When you have a baby the first, and sometimes only thing most people will ask as the ice breaker or seemingly idle chit-chat is how your little one is sleeping.  But unlike a “How about this weather” type of small talk this is a highly charged topic, and unless you’ve had some seasoning as a parent, you really have no clue what you’re getting into when you respond to these questions, or at least it was like that for me.  When my son was in his newborn months, he co-slept with me and his sleep stretched for four or more hours at a time from when he was about three weeks old.  As a breastfeeding mom, half-asleep I’d side-lying nurse him back to sleep next to me and would manage to feel tired but not terribly fatigued during the day.

When he was three months old, I took him in to see coworkers at my former workplace and nonchalantly shared those sleeping patterns when asked.  I got some book recommendations to which I said thank you and let that into slip my mind.  I was fried from my new role as a mom and reeling from my recent move to the suburbs, but sleeping was tolerable so I didn’t think too much about it, as amazing as that is in hindsight.

Office visit

This all changed when my son reached about four months old.  If you’re the parent of a child older than this age, you know what I’m talking about: the four-month sleep regression.  To put it concisely, babies go through a developmental spurt at this age that leaves them unable to sleep as long as they had been.  It started with my son waking up every couple of hours.  And I did my thing, he woke, I’d nurse him, then we’d fall back to sleep.  After a few days, I noticed how tired I was getting, but I kept it up, expecting that eventually he’d go back to the four-hour stretches at least.  He didn’t.

No sleep til…

Those few days stretched into weeks, and I lamented how tired I was but kept it up, with him waking up every hour or less some nights.  At this point I starting getting wise to the debate raging on around me about baby sleep.  In one corner, are the sleep trainers, who advocate the importance of teaching a baby to “self-soothe” him or herself to sleep, and in the other, are the folks who sternly warn against this practice and advocate parenting your baby back to sleep, with the expectation that when they’re ready, babies will knit together their sleep cycles and sleep for longer stretches.  I was firmly in the latter camp.  Before I was even pregnant, I knew I wanted to follow the attachment parenting gentle path of raising my child.  In my Dr. Sears book of that title, there is a chapter stating, Beware of Baby Trainers, decrying any method of parenting that puts your baby on a schedule or trains him to sleep, with the cost being your connectedness to your baby.  Attachment parenting philosophy focuses on using parenting practices that foster a strong bond with your baby, building confidence and emotional health.  Since it has a strong anthropologic foundation of raising children with methods used by ancient cultures, plus a strong dose of compassion and a measured view of what you can expect from your baby, it appealed to me enormously.  So when the sleep advice started coming in, I smiled, nodded and flicked it aside, just knowing that if I let my baby cry-it-out (CIO) through sleep training, I’d be damaging him.  If I heard of moms who had done CIO, I would be stunned and horrified, wondering how they could not have read the research that says this is harmful, in short and primarily because the stress hormones that flood the baby’s system when they’re crying has adverse effects on their development, among other justifications for not doing it.  Just as my baby needed me during the day, I’d be there for him at night and never let him CIO, or so I thought.

Never wake a sleeping baby

So I continued to nurse my baby to sleep for the night, and with each numerous waking.  It wasn’t an option for anyone else to feed him at night since fr om about when he was three months old he steadfastly refused to drink from a bottle.  This growing little dude wanted his meals right from the tap.

Super Baby

And I grew increasingly miserable from lack of sleep.  I cancelled plans because I knew it was unsafe for me to drive.  I snipped and barked at my husband and had emotional crying jags where I’d fall on the floor from exhaustion.  A close friend I confided in with my desperation for sleep would worry and check in nervously by text if she hadn’t heard from me in over a day since that usually meant I’d had some kind of meltdown.

In the book The No-Cry Sleep Solution, the co-sleeping, attachment parenting author covers gentle ways to coax your baby to sleep, without tears.  At first I wouldn’t even pick the book up since I was that averse to any sleep training of my child.  But after months of not sleeping for more than 2 hours at a stretch, I decided to give it a go.  I poured over it, and drew up a plan.  Since a well-rested baby sleeps best, we got serious about naps.  We implemented an earlier bedtime (7pm), and put together a nighttime routine that included lullaby music, a massage, pjs, books, and then rocking to sleep–addressing the sleep association of nursing him to sleep.  This liberated me quite a bit since my husband could put him to bed and it wasn’t all on me anymore.  And the first night he slept close to seven (yes!) at a stretch.  I was so excited I barely slept.

