Y’all ready for this? Dund dund dund…
do you remember that song from the 90’s…i think it was the Space Jam theme song. I’m pretty sure I still remember every move of my 8th grade cheerleading dance to that song. I can’t remember what I ate for breakfast today, but I could show you some pretty epic dance moves…which included the throwing out of a peace sign. I wish I was kidding…Funny how the brain works.
go right ahead. laugh away….
Anyway…today’s post is not about that. Its actually about a much more heated and controversial subject. Which is why i’m asking if you are ready?? I recently listened to a podcast from This American Life (i’m obsessed. There is no way around it. Serial changed me, and podcasts are my new BFF.) anyway…it was about “internet trolls” and how people are so bold (and nasty) on the internet….fascinating. I could throw my two cents into that subject matter, cause as a blogger, i’ve been on the receiving end of nasty more times than I’d like to count…spanning the issues of everything from my grammatically incorrect writing style, to my poor mothering because we have an EOTS, to my utter ignorance of how to correctly use elastic thread. There’s lots you could bash me for, for sure…and truth be told…I’m slightly afraid that this post will be added to that list.
(Canaan)
but…I have been wanting to write about this subject for the longest time, because as with everything on this blog, I write about the things I love, the things that i’ve found to be so helpful personally, things I want you to be able to benefit from as well…and this…its basically changed our lives as parents. so…i’m just gonna go for it….and write about Baby Wise
. For those of you unfamiliar with Baby Wise, at a very basic level, its a sleep training technique that we used for all 3 of our kiddos.
Its controversial, because, lets face it, all parenting techniques are controversial depending on who you talk to. Cause you’ve got a bunch of emotional and passionate mommas (and dads too), who have many different thoughts on the best way to raise children, and so when faced with the idea that their way may not be the exact way that everyone else does it, you might end up with all the makings for WWIII.
So even though I know this could stir some controversy, and some of you may already feel your blood boiling just at the mention of Baby Wise, my ultimate hope is that this will serve to be of massive encouragement to those of you who want more info on the subject. This isn’t one of those posts where i’m taking a stance, or pleading my case, or taking a side. I’m simply aiming to pass along some information that has been very valuable to my family, in hopes that it might be valuable to your’s too. So please. Let’s be kind. And I hope you read this knowing that you have FULL freedom and i’ll cheer you along the way to do whatever it is your heart feels right about doing for your own babies, Baby Wise or not. Amen. i really really mean that.
(Canaan and Bella)
So here’s the deal, just so you see it in writing:
I DON’T THINK THIS IS THE ONLY WAY TO PARENT!!!
do you hear that? Honestly. I do not believe that in order to be a good parent then you have to adhere to the Baby Wise program, or that you even have to sleep train at all. If it floats your boat to cuddle and snuggle with your sweet child in your bed till they are 10 years old, nursing all along the way, more power to you. For real. That’s what’s so great about how God created us…we are all meant to be individuals, with different brains, and emotions, and passions…that’s a good thing. But Baby Wise…its just what happened to work for our family, and I would’ve given my right pinkie toe to have been able to read a real life momma’s account when I first started out. But i’m not writing about it because I think this is how everyone should parent.
Also…just so i’m on record…WE MOMMAS NEED TO BE KIND TO EACH OTHER!!
this is big y’all. Aren’t we hard enough on ourselves already as moms? We certainly don’t need to be hard on each other too. I contemplated turning off the comments on this post, because somehow when you mention different parenting techniques, mommas get nasty. I’m telling you now…if there’s even a hint of nasty in a comment, I will remove it immediately and you will get a spanking 
just kidding on the spanking part (talk about a controversial subject!) but I will remove it immediately. So…if you don’t have something nice to say, let’s just subscribe to the ol’ golden role, and don’t say anything at all. I am leaving comments open because I think blogs are a great forum to discuss subjects such as this, and seeing as I certainly don’t have this parenting thing in the bag, I would love to hear your thoughts, or your questions, or your encouragements, but I would love to hear them in a humble, non-judgmental manner. So go forth and comment, but BE FREAKIN’ NICE ABOUT IT!! thank you in advance.
