HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

“Sleep, Baby, Sleep.”

It could also be read as, “Sleep! Baby. Sleep!” or if it’s 4am and I’ve been up for 2 hours, it could be “SLEEP! SLEEP! SLEEP! Baby. SLEEEEEEEEEP!”

My paintings in the last year or two have taken on the form of visual mantras or visual affirmations. I paint what I want my life to look like. Then I hang up the painting above my computer and look at it every day. I am a highly visual learner. By seeing this visual prayer every day, it slowly starts to seep into my reality and after awhile I start to notice that I actually believe the message in the painting. Once I believe it, my life and reality then follow.

And so my current visual affirmation is for my baby – almost one and not such a baby anymore – to sleep through the night. Things were going well for quite awhile. But then the teeth arrived. My stress levels soared in the summer (when I’m stressed, Fiona doesn’t sleep). Bad habits were formed. And so on and so on. It got to an all time record low several weeks ago and I was finally motivated to take action. I reviewed The No Cry Sleep Solution and then made a sleep plan, which I am carrying out in various steps.

My first step in the Sleep Plan was to cut out the 10pm wake up (she goes to bed at 7pm and started waking up at 10pm a month and a half ago). No milk, only a brief hug and then leave. The next step was no milk until midnight, only brief hugs and soothing when she wakes up. A few other steps are to make sure she doesn’t fall asleep breastfeeding and keep the middle of the night feeds short (leading to a gradual night weaning).

I’m knocking on some wood right now, but I’m pretty amazed that she is only waking up 2 times now (1:30am and 5:00am) and then is up for the day at 7:30am. It is a drastic improvement from a month ago when there were a few nights where she was waking up every 30 minutes and occasionally up for a few hours in the middle of the night.

My next step is to night wean her from the 1:30am feed by gradually shortening the feeding time and then just using hugs and soothing. After that I’ll work on the 5am feed. And after that, maybe miracles will happen and she’ll sleep through the night. I am definitely read for some sleep. I feel like I’ve been sleep deprived for 7 years now with only brief respite in between babies. Since this is the last child we have decided to have, I found that I have been a lot more tolerant of the night wakings, knowing that “this too shall pass,” but frankly I am ready for this to pass.

I am also eased the fact that I know that it is healthier for older babies NOT to have milk or food in the middle of the night because our bodies were designed for our digestive system to have a rest at night so that all of our body’s energy can go into growth, repair and development. That being said, if the baby is in fact hungry, I would definitely feed her. But in my experience the midnight feeds have more to do with habit that actual hunger. But as anything in life, once a habit is formed, it takes a few weeks of consistency to break the habit and form a new one.

Last weekend we went for a walk to collect nuts. There are city trees everywhere with nuts that plummet to the ground and nobody collects them (except the squirrels), so we were able to gather heaps and heaps of chestnuts just a few blocks away. I’m not sure if we’re going to eat them, but they make lovely decorations for now.

I recently got a request for some recipes without wheat, rice flour or chickpea flour. I immediately remembered a delicious Banana-Quinoa Muffin recipe that I used to make all the time. This recipe comes from the back of Ancient Harvest Quinoa, which has a whole variety of quinoa products and also a lot of very creative recipes on their website. If you can’t find quinoa in your town, you can order individual products online at Amazon.com.

Quinoa is an ancient grain from South America that is a complete protein and so healthy that there is almost no malnutrion in the people who consume quinoa in the poor regions of Bolivia. It’s great for vegetarians, babies and people with allergies. You can cook the quinoa grain like rice or cook the quinoa flakes to make a breakfast cereal (like oatmeal). The quinoa flour is also great for baking.

BANANA – QUINOA MUFFINS (or waffles)

1/2 cup quinoa flour

1/2 cup quinoa flakes

1/3 cup brown sugar (or 1/3 tsp stevia for sugar-free)

2 TB honey (or 1/8 tsp stevia for sugar-free)

2 tsp baking powder (or 1/2 tsp baking soda mixed with 1 tsp lemon juice)

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2 very ripe bananas

2 eggs (or 3 tsp egg replacer mixed with 4 TB water for egg-free. See here for other egg substitutes.)

Optional: blueberries, raisins, cut up apricot, cranberries, grated apple, grated carrot, or cinnamon.

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Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix flour, flakes and all dry ingredients. Mix in mashed bananas and all wet ingredients. Pour into greased muffin tins (fill muffin tins 1/2 full). Bake 20-25 minutes.
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To make waffles, add 3 TB oil and 1/2 cup milk.

Still tipsy and toddling, but definitely a walker.