But that was a short-lived success.  After that one night, he went back to frequent wakings, and then a few days later he came down with a nasty cold he picked up at a party.  He had a fever, runny nose and cough, and the only way he could sleep comfortably was by laying on me or my husband’s chest through the night.

Little sicky

Then I got sick, hubby picked up the bug, and the “Frankencold” as I called it, lept households to my in-laws’.  I lost my resolve to not nurse him back to sleep after he woke up and continued to contend with constant wakings, sometimes every 45 minutes and so often that I would lose track of how many happened through the night.  Naps were erratic and full of struggle, where he’d need to be rocked, driven around or nursed to sleep and then held while he slept.  I desperately tried catching up on sleep after my husband woke for the day and could take him before work, or on the weekends he would pick him up at 3am and hold him until the morning so I could sleep.  I had family insisting that I try sleep-training, but I brushed it off.  If someone pointed out that’s how they’d raised their children or they’d been raised, it frustrated me since parental practices have moved forward over the course of a generation.  Our little guy had a delightful little personality emerging, where he’d play contentedly for long stretches of time with his toys, barely fussing and full of bright smiles.  My husband and I ached with love for him and couldn’t bear the thought of him crying alone in the dark.

New Year’s Eve

Happy little dude

In a dark humor kind of way, I chuckled to myself when I started wondering if my lack of sleep could lead to a psychotic break, and slightly hoped for it since a hospital stay would mean I could sleep.  One mom who I respected offered up that she had sleep trained her baby, was enjoying full nights of sleep, and her baby seemed unaffected.  But coming up with the resolve to bring my husband into some kind of sleep training plan when I was in a such a haze proved difficult.  I stalled on it and grew more and more exhausted.  The thought of bringing someone in to fix the issue for me sounded appealing and I briefly considered spending hundreds of dollars from my savings to bring in a sleep expert.  Then one night, as I sat in bed awake with frustration after hours of trying to rock my baby back to sleep, I googled sleep training and came upon a very informative website called Troublesome Tots, and it worked some magic on me.  The blogger behind the site handily debunked the theory of sleep training being harmful but making the case that it would take some significant neglect (e.g. Romanian orphanage level) for the adrenaline and cortisol stress hormones to aversely affect your baby.  In fact, a few nights of crying many days and nights of poor sleeping would stress out your baby much less.  I also came around to the idea that a better-rested mom would be a better mom overall.  I continued reading and found an article saying that sleep training was a safe practice.  Reading up on development topics also showed me that with him at about seven months old, we were at a stage where it would be more difficult to do the sleep training, but it was not too far gone for us yet.  By sleep training him now, we would be addressing his object permanence issue of getting startled that he’s waking up in a different place than he fell asleep (similar to how you’d feel if you went to sleep in your bed and woke up on your driveway).  He needed to fall asleep on his own to learn how to knit his sleep cycles together on his own.  I also got hip to the idea that CIO was a misnomer of a term, and that we weren’t about to abandon our baby to cry on his own, that it was just letting him cry, so he could figure out how to put himself back to sleep, and in doing so, he could start getting an age-appropriate amount of sleep.

I was able to sort out that we had three issues to face, transitioning him to his crib, sleep training, and night weaning, and it was best not to do everything at once.  I still feared however that something would happen to my baby’s happy little disposition if we tried it.  I knew in my heart that our connectedness fostered by the attachment parenting cornerstone of co-sleeping had helped my little guy to thrive.  But I also had the hunch that if I moved him out of our bed, the wakings would let up since he didn’t smell his next meal right next to him.  I knew also that the window on moving him out of our bed seamlessly was closing since he would be approaching the separation anxiety phase, and I knew I didn’t want to do extended co-sleeping into the toddler years.  We bought a crib, but I still resisted, and after it arrived it sat in the box for a few weeks before my father-in-law put it together for us.  It was time to start moving him out of our bed, so we tackled that first.

Seven months old

We put him down to sleep in his for the first part of the night, before moving him into bed with me after the first waking.  I also got him acclimated to it during the day by putting him down with a bunch of toys to play, showing him this was a safe and happy place.

Then as the Martin Luther King, Jr. long weekend approached, I thought that might be a good time to start sleep training, since my hubby would be home for three nights in a row.  We had cancelled plans with friends to go away that weekend since sleeping was such a state of mishigas.  Still, I resisted a bit, but when I spoke to my worried friend about it, she simply said, “I think you should do it”, and with that I decided, we’re going to do this.  It also occurred to me that maybe part of my resistance had to do with a disbelief that I could “have it all”; a happy, delightful baby who also slept well.