(Canaan)
Now that all that is clear, I find posts such as this to be so super valuable. I love to see how real mommas do the real things…like feeding and sleeping schedules and all things baby…so if you are preggo and wondering just how in the heck you are gonna care for your child…or if you are a sleep deprived momma and searching for something…anything….to give you some rest…or even just someone who knows someone who might benefit from reading about Baby Wise…this post is for you.
Now…after doing Baby Wise with all 3 kiddos, it would seem logical that I would be an expert, right? Well, i’m not. Unfortunately. Shocker, I know. Don’t you wish things worked like that? So just know…if you want an expert, quit reading. But if you want a real-life, mistake making momma, read on, warriors! but also know…i am not a doctor, or a nutritionist, or a lactation consultant, or a baby expert. i’m just a normal mom, who had normal, healthy, to-term babies, so use this as a guide only, but determine for yourself what is best for you and your baby. I am going to give you specifics as it related to my own babies…times, schedules, etc. but please please know that every baby is different, and these are only meant to give you a picture of what this might look like in real life, and not meant to be a formula for your own child, or a means of comparison.
so…here’s why we chose to do Baby Wise:
we had friends who had kids before us use this method…we watched it work successfully…so we read the book when I was preggo with Canaan, and we decided it would be a good method for our family. When Canaan was born, we were in full time youth ministry, so we had lots of events and meetings at night, and students at our house often. This meant two things…we needed to train our kids to have a consistent bedtime, and an easy and doable bedtime routine, and we needed to know that if we put them down to sleep in one place, but woke them up to transfer them home, that they would be able to go right back to sleep once home.
(Canaan)
Once Baby Wise was established, it allowed us that flexibility, which has proven to be priceless, not only for their well-being, but for our jobs and lifestyle too. It has also given us consistent and predicable time together at nights after bedtime for just us, so that our relationship and marriage and life did not end completely simply because kiddos entered the picture.
The thing that caught my attention right away was the overarching theme of the book, and it’s this: “Kids are to be a welcome addition to your family, but they are not to be the center of your family.” that feels slightly unnatural, and had I not known, I would’ve revolved our entire world around my kids. However, not only have I come to believe that it is not good for my kids, it’s not good for me and Jake and our marriage either. I think one of the very best things that we can offer our kids, if its possible (I know sometimes its not) is for them to see our marriages as strong, healthy, and massively important to us. I know that this takes a lot more than a simple sleep training technique to accomplish, but Baby Wise certainly helped us in that area, not only with a healthy mindset, but also with actual time together.
I also think one of the best things we can offer our kids is to set ourselves up to be the best parents we can be. Which means, for me, that I need sleep. God knows how I tick, and I think He knows that I need to be well-rested in order to be the kind of momma He’s calling me to be. I know what kind of parent I am when i’m sleep deprived, and I know what kind of kids my kids are when they are sleep deprived…and not sleeping…its just plain ol’ HARD. And if you are like me, it makes you crazy. So establishing those sleeping patterns right off the bat has given us years of the kind of rest that our bodies and minds need. I’m not saying this is the same for everyone…but for me, that is the absolute truth. And not having to be up in the middle of the night for months or even years, was the right thing for me and my family, and Baby Wise was the method in which we were able to establish great sleeping patterns, that have benefitted my children (and me) since they were infants.
What this does NOT mean is that being a parent does not require loads and loads and loads and loads and loads and loads (you get the picture) of sacrifice and lots of succumbing to the needs of your children. I’m saying instead that I learned that there were loving ways to take care of my kids needs, while also protecting the needs of our marriage and life and overall well-being in general. I loved that concept.
Since you can read the book and get all the in’s and out’s and specifics for yourself, i’m just gonna give you the absolute highlights that really helped us, and how we worked it in. if you have more specific questions, you can leave them in the comments and i’ll try really hard to answer them if I can. i’ll also give you our specific schedules, because I tend to think seeing exactly the way someone else does it is super helpful. but please use our specifics as a guide and not as the rule.
