Because blogging keeps me awake

I had three hours of sleep last night. I'm running on caffeine and sheer willpower. I can barely put a full sentence together. It is by the Grace of God that I haven't strangled anyone this morning.

Last night was bad. There was this awful line of severe weather with high winds and tornado threats moving through, and Joe was out in it picking up a conference participant at the airport. So, obviously I couldn't really sleep until I knew he was home safe. Then I was up another 45 minutes waiting for the heavy part of the storm to pass. Thunder is annoying. High winds, though, make it impossible for me to sleep.

I was just drifting off when Olivia woke up (after the bulk of the thunder had already passed) and said that the storm scared her. So I went to lay with her in her bed. She proceeded to toss and turn, wide awake, for the next three hours. At that point, I was so tired that I was sobbing. I put her on the couch and turned on the TV at 3:45 a.m., resigned to the fact that if she could be entertained by the TV, at least that meant I could get a couple of hours of sleep before I had to get up and face the day. Normally, TV in the middle of the night would NOT be an option, but IT WAS 3:45 A.M. AND I HAD NOT YET HAD ANY SLEEP. I was desperate.

Of course my desperation and sobbing woke my husband, who had been asleep about three hours at that point. He took matters into his own hands, trying to get Olivia to calm down and fall asleep. He finally succeeded about two hours later, only to have her wake up about an hour after THAT with a bad dream.

Needless to say, we are both very, very tired today. And Olivia gets to take a nap this afternoon, whether she wants to or not.

Recovery-wise, things are going smoothly. Olivia still complains of sore throat when she eats something scratchy, but otherwise she is acting and playing normally. Where she was breathing so loudly before surgery that we could hear her on the opposite end of the house, doors closed and TV on, she now breathes so quietly that we have to watch for the rising and falling of her chest to know she is breathing at all.

All this has translated to better overall sleep as long as nothing wakes her prematurely. That part could be a problem. Even after just six hours (of her usual eleven) of sleep last night, she was refreshed enough to stare wide-eyed at the ceiling for the better part of the night.

The other thing I've noticed is that she hasn't had a bedwetting problem since the surgery. She developed that problem around this time last year, when we started noticing her apnea symptoms. It is really too soon to tell since she was so dehydrated for several days following surgery, but she has been "normal" in fluid intake for the last few days, and still she stays dry all night. I'm thinking maybe she was too tired to get up and potty before. So I'm hoping that trend continues.

The huge downside is that she seems to have developed an allergic reaction to all food dyes. Everything is making her break out. Today is the first day in a week that we haven't dosed her with bena*dryl. We aren't sure that dyes are the cause, but it seems to be the common denominator. We are hoping that avoidance of all dyes takes care of THAT problem.

I am so, so tired.

The great drop-nap experiment

Remember last week when I said we were trying to drop the nap? It was so glorious for the first few days. Olivia trudged through the last half of every day, sort of kind of somewhat compliant and mostly just too tired to fight me, and then she'd immediately drop off to sleep at an unheard-of 7:30 p.m. bedtime and sleep a solid twelve hours. Awesome, right?

Well, yes and no. On Sunday, she was so exhausted that she fell asleep on the way home from Church, and there was no waking the kid. She was OUT. So we let her nap for 90 minutes and woke her up. She was more mischievous toward the end of the day than she had been in her previous few nap-deprived days. And it took about 25 minutes for her to fall asleep that night. But she didn't fight bedtime as hard and she was asleep by 8:30 (as opposed to the more normal nap-day bedtime of 10:00). Then yesterday she melted down about a billion times and kept injuring herself, so she bought herself another nap. Yesterday afternoon was better, and bedtime was pretty much like Sunday.

Today we are back to no nap. The kids are all here, so that means no nap for the three older ones. It's been a long afternoon. A lot of defiance from Olivia. But manageable. So I don't know. All I know is I can count on an easy bedtime. And that's what gets me through, friends.

I'm thinking this is just another of those really awful transitions that you just have to live through with little kids. We haven't had one in so long that it seems more painful. I mean, the transition from two naps to one was hard. And that was more than half her life ago. So, we're a little out of practice with transitions here.

Next up...drop the pacifier. Yes. She still uses it for sleep. Get off my back. If YOU lived with this kid, you would be holding onto anything and everything that might possibly get her to calm down too. I decided a long time ago that surrendering the beloved paci would be darned near impossible until we dropped the nap and got her so exhausted that she'd fall asleep without the dang thing. So, yeah. It's on the agenda. I'm thinking after the Christmas craziness is over.

