A very sleepy day for The Boy. The cold and/or the antibiotics must be wiping him out. He was grumpy and lethargic all morning for his grandmother, then actually took a 2 1/2 hour nap in his crib for his dad... He was asleep on his dad's shoulder when I got home from work. He woke up long enough for me to feed him (of course he decided to do that right when we got our take-out from Sabor Latino!), then fell asleep for another hour and a half (some of which was spent in his crib!). He woke up for a feeding and a couple of happy diaper changes, and is back asleep again...in his crib!
Jacob still loves his change table time. Lately he's been doing what looks like a horizontal tap dance routine...huge grin with arms and legs akimbo. He sure is entertaining!
I found a long white hair in my head over the weekend. Becoming a mom sure can age you!

Jacob's first Memorial Day!
He woke us up at 8:30 - he woke up a grumpy and hungry boy. We all hung out for awhile...then the fabulous Tim let me go back to bed for a little while. I was only planning to sleep for an extra half hour, but just as I was getting up, Jacob melted down, and the only way he was willing to sleep was in bed with me...so I got to sleep in 'til 11!! Yay Jacob!
Cheryl, Jeff, Davis & Soren are back from vacation, so Ellie the Dog finally got the romp and doggy love she's been missing for nearly two weeks, and Jacob got to spend some the quality time with his favorite neighbor on the back deck.
It took us nearly 2 hours to get Jacob to go down for his afternoon nap. After several heartbreakingly unsuccessful tries in his crib, we finally gave in and let him nap in his swing. He ended up sleeping for just under 3 hours, which made us extraordinarily late for dinner at Tim's parents' house. We're very lucky that they're so easy going.
Jacob is still quite congested, but he seems to be getting gradually better. He did spend some time yanking on his ears this evening, which makes me sad. I was hoping the antibiotics would have cleared that up by now.

The Boy is sick. We took him in to the doctor just as a precaution, knowing we were super cautious first-time parents and that it was probably just a cold that she couldn't do anything about. But it turns out that he actually has an ear infection. In both ears. So today he had another first - his first dose of antibiotics.

Perhaps it was the power of suggestion, brought on by a visit to the doctor, but I am now also quite sick. Or maybe it was bought on by having my sick son sleep several nights in a row propped up on my arm (so his sinuses could drain better). Whatever the reason, it's going to be a challenge to comfort my poor sick son tomorrow if I feel as bad as I do now.

Tuesday Jacob rolled over on his own for the first time. I knew it was only a matter of time. He is a very determined boy. He may have gotten that trait from his mother. :)

It sounds like Jacob is now determined to not sleep. I had better go spell his dad.

Long day today. Normally I get to lounge with The Boy on Mondays, but today we had a day-long Category Management mtg I had to attend, so I went Boy-less for 10 whole hours. On top of all that, I couldn't get his Grandma on the phone to tell me what very cute thing he was doing at that moment...serious Boy withdrawal.

Does every new parent break out in grins every time s/he looks at a picture of their child? I can be working myself into the foulest mood, and all I have to do is look at a pic of that silly Boy face and it makes me a happy girl.

Friday Jacob absolutely refused to sleep and let me work, so we took a field trip to my office to visit Shannon. Of course he fell asleep the minute we got in the car...but we managed to wake him up once we reached the office so he could turn on his patented Boy-ish charm.

He really wants to roll over. He's gone from just rolling onto his side to rolling onto his side with his face burried on the floor, just willing his body to follow. Hasn't happened yet, but it's bound to soon. Go Jacob!

Whoops! All this typing must have woken him up - I hear him crying. Mommy to the rescue!

A happy day for The Boy. Half of it spent with his maternal grandmother, the other half with his paternal grandmother. We haven't quite decided who is called "Grandma" and what the other one would be called. So now it's "Grandma" and "other Grandma".
He talks and talks and talks these days. He seems to be imitating our conversation, forming lots of vowels and leaving space for our responses. All signs point to this being a very sociable boy.

Nearly a week has passed since the last entry. It's hard working from home - any time I spend on the computer is doing work, often until late at night once The Boy is asleep. But if this is the only way I get to spend 2 extra days a week with him...bring it on!!
My first Mother's Day was wonderful! Jacob and his dad gave me books, music, chocolate and lots of smiles!! What a great gift.
The Boy's smile gets more and more beautiful every day. Tonight he was miserable..didn't want to eat, didn't want anything, just drooled, chewed on his fists and screamed bloody murder (we think he might be teething). I was at my wit's end...I sat him up and just looked at him...and he grinned at me! Yay Jake!

Day one back to work and Jacob doesn't seem any worse for it. He spent the day hanging out with his grandmother and dad - I think he enjoyed staring at different faces all day.
Right now he's asleep in his carseat, and has been since 7:15. We took him with us to pick up our dinner at Sabor Latino, intending to eat our dinner and bathe him before Gilmore Girls started so I could feed him while I watched it. But Jacob had other plans. No bath for him tonight! I wonder when he will wake up!
He'll be 12 weeks old tomorrow. 3 months. Where did all that time go?!?!?
We went through his clothes and put aside all the 3-6 month sleepers and onesies. He's into 6-9 month stuff already. Very sad - I really liked some of those clothes!
I guess we'll go to bed now - that will guarantee that he wakes up to be fed!