One mom who had successfully sleep-trained her happy baby gave me some guidance, and I took the Dr. Ferber book, Solve Your Child’s Sleep Problems out of the library.  Another attachment parenting mom of two, whose advice I very much respected, also encouraged me.  ”Be consistent” was the mantra.  So that Friday night, we did what was once so unthinkable to me, we started sleep training our baby.  Would he stay our happy and confident little guy?  More on that in my next post.

The Friday night of the long Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend, we started “Ferberizing” our baby.  The process is to put your baby sleep baby in his crib while he’s sleepy, but still awake.  If he cries, you go in to soothe him at set intervals of time.  So at his normal bedtime, I put on our baby’s lullaby music, changed his diaper, gave him a massage, put on his PJs, read to him, then turned out the light, said “It’s bedtime” one last time and placed him in his crib.  I left the room and started timing how long before we’d go in again, which was at this point three minutes.  I sat at the table with my phone in front of me.  He cried.  We flinched and looked at the clock.  After three minutes I went back in and patted his back gently and shushed him, then left quickly.  His crying intensified but never reached the level of screaming.  Five minutes after that I returned.  Then ten minutes.  As as we waited for the next ten minutes, he stopped crying.  I tiptoed in his bedroom and lo and behold, my baby was asleep.  We were stunned.

I waited for him to wake up.  Normally this would be about an hour and half after he first fell asleep, and could take up to an hour to rock him back to sleep.  An hour went by, then two, and after another couple of hours I went to bed.  He woke up at 3am, I went to him, picked him up, nursed him from my super-engorged boobs and put him down.  He began crying.  Hubby then went in to soothe him at the staged intervals and after a few rounds, he fell back to sleep.

Over the remainder of the weekend we consistently put him in his cribs for naps, at bedtime and nighttime wakings sleepy but awake.  We soothed him at staged intervals when he cried.  We both slept longer than we had in months.

Fun with Daddy

My hubby was worried however, since our baby did seem different to him.  Not as smiley in the mornings, a bit more fussy.  Initially I didn’t see it myself, but didn’t dismiss his concerns.  I gave him more attention during the day, holding him versus putting him down to play on his own.  A few more days into the training and I noticed it myself, he was more cranky.  I thought about whether we should abandon or modify the training, then reconsidered, thinking we needed to give it a week.  The fussy/clingy period lasted a couple more days and cleared up.  Our little dynamo was back to his old self.

Serious playing

There were times of course where the crying saddened us immensely and we doubted what we were doing.  I was prepared for some possible backtracking since the Troublesome Tots blogger had covered the topic of the “extinction burst“, which is when the crying worsens and can cause parents to think the sleep training isn’t working.  So we remained consistent and extended our soothing intervals to five, ten, and fifteen minutes.  He fought us on night wakings, but that smoothed out over time.  Trying to sleep train him during his first waking of the night proved difficult, so I realized that he was waking up to eat so I nursed him, and eventually was able to put him back down quietly with no tears.  Naps were rough over the first two weeks, and I was convinced we’d need to revert back to driving him around to get him to sleep, but after I introduced a simple routine at naptime, that settled down.  Eventually we didn’t need the timer anymore since when he fussed it was less than five minutes.

Precious, precious sleep

Most surprisingly, I discovered that I could “dream feed” him by picking him up while he was sleeping and nursing him.  He went back in his crib calmly, at which point I could head to bed confident I wasn’t going to be woken up in a short period of time.

As he approaches his eighth month, we are seeing some challenges.  After months of drooling and grabbing his mouth, some little teeth are popping through his lower gums, undoubtedly with a lot of discomfort.  I’ll pick him up during those wakings and sparingly give him acetaminophen.  Naptimes have reverted back to some crying jags, but I chalk that up to his eight-month sleep regression and am remaining consistent.

Reflecting upon all of this, I’m glad I co-slept and backed off the sleep training until past his sixth month.  The crunchy attachment parenting mama that I am, I’d never recommend CIO (especially NOT for a newborn), even though controlled crying clearly worked for my family.  I will say that it’s been a game-changer overall, with my son developing healthy sleep habits and getting Z’s crucial to his development.  This has also translated into me being happier and more secure in my parenting, having left themishigas behind.  He’s still waking up at night, and while two wakings is much better than several, I’m still pretty tired and my husband is still leaving for work late so I can sleep in a bit.  But I’m no longer in a torturous haze, and that’s a relief.  I feel that my baby and I are just as bonded as before the sleep training and can see he’s clearly thriving.  The next frontier is night weaning, which I’m holding off on while he’s teething and working through his current sleep regression.  You can be sure I’ll be following theTroublesome Tots advice on that.  Goddess bless that blogger.