The home stretch

The kids are all napping today. ALL. The no-nap experiment has been going amazingly well, but it seems that Olivia does still occasionally need a nap. Today, she injured herself four times in an hour...running into a doorknob, sliding off of her chair, bumping her toe on a wall, and hitting her shoulder on a doorframe. All injuries led to tears and wailing. Such clumsiness and overreaction to mild injury can only mean exhaustion. So, she sleeps.

She needs to get her rest now, because this week is going to be brimming FULL of activity. I babysit today and tomorrow. Then Wednesday we are delivering cookies to Daddy's coworkers, and that evening she plays "sheep" in our parish's Christmas pageant. Thursday we go "to town" for a lovely lunch with friends and a few errands. And Friday starts the ten-days-of-holiday-fun-and-excitement. Family, food, gifts, a wedding, more food, more gifts, cousins, playing, eating...

It will be a nice, if exhausting, week.

Friday thoughts

It's Friday, and I'm feeling pretty good. I have only 8 more days of babysitting after today. The kids are all asleep. We're going to our parish social tonight and to Olivia's Favorite Playground tomorrow. Lots to look forward to this weekend.

Olivia has slept through the night for the past four nights. She used to do it every night, but since Easter she's been imagining monsters regularly again, and she seems to be afraid of the dark. It had become a nightly ritual for her to come wake me up around 2:00 a.m. and make me sleep with her until she was soundly asleep again. But after four nights without this nightly sleep disturbance, I feel pretty good. And kind of spoiled.

You'd think that all that uninterrupted sleep would make her more cooperative and well-behaved. You'd be wrong. She has been pretty out-of-control starting an hour before nap and then again about three hours before bed. I don't know...maybe she's growing and getting tired more quickly.

Another explanation (for the behavior and for the sleep disturbances of late) might be apnea. I've been considering the possibility of having her evaluated. She is a loud sleeper, always sounding congested and occasionally stops breathing for a few seconds, so I guess it's possible. I've read that toddler apnea is usually caused by large tonsils and adenoids inside a small head. If that's the case, it would be easily solved. But I'm putting this off until we get BACK from Omaha because we have enough medical stuff to deal with in the next three weeks.

I'll be posting a couple of new videos here as soon as they can load. The first one is of Olivia's recent bowling experience...the first one where she was allowed to try all by herself. She LOVED it. The second video is of her rockin' out with her new inflatable guitar. That kid cracks me up.

Who's afraid of the big, bad...butterfly?

I woke up around 1:00 a.m. to shouts from Olivia's room. "Aaaauugh! No! Stop!" I ran to her room and found her shaking and terrified. Of what? "That butterfly is going to get me, Mommy! Make it stop!"

The "butterfly" in question was the shadow of the ceiling fan blades cast on the ceiling by the faint light from Olivia's night light. It was, to her mind, terrifying enough to keep her glued to her bed and shouting instead of running to our room as usual.

Since Christmas, Olivia seems to have developed a fear of the dark. She's doing better at going to sleep on her own as long as we check on her frequently and keep the hall light on. But more and more she's calling us back to her room because of something "scary", including monsters. I don't know where she came up with the idea of monsters, but there it is.

I'm thinking maybe it's time to leave a lamp on in her room. But I don't know if that will interrupt her sleep. It certainly won't eliminate the terrifying "butterfly" on the ceiling...

Weekend updates

Things are looking brighter around here. And not just because the sun has been glaring off the snow all day.

Olivia's stomach bug turned out to be just a 24-hour thing...less than that, in fact. By the time she woke up on Friday morning, her stomach was not bothering her anymore. By evening, she was pretty much back to normal (except for her lack of appetite, which she still doesn't have back). I think part of her quick recovery was the 4.5 hour nap she had in the afternoon. AND she went to bed at a reasonable hour, even after the marathon nap. Which leads me to...