Just to note: I don’t necessarily agree with everything written in the book, and I for sure would not have presented the information the same way as the authors. In my opinion, it tends to come off a little bit like they have it all figured out and this is a fool-proof method. I don’t think either of those are necessarily true. i hope you don’t read this post and think that we’ve got this whole parenting thing mastered and figured out. nothing could be farther from the truth.
Also, just for reference, I was very lax on the scheduling in the first few weeks, cause they are so little and there is so much adjustment going on. I don’t think I really started the actual sleep training with Canaan until he was around 4-6 weeks old, although I did start the 3 hour feeding schedule pretty early. I pretty much started at the beginning with the girls, cause it was familiar to me, but it was very loose still in the first few weeks, especially with the sleep. I mainly focused on the feeding schedule in the beginning.
Also…i nursed all three babies until they were 1 year old, so I will be referencing nursing, but you can totally insert bottle feeding/formula. The concept, etc is the exact same, although your timing and scheduling might be different depending on if your baby stays fuller longer on formula.
To set the stage, here is a quote from the book that I think will help in understanding the methods i’m going to describe below:
“Our conviction is that a baby should be fed when he or she signals readiness. With PDF {parent directed feeding, basically the Baby Wise method, as opposed to demand feeding, or feeding the baby when he cries, instead of at set scheduled times…you can read more about that in the book}, a mother feeds her baby when the baby is hungry, but she takes advantage of the first few weeks of life to guide the baby’s hunger patterns by a basic routine.”
(Berkeley)
the things i’m going to describe that were the most helpful for us are the ways we guided our babies’ hunger patterns in the early days to set up a routine.
Here are my best, most important go-to tips in setting up a Baby Wise routine:
1) START YOUR FIRST FEEDING OF THE DAY AT THE SAME TIME EVERYDAY.
One of the most important things about Babywise for us was to start the first feeding of the day at the same time everyday. For us, it was 7:00 am. i chose 7:00 am because that made bedtime 7:00 pm and that was a good time for our family. This is where you can pick what time is best for you, because the rest of the day will fall into place according to that time. So I would work backwards, meaning…decide what time you want bedtime to be, and then adjust the first feeding accordingly (counting back 12 hours.) In fact, we pretty much stayed on that wake time and bed time schedule for many many years! In order to stay on schedule, that meant that some mornings I was waking my babies up to eat. And some mornings, they would wake early and I would do different things to make it closer to that 7:00 am feeding (more on that in a minute.) but eventually, all 3 of my babies would wake like clockwork at the time of the first feeding, ready to go.
(Bella)
2) MAKE SURE YOUR BABY IS TAKING A FULL FEEDING AT EVERY FEEDING.
this is soo soo key. So for my breastfed kids, once we guided their hunger patterns to fall into a set routine, they were able to go 3 hours between feedings, so the 3 hour schedule (more on that later) was established pretty early on. But…the only reason they were able to establish that routine was because we worked HARD to give them full feedings at each feeding. Babies tend to snack if you let them. They will eat a little, fall asleep a little, and wake up not much later wanting to eat a little more, and the cycle repeats, resulting in almost round the clock nursing, and short, quick naps. (that falls more in line with on-demand feeding.) But if babies are able to get a full feeding before dozing off, their little bellies will be full enough to last until the next full feeding, which for my babies was 3 hours later (from the beginning of the first feeding to the beginning of the next feeding.)