Happy little dynamo!

I know that many of the AP parents out there decrying sleep training mean well, and their hearts just break at the thought of a baby calling out for his parents.  I’d venture to say those parents just haven’t seen that sleep training can often mean just a matter of days of rough goings for the parents, yielding a baby in dreamland and a settled household.  Maybe they’ve considered that and the potentials risks are just not worth it to them.  Or perhaps they can just simply handle the wakings and wish not to rush their babies’ development.  All of that is commendable.  There are those however who don’t hesitate to condescend.  I admit that when I read the admonishments of sanctimommies bashing sleep training or CIO, I have a momentary flash of fury (one of which precipitated my first blog post on this topic).  All the power to them if they can handle multiple nighttime wakings while shaming others; I’m sure their babies are being held in loving arms nonetheless, which is what counts.

Best Valentine ever

(Here’s the completed blog post, as I accidentally blasted the unfinished version earlier, as well as re-blogged it and in doing so somehow sent out a blank blog post.  Thanks for bearing with me, dear readers.)

“Rick” about to annihilate the birthday “walker”.

Our gracious hosts served up lots of yummy spooky and seasonal vegan eats among which were…

Pumpkin chocolate chip muffins.

Many candy choices.

“Finger” cookies.

Guests Jesse and Jason brought veggie pigs-n-blankets a.k.a. Mummified Baby Boy Scouts in Freshly Squeezed Bandages Dipping Sauce.

An ice cream cake to die for. Note Susanne’s crafty garland in the background.

Loved it all!

This could be a tasty dessert layered with cashew cream.

Ingredients
1 6-inch pie pumpkin or one can of pumpkin purée
2 cups white rice flour
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1/4 cup coconut flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 tablespoons ground flaxseed
1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup maple syrup
2 1/2 cups almond milk
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
Vegetable oil (I used coconut)

Wash, split and scoop out seeds of pumpkin. Roast flat side down in a covered oven-safe pan until fork-tender, at least 45 minutes. Scoop pumpkin flesh away from the skin, place in food processor and process until smooth.

While pumpkin is roasting, whisk dry ingredients in a medium bowl, set aside.

After the pumpkin is puréed, add wet ingredients to the pumpkin in the food processor. Then add dry ingredients in small increments until mixed completely.

Using a 1/4 measuring cup, pour batter into vegetable oil on medium heat. I used an eco-friendly non-stick pan. Flip pancakes with spatula when bubbles appear and remove from heat when golden and cooked through.

Your home now smells quite delicious.

I made this in under 20 minutes with plenty for Super Hubby as well as leftovers for a one-handed lunch. For the record, he gave it a rave review.

Ingredients
1 16 oz package brown rice pasta (Trader Joe’s is my favorite)
1 package mixed frozen veggies
1 cup nooch
1 tablespoon tahini
1 cube unsalted vegetable bouillon
Salt to taste

Boil pasta according to instructions with plenty of salted water. A couple of minutes before the pasta is fully cooked, spoon out 3 ladles of pasta water into another saucepan and add the veggies to the existing pot of water. In the other saucepan, add nooch, tahini, bouillon and bring to a boil. Whisk until smooth. Drain al dente pasta and veggies and pour cheezy sauce over it. Serve and enjoy!

Lots of variations are available with this!

The Well of Intention is still MoFo-ing it up here! This past weekend our kitchen was dormant as we hit the road for a beautiful vegan wedding at the Frank Lloyd Wright Polymath Park Resort in the Western Pennsylvania mountains outside Pittsburgh. It’s always exciting to be present when friends tie the knot, especially when they celebrate with compassion on the menu. Here are some of the highlights. I totally recognized the bride’s palate and culinary preferences among the specially crafted menu choices…funny the intangible knowledge you have about your dearest friends.

Organic mixed salad, pretzel bread and homemade popcorn favor. I got two rolls since hubby is steadfastly gluten free. Delish!

Potato station with mashed, roasted sweet and potato pancakes served with sour cream, apple butter and applesauce.

Wild forest mushroom puff pastry. This was my favorite.