Bedtime. So much better than I could have imagined. Last night was day four in the saga of teaching the toddler to fall asleep by herself. Day one was a ninety minute exercise in frustration during which Olivia jumped out of bed at least a hundred and thirty-seven times. But eventually she did fall asleep. On day two, she fell asleep in a half-hour, with only a couple dozen reprimands for getting out of bed. Day three was about the same amount of time, and we diagnosed a fear of monsters, which was remedied by turning on the hall light. Day four (last night), she did not get out of bed and did not make a peep. She just stayed quietly in her bed and fingered her blankie until she fell asleep. It took about 40 minutes, but the point is that she did it, without argument, while I sat on the couch in view of her open bedroom door and read a book.

I think she's starting to accept this process as the "new normal". And the angels sang for joy!

I'm sure we'll have setbacks, but I can see a light at the end of the tunnel. And I'm kicking myself for not trying this sooner.

Bedtime strategy

Well, last night we tried the whole idea of sitting outside of Olivia's room and just putting her back in bed every time she got out. After an hour of this, I got so frustrated that I started yelling, and Joe had to step in. He managed to get her to stay in bed, and a half-hour later she fell asleep by herself in her bed. And she slept through the night, which she's only done twice since Christmas (don't ask why, we don't know). And away we go.

We decided on this strategy of explaining to her that she'd need to be a big girl and sleep by herself and stay in bed, and then we'd keep our vigil right outside her room until she actually did fall asleep. Every time she gets up, we're supposed to put her back in bed without talking to her. She does the usual things..."Mommy, I need a kiss. I need socks. I need a blanket." We don't respond unless she gets out of bed.

Ultimately, I think this will eventually work. But we are going to have to be very, very patient for weeks until we have great success.

I'm still open to any suggestions. We've tried shutting her in her room, but she will get up and turn on the light and play, peeking out the door to get our attention so we'll come in the room and put her back in bed. It's a game for her. I think the key is to ignore her as much as possible and she'll (eventually) get the idea that bedtime is not playtime and we aren't playing her games any more.

Overstimulated

For the better part of a year now, we've been sitting with Olivia until she falls asleep...at nap and at bedtime. And instead of getting easier, it's getting harder. A lot harder.

Naptime isn't usually too bad. She tends to settle down quicker and fall asleep easier at nap. But nighttime... is awful. Last night, I tried the go-to-sleep routine with a light on to simulate the same conditions as naptime, and it still took her 90 minutes to give up the fight and fall asleep.

And a fight it is. It's not that she's not tired. She is. And letting her stay up and play longer isn't the solution because after 8:00 she becomes a meltdown monster. She runs around grabbing everything she's not supposed to have, climbs on anything she can find, does all the things she knows she's not allowed to do...and when she gets reprimanded she goes into full meltdown mode. So yeah. She's tired.

The problem is that she will do anything and everything she can to keep herself awake. Feeling warm and comfy? I don't want the blankets on me! Now that I'm blanket-free, I'm going to kick my legs around as fast as possible. Now that mom has me tied down with blankets, I'm going to see if I can pick stray threads out of my blankie and floss my teeth with them. Mom took blankie away? Now I'm going to take my pacifier out and toss it at the wall.

It is maddening. It's like she's in a desperate fight to stay awake...as if she feels compelled to avoid sleep. I don't know what else to do. Short of creating a sensory-deprivation box that contains nothing but a mattress (no sheets or pillows...they are playthings) and keeping it at 75 degrees so she doesn't have to wear clothes (also playthings) and locking her in there, I don't really know how to tackle this problem.

Any suggestions?

Dreary fall day, with moods to match

This week has been rough. The girls were tired and whiny and mean to each other all day Monday, a behavior trait that has re-emerged today. I know Olivia is tired. She went to bed too late and got up too early. I don't know what Addie's excuse is, except that her nap was too short yesterday, so maybe she's still affected. I try and try to keep Olivia on a good sleep schedule, but if a bad dream or a noise or something wakes her too early, there's nothing to do but go on with the day. She will rarely go back to sleep after 6 a.m.

So this morning was one long whine fest for Olivia, which was exacerbated by Addie's need to aggravate. Addie kept tackling Olivia to the ground and would just lay on her. Though Olivia is taller and stronger than Addie and could easily take her down, she opted to just lay there and whine louder. No matter how many times I separated them, the cycle would repeat itself.

All I can say is that the nap had better be a long one.

My husband will be home late tonight and tomorrow. I have plans to keep us occupied tomorrow. Addie is not coming tomorrow, so Olivia and I are going to do some fun stuff "in town". I don't feel like I can justify going anywhere tonight, since we'll be out all day tomorrow. But it's raining. And Olivia is full of whine. How will we get through the evening alone?