(Canaan)
but…this takes loads of work at first, because it is more common for babies to want to snack. It seems natural to let your baby eat and then fall asleep whenever they want. But for scheduling purposes, this is really hard, because what it trains the baby to do is to take small, snack-like feedings and short naps, waking up hungry every hour or so, and never quite rested and never quite full. But when a baby is trained to take full feedings at each feeding, they learn to eat until their bellies are truly full, instead of just quickly satisfied, and then they are able to sleep for much longer periods of time, actually getting fully rested. (to some degree, this is establishing your baby’s hunger patterns…training them to know when they are really full and when they are not, and how long they can go before they feel hungry again.) I hope that makes sense. Once I figured out this piece, it really did seem so logical and healthy to me. This is what I ultimately wanted for my babies…for them to be full and completely satisfied, so that they could also be fully rested. This is the crux of this whole thing…full feedings. And this really really helps the rest to fall into place more easily.
(Berkeley)
This is not an easy task in the beginning, but its so worth it. The time it takes for a full feeding depends on the child. For my kids, who were pretty efficient nursers, 30 minutes was enough (15 minutes on each side), but please decide for your own child what is enough. For my babies, that meant that for a full 30 minutes…they were actually eating and sucking, not just sleeping in position. So as my baby would doze off, I would take all kinds of measures to keep them awake to continue eating. I would reposition them until they began eating again, I would gently stroke their cheek with a wet washcloth to wake them, I would change their diaper, I would take off their blanket, I would change their clothes, etc. whatever it took to wake them enough to get a full feeding each time…for my kids, at least 30 minutes of actual sucking and eating, which meant that in those beginning days, some feeding times were LOONG. This will feel like work, as I would often have to do each of those things at each feeding. But it is SOO short-lived, and will be worth every single amount of energy you put in now, because you are setting the stage for years and years of sleep habits that will benefit both you and your child.
(Berkeley)
because…if your baby gets acquainted with taking full feedings, they will naturally fall into a very manageable schedule on their own, because their little metabolisms have been established to get hungry every 3 or so hours as opposed to every hour, etc, interrupting sleeping. Hope that makes sense.
(Berkeley)
3) PUT BABY TO BED WHILE STILL AWAKE
I put my babies to bed for nap times and bedtimes when they were sleepy, but still awake. That means, if i wanted to rock them, I did so, but I generally didn’t rock them to sleep. So once they were in their cribs, they were able to fall asleep on their own, without my aid. The benefit to that is obvious…they didn’t need me to put them to actual sleep, and if they woke up in the middle of the night, as babies often do as they transition in and out of sleep cycles, they didn’t need me to put them back to sleep, but were able to happily fall asleep on their own again. That became very normal to them, because they were used to being put to bed still awake. that allowed me plenty of time during the day or right before bedtimes to rock, and cuddle, and sing, and read…but they just didn’t learn to need those things to actually fall asleep.
(Berkeley)
In the beginning, my kids would fight this at times, so when my babies struggled, there were times when I would let them cry it out…we are believers in crying it out, but not excessively. Meaning…i had to learn my babies’ cries. I knew the difference between a tired fuss, one where they were just trying to settle themselves to sleep, and a screaming cry, one where they needed to be comforted. I was fine to let them “cry it out” if it was a tired fuss, but when it became a screaming cry, I intervened. so if my babies needed some help to fall asleep, i helped them, especially in the beginning. for example, Berkeley would often at a few months old be so sleepy but struggle when i put her down (she LOVED being held.) so i would let her fuss for 5-10 minutes, then go in and comfort her, but put her back down awake again. if she was still struggling after a while, i would again hold her and rock her for a bit and then try to put her down awake once again. But if she was really still struggling, even after a few attempts to cry it out, i would just go ahead and rock her to sleep and then put her down. i just made sure i didn’t do that every time. It did not have a negative affect on the Baby Wise program if in the beginning I had to do that to get her adjusted to the schedule, because you are still making an effort to establish the sleeping patterns.
(Berkeley)
it can be tedious in the beginning, and feel like you aren’t getting anywhere, but i PROMISE you will get there! Nine weeks was around the time my babies began sleeping through the night, and i would say by 5 months, our entire daily schedule was a no-brainer, including easy nap times and bedtime, with hardly any struggle. for some babies, its earlier. Bella was a very easy baby and loved her sleep (she still does) so she was great with her naps much earlier. but even for babies who liked to be held (Canaan and Berkeley) they were totally on schedule by 5 months with very little to no crying. And if there was crying at that point, then I knew something was out of the ordinary.
