Posts Tagged ‘Holidays’

So, we’ve made it through the holidays in one piece. Phew! Sleep seems to be back on track in our house, given we had some late bedtimes and off-schedules surrounding Christmas. If you are still struggling with the holiday upheaval, make sure you review your post-holiday sleep recovery tips, and if you’re a member, be sure to listen to the tele-seminar recording from 12/29. One member e-mailed me this about it:

“LOVED the Recovering from the Holidays and Nap Transitions taping. I missed it yesterday b/c it was the last of the in-laws… and so I was very grateful to hear this today! Perfect taping!”
-Lily

New Year’s is a time to reflect on the last year and how you want the next year to be. Multitudes will make new year’s resolutions and only a small percentage will achieve the goals they set for the new year.

A look back at 2009

This past year has been a big year. In December 2008, this website (formerly picknicksbrain.com) had around 15,000 visitors. This past December 2009, the website enjoyed over 36,000 visitors who viewed over 71,000 pages! I’ve gone from having just a few clients to ten times the number. I get many e-mail messages that thank me for the site and helping their child sleep, even if I’ve never talked to them directly. We’ve added a Members Area, a new book, and a Facebook fan page. I also hired an assistant to help me manage it all and help me get our name out there. It is beyond phenomenal how wonderful it has felt to help you and your families get more sleep and I can’t even put it into words.

This year I also learned just how determined I am to help new parents in many different ways. I became the majority owner of Babble Soft and took over operations from my business partner, Aruni, who is a serial entrepreneur. She is so great and it’s so hard to believe we only met in person for the first time last week!

On a personal level, I celebrated my five-year wedding anniversary, my 4-year old started pre-school and my almost 2-year old started talking in sentences a few weeks ago.

Fortunately, it has been a very good year for me and my family. I am able to fulfill my passion to help other parents with their sleep struggles like I’ve been through myself and be home a lot with my kids (with help) so I can avoid missing too much of these early years.

It has not all been positive, unfortunately. My father and brother had a falling out, my two older brothers were really sick earlier this year (and both had strokes), and just over the holidays I struggled to help my family understand my son’s spirited temperament and strong-willed personality. I’m sure some of you might relate.

It was difficult to explain how my older son is slow to adapt and how his first reaction is often no (unless you can make him think it was his idea ). It’s hard when someone wants to interact with him, yet his first reaction is no. It can hurt feelings and the fact he is slow-to-adapt makes him prefer familiar (mommy and daddy) over someone new (like a visitor who sees him infrequently even if the visitor is someone like grandma or grandpa). He has grown up a lot and matured SO much in the summer before he turned 4, but if you don’t know him very well, you really don’t know how far he’s really come and I only expect great things from him as he gets older (though I still worry what his persistence will be like when he’s a teenager). His younger brother, who I’m sure looks to his big brother to guide him, is much easier-going but is VERY stranger-averse. He takes a long time to warm-up to new people. Though we sometimes wish they would warm up faster, we are not sad that they won’t let just anyone cuddle with them. I know maturity will make a big difference, so we’ll just have to be patient.

Goals for 2010

Professionally, I hope, with the new name of the website, many more babies will find their sleep. I plan to keep writing new material that will be new and different for parents to help their babies find their sleep and, you never know, I might even start on that published book I’ve been thinking about. I also plan for the Helpdesk to remain busy the rest of the year (it’s surely starting out that way!). I plan to enhance the Babble Soft suite of baby care software and help even more parents gain insight into their baby’s rhythms and help manage their baby’s schedule.

Personally, I hope my Dad and brother mend their rift and my two older brothers stay healthy now that they are on the mend and on blood pressure medication. I hope my husband has a fabulous 40th birthday and my boys, who will turn 2 and 5, stay so very cute and the light of my life.

Sleep-wise, I hope my 4 year old will stop having as frequent nightmares as there is nothing that breaks your heart more than a pre-schooler who says “I hope I don’t have a nightmare tonight” and you can’t do much about it. He’s at the age where fear is normal and they are learning about mortality. Other than that, his sleep is in pretty good shape, now, thankfully (though it’s never perfect)! For my almost 2-year old, I just hope he does not need to transition to no-napping like his brother did at 2 1/2. Otherwise, he is napping well and sleeping well most nights (again, not perfect every single night especially with 2-year molars coming in). I do plan to determine whether chocolate really is a sensitivity for him or if it’s purely coincidence that nights he has had chocolate during the day, he wakes at night. We will also transition him to a toddler bed in the next 6 months and start potty training (have you calculated how many diapers a baby uses, yet? Scary stuff!).

