cio, crying it out, the ferber method

a friend of mine ended up unwillingly causing a debate about CIO on facebook and things quickly got not so pretty. for some crazy reason i felt compelled to respond, too and then decided if i put that much time into writing something on friggin facebook, i might as well share it here for everyone to enjoy. ;)

it seems that whenever parents from "both ends" come to discuss CIO it very quickly gets very harsh. that's because we're all easily offended because we're all very passionate about trying our very best to provide our children with what they need. often (especially in the beginning) our knowledge of what they need is limited. it's difficult to understand a babies different cries and what they mean, then it becomes difficult to understand our toddler's tantrums and then we have a hard time connecting with our teenage who disappears into his room as soon as we try to have a conversation with him. so we seek help. i think all of us do. i haven't met a single parent who hasn't asked friends, family, a pediatrician for advice or read articles or books on subjects they sought answers for.
"CIO parents" do that and "Attachment Parents" do it and everyone in between does, too. because we all want to do the best job possible.
depending maybe on how we were raised, on how our friends or siblings are raising their children or simply what book was given to us first during pregnancy we are steered into one of many directions.

i feel that sadly, there is so much prejudice coming from both sides. i've seen both and i can assure you that APs don't just stay up til the wee hours of the morning every day thinking "oh well, he's just figuring out his schedule" and end up depriving their kids and/or themselves of valuable sleep. i also know that CIO doesn't neccessarily mean an angry disconnected mom carelessly dropping her baby in a babybed every night without a lullaby and then sitting comfortably in the living room drinking wine and watching movies while the poor baby cries for hours.

before i became a mother i was a very dedicated nanny (50+ hours/week plus frequent datenights). i started taking care of a little boy when he was seven weeks old. his parents are wonderful, loving, hard working, dedicated and very educated people who both come from equally wonderful families.
when the LO was a couple months old, they became concerned with his sleep and read a book which i then offered to read too. we all read "healthy sleep habits..." and it was clear to all of us, that his sleep duration, quality and timing where crucial factors to his well-being and we'd have to make sure he'd sleep (no matter what!) just like we made sure he'd only have healthy breastmilk and wouldn't sit in a wet diaper. we tried many of the suggestions, i wrote sleep log after sleep log and very often nothing other than letting him cry it out seemed to work.
we all did what we thought was best for him. we were going on information from pediatricians which were backed up by all sorts of studies and engrained in us fears of this poor kid having serious issues later in life if he didn't sleep as much as doctor soandso deemed necessary. we were worried. because we love him.
now, if you've read anything about CIO you will have read mentions of how mama's "heart was aching, hearing the baby cry." and how "hard it was to not go in there to soothe him". yes. i was not this little boys mother. in fact, i wasn't anybody's mother at that point. but my heart was bleeding every single time he cried. it was complete and utter torture (i know it was for him, too!). every pore in my body told me "go in there and pick him up and hold him!" but the book (and my employers who were surely suffering at least as much as i was) told me that this would damage him.
point? i repeat, every pore in my body told me to pick him up!
and i'm sure that all mother's who hear their baby crying in another room feel that physical ache to help their baby. it's nature. it's supposed to work this way. us feeling this way means we're doing exactly what evolution has given us to ensure our species survival.

to me, personally, therein lays the answer to almost all challenges i've experienced so far as a young mother of two girls. why is nature causing them to act this way? what are my instincts telling me? can i afford to go against my instincts or will it make me and my children miserable (whether in the long or short run). i've learned since becoming a parent that these instincts are the one and only thing i can truely rely on as long as i allow enough room for them. nothing brings me and my children more peace than to recognize, understand and follow those instincts.