*Sigh*

I have finally started sorting through Olivia's birth records and mementos, placing them in plastic sleeves and putting them in a binder. I am creating a photo baby book (electronically, of course...I'm not patient enough to scrapbook this), complete with pics of Olivia's birthmother before and after birth in the hospital and the story of how we came to be her family. I still need to add text, but the photos are all there. I figure that the actual records plus the baby book equals a life book. I don't really know. I've never done this before. But I do feel better knowing that when Olivia is old enough to ask specific questions, the information will all be in one place instead of scattered between various boxes and drawers. And it's been really fun (if time-consuming) to scroll through the photo files from Olivia's first few months.

I'm off to work on my project-of-the-week. Happy Wednesday.

Sleep and babies

Olivia's cold has made it harder for her to fall asleep, and she's been playing some of those games kids play to keep themselves awake in bed. It's maddening. And last night, she woke up twice and came to our room. The first time was to find another pacifier, since hers went missing in her bed, but the second time was because she couldn't sleep.

I'm finding that I'm getting really good at falling asleep in her bed. I try to lay awake for awhile to see if she falls right back asleep, but more often than not, I'll fall asleep while she's still rolling around in bed and I'll wake up an hour or two later to find that she's sleeping peacefully next to me.

I'm hoping that this skill serves me well with baby #2, whenever he or she may arrive. It took me a LONG time to settle in when Olivia was little, waking at every little sound and checking on her when she wasn't making sounds at all just to be sure she was breathing. I don't think that will be such a problem the second time around.

Today is my Dad's birthday, and we were going to have family dinner at our house to celebrate. But it looks like we'll be celebrating at the hospital...my sister-in-law is in labor to deliver my newest nephew. Looks like Grandpa will have a birthday-buddy grandson.

We talked yesterday about Grandpa's birthday, so when Olivia woke up this morning, I asked her what today was. She answered, "It's Grandpa's happy birthday time!" Yes it is.

What you get on 4.5 hours of sleep.

I woke up at 11:30 last night (after having been asleep for only about 40 minutes) with the vague feeling that something wasn't right. Then I saw light coming from the kitchen and went in to find my toddler standing and staring into a brightly lit, open refrigerator. I don't know what she was looking for, but she settled for milk.

I spent the next two and a half hours waiting for her to fall back asleep.

These nights are few and far between, but they never fail to infuriate and exhaust me. I could not understand what would be running through her head to keep her from falling asleep. I dozed off at least a dozen times in the first hour, while she stared at the ceiling, wide awake. She did fall asleep a couple of times, but then she woke up shrieking in terror a few minutes later. It seemed that she was afraid to fall asleep.

Lest I excite her more, I could do nothing about this but lay there and fume. My mind kept repeating a mantra of "Please, please, please God, please, please, please help her fall asleep." I kept counting the hours I had left to sleep before I had to get up and greet Addie and face the day with two toddlers (one of whom would likely be throwing tantrums all morning because she didn't sleep well, ahem). As the clock ticked, I got more and more frustrated and upset about being trapped while my precious sleep hours slipped away.

And then something occurred to me. Two things, actually. It must have been a bit of Grace, a little glimpse from the Holy Spirit.

First, I realized that Olivia wasn't trying to be difficult. She was lying still and trying to get sleepy. She knew it was time to be asleep. But she was dealing with some sort of terror in her mind that I didn't understand, and my job as Mom was to be her calming presence until she could fall asleep and stay asleep.

Second, I realized that caring for a newborn was and will be a much greater disruption to my sleep than Olivia's occasional sleeping difficulties.

So, the next time I have to lay awake while Olivia tries to go back to sleep (and please, God, don't let it be soon), I will try to remember these things and be thankful for the fact that we usually all sleep very well, and also thankful that I have a toddler who finds me to be her greatest comfort in the night.

And now I'm going to go take a nap.

Missing Daddy

This week, my husband is involved in his biggest work event of the year, which involves three consecutive days where he leaves before we wake up and comes home after we've gone to bed. Next week, he'll leave on Wednesday for some work business and to attend a friend's wedding in a town 12 hours away, and he won't be home until Sunday. In between, we have several days of "normal" when he should be home at normal times, but I'm already feeling the effect of the Daddy absence.