I believe the key to successful new year’s resolutions to keep them realistic, so I’ll finish this by saying my new year’s resolutions are to exercise more often, help more parents with sleep problems, and go to bed earlier myself (I am writing this after midnight so I’m not off to a great start here! LOL). I hope, if you’re still struggling with your child’s sleep, that you make one of your resolutions is to help them sleep better. I promise you, it’s realistic!

What are your new year’s resolutions (sleep or otherwise)?

I hope you are having a wonderful holiday season and those of you who celebrated Eid’ul-Adha, Fiesta of Our Lady of Guadalupe, St. Lucia Day, Hanukkah, Christmas, and Boxing Day I hope you had a great holiday! And, I wish all of you a Happy New Year (any interesting resolutions out there this year?), Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Omisoka, and Happy anything else you might celebrate that I haven’t listed! I love learning about different cultures, so please do comment below with your choice of holiday (even if it’s not in December!).

We celebrate Christmas and had a great holiday, but it was also EXHAUSTING! And, the kids got off schedule and routine making naps start to disappear and night-wakings increase. Today, at 1 p.m. EST, I’ll discuss ways to get back on track after the holidays and transitioning to fewer naps, in general, for all The Baby Sleep Site™ members during my quarterly tele-seminar (recorded for later listening).

To help some of you even more during the holidays, I decided to give the gift of sleep this year by giving away some of our sleep products and here are the winners:

•   Two copies of my e-Book, Help Your Child Sleep, a Step-by-Step Guide, to help a tired family with their nighttime troubles.
(Value: $28.50)

Winners e-Book Help Your Child Sleep: Allyson and Mariah

•   Two copies of my e-Book, Mastering Naps & Schedules, to help a tired family with their baby’s nap struggles or to help establish a routine.
(Value: $24.95)

Winners e-Book Master Naps & Schedules:Wendi and Becki

•   Two 3-month memberships to my exclusive Members Area, where you gain access to all our e-Books, case studies, weekly expert advice by yours truly, and much MUCH more!
(Value: $18)

Winners of 3 month memberships to exclusive Members Area: Tania and Gabriela

AND

•   Two two-email personalized consultation packages, where I customize a sleep plan for your specific situation. I promise we can get a lot done in just two e-mail! Read other parent stories. (You can also feel free to save these to use later, too)
(Value: $24.95)

Winners of two customized email consultations:Martine and Teralita

AND

•   Your choice of a $57.20 Target or Amazon gift card (so the total prizes equal $250 just because I’m a little anal and silly like that. Go ahead and check my math. I used Excel! )
(Value: $57.20)

Winner $57.20 Target or Amazon Gift Card: Melissa

I truly LOVE helping people with their sleep struggles, so I hope the winners find some relief with their prizes.

Winners were chosen randomly (using random.org) and e-mailed last week, but you must claim your prize by tonight (12/29), otherwise we will be choosing new winners.

For those of you who didn’t win, but still want to get help with your baby’s sleep, we’re having an After Christmas / New Year’s Sale!

For the next 72 hours, you can get:

• 12% Off Personalized Consultation Packages – Create an account in the Helpdesk and use Coupon Code PRE2010

• 24% Off Mastering Naps & Schedules, including 40 sample schedules to help your baby get on a solid routine and/or schedule.

• 36% Off Help Your Child Sleep, a Step-by-Step Guide, for those persistent nighttime sleep problems.

Move fast because this sale begins today, 12/29/2009, at 10 a.m. EST and ends at 10 a.m. EST on 1/1/2010!

Happy New Year and be safe this holiday season!

What are your New Year’s resolutions this year?

The holidays are tricky for your baby’s sleep. Grandma and grandpa want to spend time with the little fella, since they don’t get to see him that much. Or, you have two parties to go to on the same day, babysitters galore, or you have a lot of family members over making it really loud during nap time. Some people even like to get babysitters just to go Christmas shopping, especially those of you with more than one kid or twins or triplets, or more! After all, keeping your eye on two kids running around makes it THAT much harder to actually look for gifts to buy for people (believe me, I know!). That’s one reason I do most of my shopping online, these days. You might think that I often link to Amazon because I’m an affiliate (I get a very small percentage of sales at no cost to you), but I actually LOVE Amazon! I’m an Amazon Prime member and my holiday shopping alone more than pays for it, not to mention all the birthdays, sleep books I want to read, etc. throughout the year.

If you travel during the holidays, this can make many parents anxious and I tend to get a lot of questions about it around this time of the year. Don’t fret. There are things you can do to make the transition easier including making “away” as much like “home” as possible, being consistent in your routines, and getting back to normal as much as possible when you get back. If you have holiday visitors, try including grandma or grandpa in the routines by letting them read the bedtime stories. For more tips on your baby’s sleep, please visit MomCentral this year where I go into your baby’s sleep and the holidays in more detail.