(Bella)
4) EAT, WAKE, SLEEP CYCLE
The main component of the Babywise system is Eat, Wake, Sleep, in that order. (see schedule below) This pattern is used throughout the day to establish a consistent and predictable routine. Sticking to this schedule made my days so much easier with my babies.
I’ve already talked about the specifics on eating and taking full feedings, and on the napping, but let me say something about the wake time. This is hard to do. In the beginning, even a minute or two of wake time is working towards your goal, so don’t worry too much about not being able to keep your infant awake, especially after all the work it takes to just get a full feeding in. eventually, your baby will eat and be awake for longer periods of time. Just start off with the general concept, but know that the actual wake time will extend as they get older.
(Berkeley)
SCHEDULES:
A few notes:
*feedings are scheduled from the START time of one feeding to the START time of the next
*all wake-times may be non-existent or very very short when a newborn
*feeding times take at least 30 minutes, if not more, especially in the beginning, so those wake times, although they look long, are not really long because you are feeding for a good portion of that.
BIRTH – 5 MONTHS-ISH:
(Berkeley)
7:00 am: EAT THEN WAKE TIME
8:30-10:00 am: NAP
10:00 am: EAT THEN WAKE TIME
11:30-1:00 pm: NAP
1:00 pm: EAT THEN WAKE TIME
2:30 – 4:00 pm: NAP
4:00 pm: EAT THEN WAKE TIME
5:30-6:00/6:15 pm: NAP (this nap was usually shorter since it was before bed. they would sometimes only sleep 30-45 minutes, or i would get them up a little early for bath, etc).
7:00 pm: EAT THEN BEDTIME (no wake time).
– i would usually bathe sometime after the 4:00 feeding, or before the 7:00 feeding. so once i fed at 7:00, it was right to bed.
10:00/11:00 pm: DREAM FEED
i would wake them up to eat again and then put them right back to bed (called the “dream feed” cause they are pretty sleepy during this feeding since i was waking them.) i kept this feeding for a long time, about 5-6 months, mainly for my own milk supply. but dropping it wasn’t a problem for my kids at that point. Once I did drop it, I pumped that feeding for a few months to build up my frozen milk supply so that I could leave bottles if I ever needed to go somewhere without the baby.
after the dream feed at 10 or 11, i would let them wake up on their own and feed them when they woke in the middle of the night. For the “middle of the night” feedings, i would feed them and put them right back to bed. My babies slept in a cradle next to my bed until they were sleeping through the night (usually around 9 weeks) so if they woke to eat in the middle of the night, I would feed them right in my bed, and then burp, change a diaper, and put them right back down, with as little stimulation as possible. They usually went back to sleep with no issues.
(Berkeley)
As newborns, my babies would generally wake up twice in the middle of the night to eat, usually around 1:00 am and 4:00 am (pretty close to the every 3 hours). I looked back at Berkeley’s schedule, and around 4-5 weeks old, she dropped down to only one feeding in the middle of the night, usually around 3:00 am. For the first few weeks of dropping a feeding, she would sometimes wake early, before 7:00 am, and I would do different things to try to stretch her to 7:00 am (i’ll talk about that in the next paragraph). By 9-10 weeks, all three of my kids dropped all middle of the night feedings, although I still kept the dream feed at 10/11:00 pm to ensure that they were still getting 6 feedings a day. Around that time is when we moved them out of the cradle in our room to their crib in the nursery.
here’s a little tip to stay on the schedule with the first feeding starting at the same time each morning, even if your baby wakes earlier. As I said before, my goal was always to start the day with the first feeding at 7:00 am. so if my baby woke up before 6:00 am (for mine, it was usually around 5 or 5:30 am for the first few days of dropping a feeding, as they were still adjusting), i would usually try to let them cry just a little to see if they would fall back to sleep. if they didn’t, i would get them up, nurse on one side only (so not really a full feeding…this is the only time I would purposefully let them snack) and put them right back to bed, treating it as a “middle of the night feeding” like I mentioned above. then i would wake them at 7:00 am and give them a full feeding then. (you may have a little less milk if you just fed on one side at 5:30 am, but just feed as best you can…i would still feed on both sides at 7:00 am, starting with the side that I didn’t feed on earlier, and I always had plenty of milk for them).
