the jellyball family blog

Click on the image below to view my conversation with Caleb this morning on who's coming home. Plus, get a peek at his super wicked bedhead.

Dada on Vimeo

The infamous video of Caleb zerberting... himself. And also blowing raspberries.

Caleb zerberts himself on Vimeo

Hold onto your diapies! Click below to view a short clip of Caleb lovin' the swings.

(You can tell he's smiling by the size of his dimples.)

Swinging at the park on Vimeo

I realized that I made this video a few weeks ago and never posted it. Ha, bonus video! Two in one day!

Here is a little compilation of our little man laughing. In the first clip, I discovered that Caleb found Mommy stubbing her toe to be hiiii-larious. And in the second clip, we are playing a game that Papa invented called the "BZZT finger", where you convince the unsuspecting child that he somehow has electric fingers. And he believes it!

Caleb's got the giggles on Vimeo

I've been told that I haven't been posting enough video footage lately (sorry, been lazy), so here is a very special instructional video from our now-expert pole dancer.

Caleb's Pole Dancing 101 on Vimeo

I cheated a little with the last scene - he's not actually pole dancing there, but he is standing up against what Luc affectionately (and in this case, appropriately) refers to as the "stripper podium". It is NOT a stripper podium, it's a funky coffee table. In a former life, it was a mannequin stand at an Eaton's department store, which I bought for $20 when the store was closing and liquidating all its assets. And for the record, no one has ever stripped on it. (At least in this household.)

Further evidence that our boy has the biggest heart of gold: he's learned to share his food. In the past few days, he's shared all his most treasured finger foods - his Cheerios, his puffed wheat, and his Baby Mum-Mums.

Click below to see Caleb sharing his lunchtime cracker with Luc.

Caleb shares his food on Vimeo

Motherhood is full of so many wonderful, precious moments, which is made only sweeter by the fact that there are dark moments as well. In the first two weeks of Caleb's life, there were days where I cried all the time. There were moments, in the dead of the night, where I was so tired and worn out that I felt overwhelmed by the fact that my patience was wearing thin combined with the accompanying guilt of being exasperated at this helpless little being.

Those are the moments when don't particularly like yourself and you don't feel like you're being the parent you thought you'd be. You wish you could be stronger, more patient, and more of a trooper. You wish you didn't feel so selfish about wanting to have a few moments to yourself - maybe be able to eat when you want, pee when you want.

There are moments where you are so desperate for sleep or a break that you find yourself making deals with the devil in your head.

We're about two weeks into the process of trying to institute better sleep habits for Caleb. Like most new parents, we fell into a pattern of habits that were both convenient and that worked in a reliable way. Parenthood seems to be all about the bag of tricks - once you find something that works, the hell with anything else - why fix it if it ain't broke and works just fine. This is how parents end up on the BabyCenter forums at 3am, looking for help on how to get their kids to sleep somewhere other than the bouncy seat or the swing.

Our dirty little habit was nursing to sleep. Caleb would literally go from happy-go-lucky, to hungry, to fast asleep. He didn't have the "drowsy" stage that all the sleep experts talk about. He literally just went from happy to boob, and then off to Dreamland. This always worked great for us because there would be no fuss, no muss - and most of all, no crying.

Caleb is almost nine months old and I know we will be weaning him soon. I've been dreading this for so many reasons - but the scariest part was knowing that nursing was so tied into our daily routine of naps and bedtime. I knew that we'd have to work towards better sleep habits, not just because of the weaning, but also because I don't want to be the only person who can put Caleb to sleep. I want him to be able to put himself to sleep, and I know it can be done because all the sleep books talk about these mythical babies who are put in their cribs and happily go to sleep on their own. This, to me, is the Holy Grail of Sleep.

We've been making some good progress. I don't win every day - some days, after an hour or two of rocking and singing and soothing, I nurse him and within minutes he's asleep. Other days, he falls asleep without nursing, and I feel accomplished.

The last few days have been a little rough. He hasn't been napping well or sleeping well, and there's been a lot of crying - day and night. He's been going to bed at 8 or 9pm, and then waking up for an hour or two around midnight. Last night he was up from midnight until 2am, and again from 5am to 7am. While he was awake, he was crying almost non-stop.

I rocked him in my arms, I sang to him, I even nursed him. More than a few times. All the hopes that he would just go back to sleep. An hour - even two - can seem like an eternity when it's 2am, your baby is fed, changed, and still crying.

With about four hours of sleep under my belt, all my patience and perserverance seemed to evaporate into thin air. While we normally only nurse three times a day, I've already nursed Caleb four times since midnight. One could say I've not only fallen off the sleep wagon, I've rolled off the road, into a ditch, down a hill, and into a river.

And somehow, you just get through it. This morning, while I was sleepily eating my breakfast, Caleb was playing with a toy cell phone, and laughing to himself. I had to laugh - my precious, happy little boy was back to himself.

So, I motivate myself by saying - today is a new day. Plus, I watch videos like this over and over again, to remind myself that while there are some tough times and moments of weakness, for every bad day there are two dozen good ones.

Caleb has the giggles on Vimeo

They say that crawling is kind of like walking - one day, when you least expect it - babies just figure it out.

Well, he figured it out yesterday.

Click below to view our new expert-crawler. Watch out, here he comes!

Caleb learns to crawl on Vimeo

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go try to Caleb-proof this death trap we call home.

A few days ago, we were all sitting down eating dinner. Caleb was chewing away on his teething biscuit when I saw a funny look on his face.

Then, I spotted the teething biscuit, minus a small chunk the size of my baby finger. I put my fingers in his mouth in a futile attempt to try to sweep out the piece of biscuit, and somehow, he managed to throw up the tiny little piece (and some other stuff) into my hand.

It was days before I got over that feeling of panic and guilt.

My mother-in-law was able to explain to me what I should have already known - Caleb already has both his top and bottom teeth, and so he's learned how to bite. I suppose it would have been more appropriate to give him teething biscuits when he had itchy gums and no teeth. It would have taken him days to saw through a biscuit at that point.

Caleb was so young when he got his first tooth that he could barely hold a teething toy, let alone a biscuit. It was just a question of timing, and the timing wasn't right. I'm a little too late with the teething biscuits.

I finally got up the courage to try giving Caleb a Baby Mum Mum rice cracker. I'd been crushing them up with a bit of water so he'd be able to experience a new texture, but today, I gave him the whole thing. In all its crunchy glory.

I had a feeling he'd be a pretty good self-feeder, as he's gotten SO good with his little fingers. I was right.

He really enjoyed biting and gumming the cracker, and hearing the crunch-crunch-crunch as he closed his teeth on it. Check out the big bite he took out of the second cracker:

Every once and a while he'd open his mouth, waiting for the next bite, forgetting that he had the food in his own hands.

He really had a good time.

Click here to view a short, crunchy clip of Caleb double-fisting a cracker. If you listen closely, you'll hear all the delicious crunching, and if you look closely, you'll see his eyebrows doing all the talking.

As for those teething biscuits, looks like they will be dipped in coffee and eaten by the bigger of the two cute boys in this house.

Caleb does so many cute little tricks these days. He puts his arms out when we come to pick him up out of his car seat or saucer. He shakes his head, as if to say no, even though he isn't really saying no. He claps his hands together in applause. He loves to bang on makeshift instruments and plastic spoons. He laughs when we play peek-a-boo.

I've been taking lots of videos in an attempt to capture many of these cute little habits, and I've compiled some of the really good stuff into a 1:30 clip.

Caleb - June highlights on Vimeo