didn’t have the mental capacity to figure out a schedule.  Since I work from home, it was certainly a luxury that I didn’t have to figure this out to start with.  I would just let her sleep when she was tired and wake up when she woke up.  (You can read my previous two posts on a day in the life with Emma HERE and HERE if you want a glimpse at what we used to do and how things have changed.)  She was a decent sleeper at night and sometimes would sleep through the night (about 11pm-8am) but then she started waking up more and more.  I was getting increasingly more exhausted by those wake ups and knew something needed to change.

Honestly looking back on those schedule-less times feels very chaotic and I am very stressed out thinking about it, ha!  I am so happy with the schedule we are on now.

After doing my research on different schedules and what helps baby sleep through the night, I decided I wanted to give Moms on Call a try.  I started first by downloading their app from the app store…it is JUST the schedule but nothing else, just FYI if you get it. (PS, if you want to get the Moms on Call courses, which I will definitely use for any future babies and start right away, you can use code BESS20 for 20% off your online course order.  This is the first ever discount code they’ve ever given out!)

Another thing I want to mention is sleep training.  Please note, what works for me might not work for you and vice versa.  Every baby is different and it’s a big trial & error game!  I know there are a lot of polarizing opinions on sleep training and cry it out but I just want to be honest about what we’ve tried and what worked & didn’t work.  We did try the Taking Cara Babies “no cry” approach for weeks.  It did not work for Emma.  I think a large part of this is that she never took a pacifier, and that seemed really to be a key component for their approach.  We tried everything before getting to the cry it out approach but nothing else worked for us.  I know cry it out isn’t for everyone and that’s fine.

Around 4 months when Craig and I (and Emma) were all super sleep deprived and cranky, we decided to try the Ferber method of cry it out, which you can google but essentially, you put the baby down and you go in at specific timed intervals to try to soothe them (without picking them up) before leaving again.  What we found with this is that every time we would go in, it’s like it would reinvigorate Emma’s crying.  In the long run, she’d cry MORE and harder when we would go in at timed intervals.  For some babies this might not happen, but it did for Emma.

So when we started on the Moms on Call schedule, we did what’s called the extinction method of cry it out.  Which sounds so harsh and I was really nervous to try, but it worked the best and the quickest.  With the extinction method, you put the baby down and then you don’t go back in until morning (of course we have her in the Owlet and we can see her on the camera to make sure she’s okay) but if she’s just crying, we didn’t go in.  After a couple nights she was going down at 7:30pm and sleeping until 7am, when I would wake her up per the schedule (which I’ll share below).  That was about 4 weeks ago now, and she’s pretty much doing that every night.  Some nights she will wake up and cry for maybe 20 minutes or so and then she will put herself back to sleep.

She has learned to self soothe and in turn, mom & dad have been able to get more sleep too.  PRAISE.  You just cannot be the type of parent you need to be if you’re deathly tired.  At least, I can’t!  Sleep training is tough but I think in the long run, it’s worth it, and she still gives me a sweet smile in the morning!

We took the schedule from the app and for the most part, we follow it, but we don’t always do the baby food part of the schedule (which you’ll see in the app, but below just going to share what our schedule looks like without that in there since we only do that on occasion right now.). One thing that has helped a lot is I don’t let her take naps longer than 1.5 hours anymore.

OUR SCHEDULE

7:00am: Emma’s wake up time.  I have my alarm set for 6:55 just so I have time to get up and press “start” on the coffee machine before going into her room to get her.  We sit in her room and I nurse her.

7:30-9am: Play time

9am-10:30am: First nap of the day

11am: Feed

11:30am-1pm: Playtime

1pm-2:30pm: Second nap of the day

3pm: Feed

3:30pm-4:30/5pm: Play time.  Emma will often get tired earlier than 5pm so sometimes I put her down at 4:30, but I aim for 5pm.

4:30/5pm-5:30pm: Third nap of the day.  This one is shorter, only 30-45 minutes.  I always have to wake her up.

5:30pm-6:30pm: Play time

6:30pm: Bath time (*we do baths usually every other night)

7:00pm: Feed & start bedtime routine

7:30pm: Bedtime

7:00am: Wake up & repeat!

Things We’re Loving Lately

• Emma takes her naps and sleeps at night in her sleep sack.  We have the fleece one for colder nights and also have the cotton one for nights when it starts warming up.
• Tubby Todd:  We love the All Over Ointment (seriously a miracle product for so many issues) and their bath products & lotion.  Click this link to get 10% off your order at Tubby Todd.
• We are trying Baby Led Weaning to introduce Emma to solid foods and so we’ve been using our new high chair for that!  Emma loves to sit in it and I love that it’s pretty to look at and matches my home’s aesthetic 😉
• We love these bibs because they are dishwasher safe and also catch any dropped food in the pouch.  Plus they are cute!
• We started using our jogging stroller at 6 months (got clearance from the pediatrician) and we love it.

xo,

Bess