(Berkeley)
if they woke up after 6:00 am and wouldn’t go back to sleep, i would try to stretch them as close to 7 as possible before feeding, so we might play, or cuddle, etc until it was as close to 7:00 as I could make it. (a half hour on either end is okay) i know that might sound weird, but one of the most important things in Baby Wise to get your baby to adjust is to start your schedule at the same time everyday. This is also so short-lived, and before you know it, they will be waking you right on time!
(Bella)
I used this same technique if my babies woke early out of their naps and couldn’t settle themselves back to sleep after a minute or two, except I wouldn’t do the “snack” feed, but just let them have wake time until it was time to feed again. The only time I would adjust that and feed earlier than scheduled was if they were showing signs of hunger, due to a growth spurt, etc. which does happen and which I will mention later on.
At around 5 or 6 months, we transitioned to an every 4 hour schedule, and the time it took to nurse was much shorter, and playtimes were more of actual playtimes:
5 MONTHS – A YEAR (OR MORE):
(Canaan)
7:00 am: WAKE AND EAT, THEN PLAY
9-11:00 am: NAP
11:00 am: EAT THEN PLAY
1-3:00 pm: NAP
3:00 pm: EAT THEN PLAY
5:30 pm: NAP (30-45 minutes)
7:00 pm: EAT AND BEDTIME
as I slowly introduced solid food at 6 months, I would nurse at the times listed, but offer food after I nursed, beginning with once a day, and slowly transitioning to 3 solid meals a day too. As I weaned at a year, I first dropped the late-afternoon feeding, and only nursed at the three meals, and then slowly backed off each feeding, dropping the early afternoon feeding next, then the bedtime feeding, and eventually the morning feeding. That’s just the way I did it, but that could be done any number of ways.
(Canaan)
As with any method, there’s lots that can and should be adjusted according to your child’s individual needs. There are also lots of things that I changed with subsequent children, as I learned what worked well and what didn’t. My poor Canaan…he was my guinea pig (as most firstborns are with lots of things.) but it seems as if he’s adjusted fine! And now we can tell him stories and laugh about how we were as young, first-time parents. I mean…i was 23 when I had him….23 and CLUELESS!
(Canaan)
so…WHAT I LEARNED ALONG THE WAY AND DID DIFFERENTLY WITH #2 AND #3:
once the girls came along, and I had one kiddo under my belt, I was not so afraid that I was gonna mess it up, or that it wasn’t gonna work. I learned along the way…that it IS going to work. And even though consistency is key, I learned that I could be consistent but still be flexible.
so….here are a few things I did differently:
I was not such a slave to the clock. I’m telling you, with Canaan, I was to the MINUTE! Like…if the next feeding is supposed to be at 3:00 pm, but its 2:53 and baby woke up early and is hungry, i’d wait until 3:00 on the dot. However, I quickly learned that 30 minutes either way isn’t gonna mess it up, so if you need to feed 30 minutes early, do it! Or if your baby is taking a longer nap, you can give them an extra 30 minutes. Or if they are showing any signs of hunger, even if for no good reason, its okay to feed them!
(Berkeley)
I went slower. Meaning, I worked on staying on schedule as best as I could, but I didn’t freak out when things had to be adjusted, or if the day wasn’t going according to plan. I was way more laid back with #2 and #3, cause I knew that some days i’d just need to survive, and not sticking to the exact schedule wasn’t gonna mess it all up. Also…i soaked in them just being babies, and wanting to sleep in my arms, and be rocked and cuddled. I tried to stay on schedule with feedings, but often times with naps, especially in the first few months, I didn’t let them cry it out much at all.