in our society though, instinctual living is often less than convenient or even seemingly impossible. i was lucky enough to have been raised in an environment that strongly encouraged instinctual decision making even if that meant having to take on the role of outsider of a group at times or if it wasn't fitting my school or work schedule or that of my parents. so now, that i am a mother and my husband and i make the decisions (luckily, he's a very passionate and instinctually gifted man) our children are not crying it out. and we don't stay up past ten with them. in fact, for a long time we had a very good "strict" seven o'clock bedtime because at the time it worked well. we will most likely go back to that soon btw.
our oldest was nursed and cuddled to sleep every night until she was 13months old. not long after that she decided to move to her big girl room into her big girl bed and has slept there confidently ever since. we comforted and protected and cuddled her while she needed and wanted it and we let her go when she felt the need to be let go off.
our younger daughter is now ten months old and has lately fallen asleep in bed next to me but on her own frequently. she usually nurses to sleep and especially when she's going through times of rapid change i can tell she needs the help to wind down. but there are times when simply knowing that mama is there is comfort enough for her to lay her head down and fall asleep peacefully.
this is what works for us. no doubt, sometimes it's tiring. sometimes i want to yell "what the hell? can i just have ONE night to myself?" but i know that if i did, i'd miss something, too.

so i think, the key is realizing what works for you and your family. i wish with all my heart that all people had the same freedom that i had and have to live true to their nature and not hurried or molded or forced or lured or whatnot into simple "functioning" the way anyone other than themselves expect it. and i think if more babies were parented in an unconditional manner, more children would grow up to become instinctual adults again.
but until then, we can't expect everyone to have the same patience, ideas, convictions, education, feelings we have.

so peace should be the message, ladies!
let's keep the lines of communication open and learn from each other. i'm pretty sure, if we just listened and talked to each otehr more, we could all gain much more valuable confidence and knowledge than any parenting book written by a success driven doctor can. ;)


<3

christmas plans

our first family blog post in what seems like ages and it's regarding things we want. nice, right?

seriously though, the holidays are approaching at rapid speed and i'm feeling completely overwhelmed by basically all of it. except for the fact that we're obviously just stoked to get to spend christmas with our american family this year. :)

so while i'm thinking of it, this will be a random quick post about wishlists. just in case any of you feel the need to get things for the girls.

we need absolutely nothing! so mainly we'd like contributions to causes we care about. i'll try and add a few links later tonight if i manage to stay up past the kid's bedtime.

so if you'd like to have things for them to unwrap, please keep it small (i foresee us having a hard time staying within luggage limits as it is) and preferably somewhat in line with our crazy hippie ideals, which i know you're aware off at this point. ;)
just a gentle reminder, etsy is a fantastic source for beautiful and thoughtful gifts for the whole family. support local artists!

joon has recently shown a LOT of interest in schleich animal toys. they're more expensive than other animal miniatures i've seen, but they're so beautifully made and feel so good in a child's hands i can see she clearly prefers them over others. she especially loves horses, elephants, rhinos, hippos, dinos and monkeys and doesn't have any yet, so no worries about her having doubles. she's also very much into just about anything crafty. so age appropriate craft tools would be nice. however, she can't do fingerpaints or bathtub paints because of her excema.

mika is drowning in joon's toys and clothes and really doesn't need anything other than a carseat and good shoes, both of which we kinda have to "try on" in person. however, she loves anything that makes music. so maybe wellmade african or asian handdrums or other small childfriendly instruments would be something for her.


so. that's that. your company and lots of yummy food is all the four of us need to make this christmas wondeful!


in other news, mika got her first tooth, took her first unassisted steps, joon pooped in the toilet and dave got an official certificate stating his german language skills as excellent all within the past few days. hooray! i'm strangely exhausted and would like to spend a few days in bed and continue to accomplish nothing worthy mentioning here. no, i'm not pregnant. and won't be any time soon. it must be winter hibernation mode kicking in....


much love all around and we'll see y'all very soon!

hessenpark

went exploring yesterday and got lots of pictures to show for it.

beautiful garden, talented artist, fresh fruit, refashioned clothing...

beautiful garden, talented artist, fresh fruit, refashioned clothing
or if you prefer to look at everything all together... joontoon's photostream

pics, pics, pics

howdy everyone.

summer has hit germany. it's hot and wonderful. we're having loads of fun, sweating our butts off, learning lots of new stuff, rediscovering little bits of childhood goodness (i.e. southern sweet tea and playing in the woods) and suffered from a brief tummy flu which has been successfully cured.

things are great and as usual we've got lots of pics to prove it...
yesterday and for friends and family more of yesterday even more pics taken by our dear friends.
new dress and haircut and if i have the nerve to battle the internet once more today, there's more to come, too.

hope you enjoy! i'm off to catch up on housework, take a much needed shower and hopefully set up our new bicycle trailer.

the pledge

it's june 1st, a day i've been mentally preparing for the past couple of weeks. the reason today is special? it marks the first day of a 2-month long experiment for me.
i've decided to take the wardrobe refashion pledge.

the official rules as stated on the website are as follows...