My first day of working from home and Jacob made it really easy! Lots of long naps for The Boy today...and we're paying for it dearly tonight. It took 20 minutes of tears and wailing to get him to sleep at 8:30...he slept for an hour and woke up alert and hungry. Now we've been listening to him cry for 1/2 an hour for his SECOND bedtime tonight. It's enough to make us cry. It did make me cry.
Ellie the Dog gets very worked up when Jacob cries. She comes to tell us about it, like "why don't you humans DO something about this???" Then she usually camps out in his room until he stops. For a dog who is afraid of kids, she sure does like this one!
Tomorrow is the big day - my first day back to work and away from Jacob. I think I will go cry with Jacob now.

Jacob fell alseep in his crib!! Jacob fell asleep in his crib!!

I finally read what Spock had to say (no, not the Vulcan...the other one) and even he said it was important for babies to learn to fall asleep on their own, even if it meant some crying. So we put him down, left his door open, and made lots of noise to let him know we were still around. It took about 15 minutes or more of crying, but he finally did fall asleep. Yay!! Yay!!

Now let's see how long this lasts. Tim and I are going to go sleep now while we can!

The last day of my maternity leave, and Jacob spent a good part of it asleep. Sigh....
He's getting really good with the rattle - can grab it on his own and holds onto it for a couple of minutes at a time.
Lots of smiles today. He can be such a little flirt. He continues to be quite smitten with the picture of a baby we taped to the underside of the shelf over the change table.
Jacob is on his way to being able to roll over. He spends a lot of time rolling onto his side now, especially when he is mad about having to be in his crib.
We packed him and Ellie up in the car and drove out to Burns Park (our old neighborhood) for a walk this evening. Ellie seemed to remember the front yard at the apartment. Boy oh boy do I wish we could afford to buy a house in that neighborhood. It feels so much cosier and kid-friendly than this one.
We followed the advice of all the baby books tonight and tried to put Jacob down for bed while he was still happy and awake but getting sleepy. Who are they trying to fool?? Jacob wasn't buying it for a minute. His uncle Robert took a turn trying to calm him down, and as usual, Jacob would fall asleep the second he hit Robert's shoulder. But as soon as he tried to lay him down in his crib...WHHAAAAAA! Robert gave up after about 1/2 an hour. Tim and I spent another 45 minutes picking him up and putting him down before he finally passed out in his crib. This is exhausting! I hope he sleeps for more than an hour before he wakes up again!

A fairly uneventful day in the life of The Boy. Slept late, woke up in time for The View (which my mom and I agree is much better when Barbara is on it). Had some quality time with his mobiles. He seems to be ok in his crib as long as he knows that we're not trying to get him to sleep. As soon as he catches wind of any sleep talk, he starts screaming.
We got him to sleep in his crib for a nap, but the phone woke him up after about half an hour, and Jacob just would not go back down. He would fall asleep on my shoulder, but every time I tried to put him in his crib, he would wake up with a start and scream. So....I did about an hour and a half worth of work on the computer with him on my arm. He even slept through doggy play time with Cheryl and Soren. How he can sleep through 2 crazy wrestling dogs but can't sleep quietly in his crib is beyond me. Maybe we should make it louder in his room! Hmmmm....
We took a chance this evening and took him out to Weber's with Tim's family to celebrate Tim's dad's birthday. Jacob was starting to melt down on the car ride there, and we were a little worried when we sat down and realized we were going to be blasted by the sounds of the world's worst hotel lounge blues band. But all it took was about 3 bars of "Sweet Home Chicago" and Jacob was out like a light. He's still asleep, in fact...strapped into his car seat on the dining room table. I think I will go crank up the music in the nursery before I put him to bed!

Day two of the blog, and week 11 of The Boy.
Making up for yesterday, I suppose, Jacob slept most of the day today. Perhaps Ellie The Dog was making up for yesterday too. She hardly barked at all, and only growled under her breath at the mail person. Good dog!
Part of the reason Jacob slept so well today is that we never put him in his crib. Mostly because of the disaster yesterday ended up being, we never took a chance on waking him up by putting him down, so he slept in my arms all day. Tim's too, actually. In fact, he started the whole thing. Jacob was getting fussy at the tail end of Tim's lunch (which he so kindly takes with us every day...YAY TIM!), so Tim decided to stretch his lunch an extra half-hour and rocked Jake to sleep in his arms. Poor sleepy Tim fell asleep too, and nearly missed his bus.
Once Jacob was asleep, I didn't want to risk waking him after only a half an hour, so I decided to sit down and watch All My Children with him in my arms. I figured he would wake up hungry soon and I could put him in his crib once he was done eating and then playing (after all, that is what the Baby Whisperer says to do!).
Well that crazy boy slept until 3, ate a quick meal, pooped, and promptly passed out again. I was in a quandry. Is it worse to let a baby stew in his own poop, or is it worse to wake up a really really tired baby to change his diaper. I thought about it for a couple of hours. Watched some really bad television. Watched Trading Spaces (Why can't I stop watching that show?!? What will I do once I have to go back to work?!?) Finally woke him up whenTim got home. He was a much happier boy after all that sleep.

Every day he seems a little more alert, a little more like a little person instead of a little baby. Today he grabbed one of those toy key rings and shook it. Seems like a little thing, but it was a big step for him. He GRINNED at his dad when he came home for lunch today. What a wonderful feeling.
Well, it's 11:00 and Jacob seems to think it's eating time again, so off I go.