As always happens when Daddy's not around, Olivia has been more irritable these past couple of days. She's less willing to nap and much harder to get to bed at night. It's exhausting.

It was especially exhausting tonight because she was OVERLY tired at bedtime and fighting it AND there was thunder to complicate the whole situation. I used to enjoy thunderstorms. Now they terrify me. I wake up in the middle of the night to the smallest rumble of thunder, and I have a hard time sleeping until I'm sure it hasn't bothered Olivia at all. She often doesn't even notice it, but there were a couple of times when she ran screaming from her room in a fit of terror, and the thought of that just rips my heart out.

Unfortunately, we've had a rather thunder-heavy summer, so thunder-related sleep deprivation is a rather common occurrence.

The combination of nap stubbornness and necessary errands have kept me away from my computer for the last two days. I'm sure next week will be rough too as we start adjusting to the babysitting schedule and having TWO toddlers in the house. Or maybe they'll wear each other out and leave me with a couple of hours to myself in the middle of the day. We'll see.

I don't have the brain power for any more coherent thoughts tonight.

Sick and hot, and a picture just to keep you interested.

Olivia has been waking up in the middle of the night and having a hard time getting back to sleep the past three nights. It was making me crazy because I couldn't figure out why she was having such trouble sleeping. And then it occurred to me yesterday that she sounded pretty congested and her nose was running a lot.

Yes, folks, she has a cold. A pretty nasty one, it seems. And it took me three days to figure it out because...I'm not sick. In fact, I'm breathing freely for the first time in three weeks now that my sinuses have finally calmed down. It just never occurred to me that she could be sick if I wasn't also sick. That has never happened before.

It seems to be a cruel joke that when kids are most in need of sleep (illness), they are least likely to be able to get a good night's sleep. It's hard to sleep when you can't breathe. But Olivia is already two hours into her nap, and I'm hoping that a good nap and lots of rest and fluids today will help her bounce back quickly. And maybe she'll sleep better tonight. No rest for Olivia means no rest for Mommy, and that doesn't help Mommy stay healthy either.

We had another Santa breakthrough this week. Olivia crawled up into Santa's lap. He's not so scary anymore.

Yeah, I'm sitting on Santa's lap. I don't know why you are all making such a big deal out of this.

I bought a cute new swimsuit for Olivia this week, and today would be the perfect day to try it out if she wasn't sick. It's going to be mid 80s and so humid that it will feel like 90s. On days like this, it's either pool time or indoor time. There is no comfortable activity beyond those two. And tomorrow promises to be way worse.

Maybe it's a good thing that we have an excuse to stay in and enjoy the air conditioning. We can play with puzzles and watch Lion King for the ten millionth time this week. I don't know why, but Olivia is obsessed with that movie. That, and Nemo. She LOVES Nemo.

A good Sunday

Olivia has been exceptionally good today. She slept in until 7:45...and on a Sunday, our only real day to sleep in! She was passably well-behaved at Church and wanted to kiss Mary before we headed home.
She fell asleep on the way home and is still sleeping. We'll have to wake her soon...it's been over 3 hours. We had sun and fun and outings with friends on Friday and Saturday, so she must just be exhausted.

I'm more and more surprised at how Olivia is getting to be really good at behaving. She still has her moments...often. But more and more, she's learning how to behave in Church and in public, and she's starting to listen when I tell her what she needs to do. She's turning into such a big girl right before my eyes.

It's rainy, the cable is out, and I'm sleep-deprived

After days of hearing about the "chances" of thunderstorms, our turn came around last night (after I finally broke down and watered the flowers...of course!).

Sometime after midnight, I was dreaming that I was wrapping Olivia's head with ace bandages so she couldn't hear the thunder that was pounding in my dreams. I woke up to the impressive light and sound show that inspired that dream. Olivia must have been in a deep stage of sleep because she slept through the first wave. The second wave was right on it's heels, though, and as I dozed and worried about her sleeping, the thunder claps increased. All of a sudden, I heard a terrified little squeal and dashed out of bed to find Olivia frozen and screaming in the middle of the living room. She was running in spurts between lightning flashes because they scared the bejeebers out of her. Seriously, with all the blinds open, she must have felt like she was under attack or something.

We talked a bit about thunder and calmed her down, and I went to lay in bed with her until I was sure the storms were gone for the night. Moments after she finally fell asleep, thunderstorm #3 started rolling in, and we were up again. Let's just say that this pattern did not allow me much restful sleep last night.

