Hi there! I wasn't very active on the blog this month so I wanted to check in. I had started to write a number of posts but then something would always come up or I'd lose the momentum. I feel like there are a lot of changes happening so stay tuned!

This month has been consuming:

+ Peanut turned 1! We gathered over Passover with all sorts of family on the East Coast. He got to celebrate with most of his grandparents, all of his cousins and his aunts and uncles! It was super fun and low key with homemade apple cupcakes made to look like beehives and some of his Instagram photos hanging from strings around the room. <3

+ We got to live in Brooklyn for a week and check out life there with a baby. Greg worked and I really missed having some childcare but Peanut and I had fun. Some highlights were Baby DJ School, Smorgasburg, Radegast Beer Garden, yummy chicken & waffles, and hanging out with some of our favorite people. ;)

+ We've started to rent out our house again when we're away! We rented out a room for a while before and during my pregnancy but baby sleep hasn't been conducive to having guests. Ah, but now when we travel, it's a great way to keep the house useful and help fund our trips a bit. Even with our Lean Home, it's still a lot of work though.

+ And I got sick again for the 4th time since Peanut was born. :/ Is this a postpartum thing because that's about 3.5 times more than usual for me? It's always after we get back from travel. Luckily Peanut doesn't usually catch it. (Speaking of being sick... today, April 29th, is National Drug Take Back Day! It's the best way to dispose of all of those drugs and medications that you don't need anymore. In SF, you can just drop them off at any police station, no questions asked!)

So I try to practice what I preach. When things start to feel overwhelming, I focus life down to the essentials for a little while. And that's what we've been doing around here: just the basics... no extra projects and little success on 8-Hour April.

May Habit: Oops, an 8-Hour Do-Over ;)
For May, our habit will be to retry getting 8 hours of sleep a night. It's been going okay but we have some adjustments to make. In reading about baby sleep training (and talking with some girlfriends), I'm reminded that we have natural sleep rhythms and sleep windows. If Peanut misses his nap window, he won't fall asleep easily. We're the same! There's a window for most of us from around 6-8pm, another from 9-11pm, and then if we push through that one, another from 1-2am. I'm learning that if I'm not in bed by around 10, I have a much harder time getting sleep. Like babies, the later I stay up, the earlier I wake up. Ugh.

Let's do this! Ahem Greg!!

+ Yay! It’s a new month which means a new monthly habit and a recap of last month’s. These monthly experiments help me build healthy habits, break unhealthy ones or just learn more about myself so I can figure out what’s really essential!

Peanut is almost 1! I can’t believe it and I also can’t imagine my life without him… he has been the biggest blessing. AND I haven’t slept through the night in a year. Nursing, teething, what have you. Honestly, I feel pretty great physically but I know the lack of sleep has worn on me… on us.

But now we’re all sleeping through and it’s a dream. <3 Sleeping enough hasn’t been the priority for us in a while but that’s changing today! For the month of April, the goal is that each of us gets 8 hours of sleep a night: 8-Hour April!

We’ll do a few things to help make this happen:
+ No screens 30 minutes before bed! We’ll make the time at the end of the day to calm down and practice an Evening Routine. “A good evening ritual helps you close the book on the day, prepare for more restorative sleep, and set yourself up for a fabulous tomorrow!”

+ We’ll track our time asleep, most likely using an app. We already use Glow Baby for Peanut and have used Hello for ourselves in the past. Any recommendations if we’re not into wearables?

+ Since we have a pretty reliable alarm clock these days (<3), we have to get to bed a little earlier to make sure we reach our goal. And that means in bed at least 10 minutes before we’d like to be asleep.

+ If we don’t get 8 hours because of work or things that go bump in the night, we’ll stay in loungewear and nap with Peanut until we do, if possible. (Unfortunately, Greg and most people can only do this on weekends.)

This has been an amazing year but not without its challenges. Maybe this experiment will help us make up for one of the hardest aspects of caring for an infant. You can make up for a year without enough sleep in a month, right? :D Okay good… I’m already feeling more rested.

Reflections on our March Habit: Morning Meditation:
For the month of March, we reinvested in daily meditation. Greg did it daily before lunch and I got back into meditating first thing in the morning.

Meditation March was so great. The best time to add a new habit is first thing in the morning. Waking up is the biggest trigger of our day and what we do right after is easiest to sustain. I had a 100% success rate and felt really grounded this month:
+ I was more engaged and less reactive.
+ I was able to pay attention without always creating stories.
+ I smiled more.
+ It’s probably a coincidence but Peanut seemed happier, calmer and he also slept better!
+ And I noticed that the days when it was hard to do were the days that I needed it the most.

Greg was almost as successful and loved meditating before lunch. He noticed he ate less and more mindfully. It’s so interesting… he said he would gather a plate of food before meditation and then look at the plate right after and feel like he took too much! What a smart habit for him.

We felt such obvious benefits that we’re both going to continue the habit. I’ll need to find a new space as the boys aren’t really up and out when I get out of bed. ;) I’d also like to work up to 20 minutes of meditation in the morning but will probably wait until I’m not nursing. What a joy to have this little pocket of time for myself!

Namaste. <3

May Habit: Oops! A Do-Over

April Habit: 8-Hour April and a March Habit Recap