Strength of wills

Christmas break has been over for a few weeks now, and we've gotten back to "normal" around here.  Tommy goes to bed no later than 8pm, and many nights no later than 730pm.  He gets his bottle and typically goes right to sleep.  We get get 3-4 hours before he's up to eat again, though he usually requires pacification at least once in that span.  We repeat this 3-4 (sometimes 2) hour process all night.  I try to pacify him whenever he gets up, and if he won't go back to sleep, then Katie feeds him.  He's usually up sometime between 530 and 730am, though this is unpredictable.

Several things can wake him up in the night.  Like most babies, he's a light sleeper and the house needs to be very very quiet after bedtime.  I even have a sign I put outside the door to warn visitors they ring the bell with peril to their lives.  Gas pain is a frequent disruptor of sleep - no, not the noise I cause, but rather the gurgling bubbles in Tommy's belly.  It's common to help him pass gas in the wee hours of the morning through a variety of positions/techniques, though they don't always work.  We've modified Katie's diet constantly and have identified some problematic items, but nothing has seemed to spare him entirely.  Katie calls it the Bakker curse - apparently this is yet another trait he and I share.

Whenever Tommy wakes up, he's good for 1-2 hours before he melts down and needs his morning nap.  We generally start the nap process at the first sign of fussing, otherwise we soon enjoy a tantrum of epic proportions.  Oh, and if we miss the morning "nap window", he may not go back to sleep at all.  We've been suspecting for multiple weeks now, but there's really no question in my mind now that little Tommy Bakker is, shall we say, strong willed (there are no words in the english dictionary capable of describing the strength of my son's convictions).  Suffice to say, we are very keyed in to Tommy's morning routine.  Once asleep, he will generally nap for 1-3, on rare occassion close to 4 hours.  This is also impossible to predict, and he may require frequent pacification, swaddling, singing, and rocking, just like at night.

Tommy will not eat food.  He can be sitting in his Bumbo laughing, and if I get out any of the accoutrement associated with "the poison" (otherwise referred to as food), I get sideways glances and the stink-eye from a very serious little boy.  He'll allow a bib to be placed, but if a spoon nears the orbit of his head, he purses his lips and starts spitting in tasty anticipation.  We've tried a host of foods/cereals, delivered in every conceivable fashion to no avail.  I guess I should come clean now.  I did actually get him to eat rice cereal 6-7 weeks ago, on top of which I gave him his usual bottle.  Within the first hour of sleep that night he puked all over himself and his crib (Tommy, mercifully is a dry baby and puke/spit-up are very rare), and hasn't touched food since.  We've decided to wait a while and chill out - I'm sure this will happen on it's own sooner or later.

Tommy needs to take an afternoon nap, but we've had little success here.  The most effective technique is to strap him his seat and go for a drive, though he never sleeps more than 45 minutes to an hour.  Otherwise, he requires non-stop attending to get a small cat-nap or two.

I've recently added to my prayers - not only do I pray that some of these things will improve soon, I've been praying that Katie and I adjust a bit and have strength.  How about you?  Anybody have trouble getting their kids to sleep & eat?  We're actively soliciting advice...

In totally unrelated news, we saw signs of mice when we returned from Phoenix.  I'm guessing the ultra-cold (for Utah) temps we had over the holiday encouraged them to seek warm shelter.  We cleaned up thoroughly, loaded my traps with peanut butter, and set them in the basement utility room and under the sink.  I saw signs in the basement briefly, but nothing touched the traps.  A couple days ago, I noticed the traps under the sink were still set, but devoid of peanut butter (what the heck?).  I re-loaded the traps and adjusted the triggers to be a bit lighter and the next morning they were clean again (how is this possible?).  I re-loaded again, and added a "tin-cat" and sure enough, I caught one last night!  Of course, I had to let him go down the street alive - I felt like the bugger had earned the right not be destroyed after cleaning up 6 mouse traps without springing them.  Good thing I didn't have to get some of those "mouse huggers".