Seitan piccata.

Custom pasta station with penne, linguine, or gluten free linguine. Choice of marinara, pesto, olive oil with a variety of vegetables toppings plus veggie meatballs and sausage.

Here I am with my (first) plate.

Gorgeous and delicious almond wedding cake with raspberry filling and almond frosting. Hubby stood in briefly as a cake topper.

I sadly missed getting pics of the other desserts; house-made ice cream, red velvet, caramel-vanilla, and hazelnut praline petit fours, peanut butter chocolate groom’s cake (from Vegan Treats) and ginger with lemon and vanilla cupcakes.

Delicious baby fast asleep for much of the wedding, allowing his mama to dance with friends.

Next post will be a recipe!

Ingredients
4 cups water
2 cups uncooked brown basmati rice
1 teaspoon salt
1 unsalted vegetable bouillon cube
1 medium sweet onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, diced
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 medium acorn squash, peeled and diced
2 cups crimini mushrooms, sliced
1 14 oz can coconut milk
1 cup water
1/8 cup curry powder
1 bunch kale, destemmed and chopped
1 teaspoon salt
Chili sauce, to taste

Makes about 8 servings

In a medium saucepan, bring water to a boil. Add bouillon, salt and rice. Bring to a boil again, then lower heat and cook for 45 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a large pan, heat vegetable oil (I used coconut) and sauté onions and garlic until golden. Add squash and mushrooms and stir. Add coconut milk (I used Trader Joe coconut cream!), water, curry and salt.

Cover and simmer until the squash is fork-tender, about 20 minutes. Add kale and stir until the leaves are bright green. Remove from heat and serve over rice. Add chili sauce accordingly.

I realized after preparing this that this dish is visually the same as my last recipe!  Apparently my unplanned MoFo theme is orange food, so I’m planning to switch that up for next time.

This dish can be served with a variety of chips, with crudite, layered onto tostadas, there are many possibilities.  Tonight we are going to have it for dinner on rice cakes with a kale salad.

Ingredients

1 cup raw cashews

4 sweet potatoes, peeled and sliced

1/8 cup olive oil

cayenne

salt

1 cup dry red lentils, rinsed and checked for stones

3 1/2 cups water

3 cloves garlic

2 tablespoons vegetable oil (I used olive and coconut)

1 cube unsalted vegetable bouillon

1 teaspoon salt

1 bay leaf

1/2 nutritional yeast

1 tablespoon paprika

Makes a ton of pate, plenty for a potluck of 10 or so people.  For the moms of babies out there, this is very easy to eat one-handed!

Soak the cashews for at least 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Place the peeled and sliced sweet potato on a baking sheet and brush with olive oil, and sprinkle with salt and cayenne.  Bake until browned, about 45 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, saute garlic in vegetable oil until golden.  Add water and bring to a boil.  Dissolve vegetable bouillon and nutritional yeast in water.   Add red lentils and drained raw cashews.  Cover and cook on low heat until the lentils are soft, about 20 minutes.  Set aside.

When sweet potatoes and lentils have cooled, place in food processor with paprika.  Puree until smooth.  Serve sprinkled with paprika and drizzled with olive oil.

Ingredients

2 medium-sized (or 1 large, 1 small) butternut squash – peeled, seeded, diced

2-3 tablespoons vegetable oil (I used coconut)

1 medium white onion, chopped

3 cloves garlic, diced

4 cups of water

2 cups almond milk

1/4 cup dark brown miso

1/2 cup nutritional yeast

1 tablespoon cayenne pepper

I didn’t add salt because of the miso, so it can be added to taste if you have a salt-tooth.

Yields 8 servings

In an 8-quart saucepan, heat the vegetable oil on medium heat.  Add the onions and garlic and saute until translucent and golden.

Add the diced butternut squash and stir.

Raise the heat to high and add the water and almond milk.  Butternut squash should be submerged and just poking through the surface of the liquid.  If it is not, add water sparingly to bring the level up.  Cover and bring to a boil.

Lower heat to medium low and add miso, nutritional yeast, and cayenne.  Cover and simmer until butternut squash is fork-tender.

Puree soup in the pot with an immersion blender, or in batches in a blender.  If using a blender, for safety, be sure to take the center cap off the lid and cover with a dish towel so that the steam can release and you avoid blowing off the top of the blender.

I served the soup over red quinoa and had great reviews from the hubby.  Plus plenty of leftovers for one-handed lunch!