To help some of you even more during the holidays, I’ve decided to give the gift of sleep this year by giving away the following:

•   Two copies of my e-Book, Help Your Child Sleep, a Step-by-Step Guide, to help a tired family with their nighttime troubles.
(Value: $28.50)

•   Two copies of my e-Book, Mastering Naps & Schedules, to help a tired family with their baby’s nap struggles or to help establish a routine.
(Value: $24.95)

•   Two 3-month memberships to my exclusive Members Area, where you gain access to all our e-Books, case studies, weekly expert advice by yours truly, and much MUCH more!
(Value: $18)

AND

•   Two two-email personalized consultation packages, where I customize a sleep plan for your specific situation. I promise we can get a lot done in just two e-mail! Read other parent stories. (You can also feel free to save these to use later, too)
(Value: $24.95)

AND

•   Your choice of a $57.20 Target or Amazon gift card (so the total prizes equal $250 just because I’m a little anal and silly like that. Go ahead and check my math. I used Excel! )
(Value: $57.20)

Why am I giving away so much? It’s the holidays, we should all be generous and I LOVE helping people with their sleep struggles, that’s why!

How can you win one of these lovely prizes? Just leave a comment below and I’ll randomly choose winners (using random.org).

Make sure you enter below NOW, forward to all your friends and family, post it on Facebook, and tweet on Twitter! Share! Share! Share! The baby on his dad’s shoulder at the top is reason enough alone to share. Soooo adorable!

(Note: One person / e-mail address can’t win two prizes. If I randomly choose the same person, I’ll choose another winner, to be fair. You can enter up to once a day, though (Max 9 entries).)

Happy Thanksgiving!!! (at least to the U.S. readers)

This week is a good time to find the silver lining and say what we are all thankful for, sleep-wise. I’ll start:

• I am thankful that my once challenging son, who inspired this site and is now 4 years old, can now be walked up to bed, put on his PJ’s, brush his teeth, cuddle in bed for a few minutes and he falls right to sleep. No fuss. No muss. (most of the time) Gone are the days where it took me an hour to put him to bed. Hooray!
• I am thankful that I can put my 21 month down for a nap by proclaiming it is “nap time” and he walks up the stairs, I put him in the crib, say night night and walk out.
• I am thankful that, most nights, my 21 month old wakes briefly, sits up in bed, and lays back down without needing anything.
• I am thankful that I can now check on my son before bed, since he sleeps with the door open and can stare down at him for a few seconds watching him sleep peacefully. I couldn’t do that when he was a baby because he’d wake up when I opened the door, yet he couldn’t sleep through noise, so I couldn’t keep the door open, either. I look forward to when my younger son’s door is open, too.
• I am thankful that I didn’t have to break a pacifier habit or thumb-sucking habit for either boy and, most of the time, they can find their own blankies (occasionally I’m woken up by my older son because he can’t find it and it’s buried in covers or on the floor).
• I am thankful that we figured out that if our sons don’t have a snack before bed that they sometimes wake up earlier in the morning or in the night.
• Mostly, I’m thankful to have two wonderful boys who are the light of my life.
• I am thankful that the fact that my boys are imperfect sleepers has given me this unique opportunity to meet so many parents out there and allow me to help them with their troubled sleepers. It is truly one of the most rewarding things in life I’ve ever done, so far.
• I am thankful that I can do my Black Friday Shopping online this week, so I can sleep a little more on Friday, one of my (very) few days off.

It doesn’t hurt to get some things off our chest, too, so we don’t bottle them up inside. I am NOT so thankful for:

• I am not so thankful that sleep is still not perfect for my eldest son (who inspired this site).
• I am not so thankful that my son is so sensitive that our imaginative play or something that seems “ok” to see on TV causes nightmares for three nights in a row this weekend (hoping for a good night tonight).
• I am not so thankful that if we think our younger son has eaten enough, but he hasn’t, that he will sometimes take longer to fall asleep or wake in the night (this is finally getting less common as he gets older).
• I am not so thankful that with two boys who aren’t the perfect sleepers that sometimes it still feels like I will never just sleep well every day again and that I’m commonly waiting for that wake-up call, even on “good nights”.
• I am not so thankful that one day my boys will be older and not need mommy anymore and I will probably be sad because now they don’t need me anymore and I will wonder why I worried so much about their sleep, yet I would love not to worry about it and it is so ironic that one day they will be teenagers that I will have to drag out of bed and I’m not so thankful that it all makes me sound so crazy.