1. No buying new! (handmade is excepted; So this allows for Etsy purchases etc!!) All clothing must be Recycled, Renovated, Preloved or Thrifted, or Handmade only for the term. Employment related and special needs clothing (ie sports, school), shoes and undies are excepted from the rules, although you are encouraged to have a go at making these.

2. In extreme circumstances, maybe a special event, or the worlds greatest and most amazing never to be repeated sale that you simply can not pass up, you may use the Get out of Refashionista Jail Free card. You are able to use this card once during the 2 month part of your contract; ie 1 for 2 months, 2 for 4 months etc. Of course you need to fess up on the blog and display the button!

3. You must post on the blog at least once a week to let the community know what you've been up to. This will not only give you brag points, but inspire and encorouge others! Of course you need to display the button on your blog and have copied the pledge in at least one post, and provide a link to your pledge under the button.

4. You need to be honest and admit when you've fallen off the Refashionista Wagon! Go directly to Refashionista Jail, do not pass GO and do not collect $200! Apply for parole once there.

refashioning has long been something of interest to me and i've collected several big moving boxes full of pre-loved (or not so loved) clothing in the past few years hoping that i'd one day put new life into these items and make them wearable again. once i really got into sewing though i unfortunately also really got into buying fancy new fabrics and so i created new items from scratch using new materials and those boxes have remained more or less untouched.

doing lots of thinking about consumer culture lately and having lots of interesting conversations with my awesomely driven creative and independent thinking husband i realize that i must try as best as i can to make use of the resources we have and that unfortunately the only way to change consumer culture is to avoid being a consumer of mass production whenever possible. even if that means being inconvenienced at times. so there are lots of "thinking outside the box" challenges ahead of me and i'm very much looking forward to facing them.

in addition of taking the pledge for clothing i've also promised myself that we as a family will take the spirit of no buying new! re-use! and less is more! to all aspects of life. over the next two months we will only purchase things we actually truely need or which will help enable us need less (i.e. we just spent 100 bucks on a bycicle cart to pull around the children in and will need to purchase new tires and small bits to get our bikes in running order so that we will have fewer reasons to use a car) and when we will try to purchase used items whenever possible.

i will post on the wardrobe refashion blog at least once a week about the wardrobe part of our experiment. if we make other cool discoveries or come up with cool anti-mass-consumption stuff i'll most likely post about it on our family blog.

so now here's the official part...

The Pledge

I, Karoline Stephens, pledge that I shall abstain from the purchase of "new" manufactured items of clothing, for the period of 2 months. I pledge that i shall refashion, renovate, recycle preloved items for myself with my own hands in fabric, yarn or other medium for the term of my contract. I pledge that I will share the love and post a photo of my refashioned, renovoted, recycled, crafted or created item of clothing on the Wardrobe Refashion blog, so that others may share the joy that thy thriftiness brings! Signed xxx.

more happy hippie pics

since either flickr has decided to hate me or this crappy internet connection and flickr can't work together, i'll try and upload more pics straight to the blog.
hoping that'll work. the quality won't be as high but once thee flickr situation is sorted out i'll add the full size images to our flickr collection.

so...




































btw, if any of you have considered buying a baby carrier but are afraid it's not worth it because you won't get to use it long enough...
joon was exhausted after water fun and wanted me to carry her home. i strapped her in the manduca and was very surprised how comfortable it was. sure, she's heavy. but it was totally possible. i hadn't carried her in over a year and it felt kinda nice having her ride on my back again. she fell asleep and i climbed across the little mountain between our house and the woods with a sleepy toddler on my back. that trip would not have been possible with a stroller.

so. buy that carrier! and once you're really done with it you can resell it for a very good bit of your initial investment.