I Try Everything Until It Works. That's What's Called Bonding.

I never thought I'd be one of those moms who guards her baby's sleep like a patrol officer. "No, don't touch him, he's sleeping!"
"Sssshhhhhh, don't make so much noise!" Evil mother eyes glare.
"Gooodddd!" I lament in a whisper, shaking my head, "Don't kiss him like that, you'll wake him up!" All of a sudden daddy becomes the perpetrator.
"If you wake him up you're going to have to deal with the consequences!!!" I've never threatened my husband so sincerely. He looked at me with fear.

What are the consequences? Usually they are the ultimate challenge of your patience and endurance; and usually daddy will always hand baby off before even entering round two. "Mamma," daddy has such a gaze of desperation, 'Bruno's hungry," he sings this as if to soften his defeat.
"He just ate!" I yell. "How do you think I know how to handle him? Because I try everything until it works. That's what's called bonding!"

But I'm not upset with daddy. He works twelve plus hour days, five days a week, providing Bruno and I the luxury of bonding together. But babies are twenty-four hour machines, like the energizer bunnies that keep going and going and going. I've learned a new meaning of perseverance. I've learned how persistence will lead you towards the breaking point -- the entry point -- even if something so trivial as trying to get Bruno to sleep in his bassinet during the day time takes me three days of trying the same routine over and over again. I persevere.

I've learned a new meaning and feeling of success. When you struggle for something so hard, like getting your baby to sleep in/on anything else other than you just so you can eat lunch or dinner, and you finally succeed . . .the sense of accomplishment is unrivaled.

I never give up, and I never assume that just because he was cranky during lunch, or in his bassinet, or woke up in the middle of his walk and I have to stop every five minutes to hold him until we arrive home a mile later . . . I never assume that he will repeat the same action again the next time. I never let that stop me from going out to lunch with friends, or taking another long walk. And when the hoped for moment that he is an angel happens, it's the best moment in the world. The other moments I call bonding time. The other moments of trying to comfort him in a million different positions I rationalize as muscle toning after a long pregnancy. It's amazing how moms do become like octopuses. I use my feet sometimes as often as my hands and have discovered that I can even hold things using the space between my neck and shoulder, using my mouth, my two feet together and even my knees. Basically . . . moms make it happen, no matter what.