Thursday, January 10, 2008

If nothing else, at least I know I'm not crazy

To those of you who still have advice for the sleep situation and are holding out on me, please continue to comment on that. Whether it ends up being helpful or not, it's good to know that there are others out there dealing with the same situation.

Yesterday was better. For some reason, the princess decided that yesterday was nap day, and she took two super-long naps at the sitter's house. She settled in for a couple of short naps after I picked her up last night, but the important thing is she went down for the night with relative ease and slept a six hour stretch before getting up for her nighttime bottle. And, for the SECOND night in a row, she went back down after that nighttime bottle and put herself to sleep.

Yes, I am amazed.

Oh, she fusses a bit, but mostly she just talks to herself until she's bored and just drops off to sleep. Now if we could translate this into her pattern for naps and going down for the night, then we'll be in good shape.

Last night, I had to pack away five more sleepers that Olivia has grown out of. Two of them were among my favorites...the type that get a lot of wear because they are just so darned CUTE. But, alas, the baby is GROWING, and now she's too long for these, and as I was putting them away it occurred to me that she will never be that tiny again. Aauuughhh! Yes, I want her to grow out of this crazy fussy stage, but where did my tiny sweet little baby go?

Luckily, we have a constant supply of next-size-up clothes. Some friends of ours have designated us as the recipients of their daughter's hand-me-downs. Since their daughter is a few months older than ours, we are constantly supplied with lots of cute outfits and sleepers that are barely worn. These are on loan until Olivia grows out of them, and I think this is a FABULOUS idea! Babies at this age grow out of their clothing in about 20 minutes, so why be forced to constantly buy a whole new wardrobe? I'm thinking we should start a baby network among friends here and start doing the clothes swap thing for everyone. This works for cribs and changing tables too, especially among couples who space their kids by a few years. Saves on storage space and someone else gets some use out of it in the meantime. Yeah, this won't work for people who want everything new and special and matching (like furniture) for their baby, but we are into being economical, people! Besides, if the rest of the furniture in our house doesn't match, I see no reason why the baby's furniture should. She can't even see past the footboard of her crib right now anyway. And someday she's going to be very happy that Mommy and Daddy put all that extra money into her college fund instead of new clothes and matching furniture.

What do you think?

1 comment:

HereWeGoAJen said...

Good idea on the stuff sharing! I bet you get a lot of takers. I think I will attempt that too, eventually.