(Bella)
I paid more attention. I was aware of growth spurts, and off days, and teething, and I adjusted as needed, adding in more feedings, more naps, etc. this is my biggest regret with Canaan. I was such a first time, nervous-nelly of a mom, and I needed a formula to follow cause I had no clue how to be a momma yet, so I followed our Baby Wise schedule to a T…but when he hit a growth spurt around 4 months, and would cry after his feedings, it never crossed my mind that he was still hungry (because I hadn’t really experienced growth spurts yet), and since he had just taken a full feeding according to my clock and schedule, I failed to see at first that what he really needed was more milk!
(Canaan)
I think this is more related to being a first time mom and just simply still figuring it all out, and less related to Baby Wise, but sticking to my schedule at this time wasn’t what he needed during that growth spurt, and it took me a bit to see that. Thankfully, we caught on that something wasn’t quite right, and with the help of our pediatrician, I learned to add in more feedings and did some bottle supplementing with frozen breast milk and even some formula for a few days to ensure he was getting enough. But if I had just kept going according to my schedule, without paying attention to his needs or the needs of my milk supply, it could’ve been bad. So although Baby Wise is wonderful, it should be used as a loose and adjustable formula, and should never take precedent over your individual baby’s needs, at any specific time. So pay attention.
Along those lines, I paid more attention to the kind of crying too, like I mentioned before. If I could go back to Canaan as a baby, I would’ve let him cry it out less. I think I was so afraid of “getting it right” that I was terrified that I would mess it up if I didn’t do it all exactly right, cry it out and all. So looking back, I feel like I let him cry it out the most. Now that i’ve done it a few times, I know that the system works, and they are gonna eventually get it…so I was more quick with my girls to comfort them and not let them cry it out for too long.
(Berkeley)
These are a few areas where we adjusted the book to our individual family, and took and used the concepts, as opposed to being hard and fast with the “rules.”
in conclusion, let me say this…my kiddos are big time stinkers. Every single one of them. Sweet Berkeley might even be leading the pack in stinker-ness these days. They are normal kids, precious and fun and full of life, but also full of sin and selfishness and entitlement. But…they are healthy, well adjusted, brilliantly smart, very social, average-sized, loving, caring, empathetic individuals, who as much as they try to convince us otherwise with some disrespect and disobedience, really do love us and trust us as their parents. We cuddle, and hug, and kiss, and physically show affection for one another daily, and tell each other we love each other multiple times everyday. We are a normal, loving family, and although we screw it all up to tarnation all the live long day, I genuinely do not believe for even a second that sleep training my kids, or letting them cry it out, has led them to be anything less than, well, normal! And i’d think by now, at ages 10, 7 and 18 months, we’d know otherwise. I’m also pretty sure i’ve got a slew of friends, who may not have necessarily used this same method, or even who agree with it, but who would still vouch for my kiddos well-beings, mentally, emotionally and physically.
I know that this is not the right system for everyone. I also know that some people actually feel hatred towards Baby Wise, or sleep training methods in general. So even though the “haters gonna hate,” I really do hope you hear the heart and motive behind why we chose to sleep-train, and the benefits we’ve experienced from Baby Wise. I also know for sure that there are mommas out there like me, who are dying for some real life momma advice on sleep training. This is the kind of post that I wish I had come across when I was a first time momma. so I really hope and pray that for those of you in that boat, this is helpful and valuable information. I can only speak from my own personal experience, but I can tell you that we have loved the outcome of those early days of the hard work of sleep training through Baby Wise, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world.
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, and filled each one with a different colored buttercream frosting that Bella and I made the morning of the party. i used a simple buttercream recipe for all of the frosting (butter, powered sugar, and milk), and just made sure the consistency was not too stiff to make squeezing it out of the bottles difficult, but not too runny that it wouldn’t hold up on the cake. using these bottles really prevented what could’ve been a huge frosting mess!