What are YOU thankful or not-so-thankful this year, sleep-wise (or not)?

Happy Thanksgiving! Have a very joyous and safe holiday. And, sStay tuned for a BIG announcement in the next week or two!

Parenting is hard work and when you have a challenging sleeper and sleep-deprived yourself, it’s all that much harder. This article is straying away from sleep for a moment, to take some time to allow you to focus on you for the moment.

I hope all of you will take some time for YOU this holiday season, away from the sleep struggles for just a moment (the holidays are a crazy time for sleep anyway!). It’s important to recharge yourself, so you will be a happier person and have more patience with your little ones as you solve their baby sleep problems, whether you are helping them sleep through the night or nap better.

If you need help finding ideas that you can do for yourself, I encourage you to look at the “5 Minutes” websites. I was recently interviewed at 5 Minutes for Mom. They also have 5 Minutes for Giveaways, 5 Minutes for Parenting, 5 Minutes for Special Needs, 5 Minutes for Going Green, and 5 Minutes for Books.

If those don’t tickle your fancy, here are a few interesting articles around the ‘net for your reading pleasure. You can read about whether rich and poor kids’ brains are different, how to keep your children’s identities safe, the simple math of losing weight, or look at Dooce’s 14-week belly.

I hope those of you who celebrated Eid’ul-Adha, Fiesta of Our Lady of Guadalupe, or St. Lucia Day had a great holiday! And, I wish all of you a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Boxing Day, Happy New Year (did you know it would be delayed one second this year?), Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Omisoka, and Happy anything else you might celebrate that I haven’t listed! I love learning about different cultures, so please do comment below with your choice of holiday (even if it’s not in December!).

With that, I leave you with one of the guest posts from my holiday giveaway this month. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did! See you after the new year when I’ll continue my Baby Temperament and Sleep series.

Rock-A-Bye Baby

I can still remember being a young woman and dreaming about my days as a mother. I had it all planned out. After a day of cuddles and giggles I would gently rock my baby to sleep with a story and their very own lullaby. (I had planned to write a personal lullaby for each child). Not many years later the reality of a baby was there but all my other motherhood fantasies seemed distorted in the reality of, well, life. Yes, my baby was soft and sweet and I loved him in a way I never even imagined. But suddenly I was seriously lacking in the sleep area and slipped into a depression that took over every part of the me I had always known. And when I would try to sing my baby would cry. And so would I.

Luckily things get better. That first baby is now eight years old and has three younger brothers. During that time and with each baby (or babies in one case) I have learned to sing that lullaby, although I’ve found that wordless humming seems to work the best. Some tips that I have learned in my years is that what works for one baby will not always work for every baby. Be willing to try new things and new techniques. Get to know your baby. Are they happier bundled up tight or do they like to wiggle around? Do they sleep better with a little light or in the dark? My twins actually sleep much better when their room is completely dark, but my four year old has always needed a light on. Be in tune to what they want and keep trying until you find what works. I think the most important thing I’ve learned as a mother is that I don’t have to be perfect. My children are cared for and loved. Isn’t that what really matters in the end?

If you haven’t bought anything for Father’s Day yet, you may be able to win something free! I thought I’d post some links for some free giveaways I’ve seen around the web. I was not ahead of the game enough this year to do one of my own, but still would like my readers to be able to win something. Maybe next year I will host one for Mother’s Day and Father’s Day! Remember, though, the best Father’s Day gift is sleep!.

Father’s Day Giveaways still in play

Mommy Daddy Blog – Jr. High Sweethearts Chronicle Their Adventure Through Parenthood are new parents since April and have a great blog with their reflections as they go through it. I think many of us can relate to them…except for the Jr. High sweetheart part which is just so awesome!

Win a Dyson! (Valued at $499) at An Ordinary Life. It’s a blog in which she talks about her journey through life as a Mom, and college student. Talk about multi-tasking!

My Mom Shops is giving away a Little Tykes Fold-Away Climber. Deadline is June 10th.

Dr. Moz is having a give away worth over $160 with some cool stuff in a gift pack!

Great Father’s Day gift ideas:

My Mom Shops will be posting ideas for the next few days. This site has some great shopping ideas for any day!

Amazon always has great gift ideas and if you are an Amazon Prime member, you get FREE 2-day shipping all year! It’s great! For the high-tech and green dads out there, check out Kindle: Amazon’s New Wireless Reading Device. It looks very interesting and you won’t use up paper reading your favorite books.

AskMen.com has a top 10 Father’s Day gift list, too.

I hope you find the perfect gift you’re looking for! One week to go!