So our cable is out for something like the third time this month. And I'm done. I'm actively researching our options. "Free" antenna TV is back on the table, but I want to see what satellite has to offer. So I'm looking for input...which company do you use, and why? Are you happy with their service?

I'm going to take a nap now.

Toddlers shouldn't have their days and nights mixed up.

Last night was bad. I'm afraid that the events of last night have made me a bad Mommy this morning...grumpy and unwilling to compromise with the child. Because last night, just as we were getting in bed, Olivia woke up and came to our room. I went back to lay down with her and did not return to my own bed for four hours. That's right. FOUR. HOURS.

I know you are already bored out of your minds to read another post on sleep issues. She's been sleeping so well all week, but not last night. Let's just say that she did everything she possibly could to keep herself awake. She sang and bounced and cried and kept mumbling something about bees. I negotiated and threatened and cajoled until I was exhausted, at which point I collapsed and sobbed myself to sleep, waking up about ten minutes later to find that Olivia had finally, mercifully drifted off to dreamland.

I am exhausted. The truth is that I have no idea what the best technique is for getting Olivia to sleep. We have tried so many things, but the default position and the one that works most often is rocking. I hope I'm not still required to rock her to sleep when the next baby comes. I guess we'll just have to cross that bridge when we get there.

I'm off to nap. See you when I am better rested and more coherent.

A brighter day

I'm feeling much better today. It helped that Olivia slept through the night and woke at a decent hour (6:30). We started our day early with a shopping outing with Grandma. Olivia slept in the car on the way home and then - get this - STAYED ASLEEP FOR TWO MORE HOURS. In that time, I mowed the entire lawn and got started on planting one of my corner beds around the playset.

I'm telling you, that nap made all the difference. She went to bed tonight with little drama, and it only took me a half-hour to get her down. Plus, she was well-rested and agreeable for the whole afternoon, allowing me to finish a lot more planting (with toddler help, of course). Throw in an hour visit by Aunt Lori (who took Olivia off my hands and left me free to plant), and two of my three beds are planted. Yay!

Now, the trick is to find a way to get the well-rested child all the time.

Last week, when we were making the long drive to visit my brother's family, I was thinking that traveling with a little one is kind of like race car driving. A race car driver is always strategizing about how to maximize their speed, position, pit stops and such for the best possible outcome. With toddler travel, you are constantly calculating your moves in your head in order to maximize non-screaming drive time. Maybe she can stay awake until a certain exit and then we can eat at this place and then will fall asleep for the rest of the drive. Oops...looks like she's getting restless and won't make it that far. Stop in five miles, or can we tolerate the screaming for fifteen miles and stop where the gas is cheapest? Your start time for driving can also dramatically effect how well she'll sleep that night. It's all about calculations.

I think it's that way with the day-to-day schedule too. But the day-to-day is so hard to get just right. There are always errands, outings, appointments and things that get in the way. Not to mention the fact that we'd both go insane if we did the exact same thing every day and never went anywhere. She needs a certain amount of activity in order to be properly tired at bedtime. But too much activity makes it difficult for her to settle down.

These tiny people should really come with instructions.

In which I rip my hair out

Oh, internet friends, I need your help. I just put Olivia to bed. It took two hours and included a lot of tears (hers and mine).

I am beside myself.

Since Olivia learned to climb out of her crib, she has refused to go to sleep on her own. We transitioned to a bed (because if she's going to climb out, at least she won't be at risk of hurting herself), and things are pretty much the same as they were two months ago when this all started.

We started out rocking her to sleep. It worked OK...sometimes it took awhile, but it was relatively painless. Then she wised up the the whole rocking-puts-me-to-sleep routine, and now it doesn't work. Her eyes will start to droop, and then she will start kicking one or both of her legs furiously to wake herself up. This will go on until you try something else or until she passes out, and the latter can take HOURS.

Tonight, for instance...I had no doubt that she was exhausted. She behaved VERY badly in church, as a very tired child would, so I assumed that she would nap when we got home. She refused a nap, and then we were pressed into an unexpected errand, which resulted in a short car nap. So, naturally, I thought bedtime would be easier than normal because she was more tired than normal. Oh, so naive.

Tonight was not unique, though. Most nights are like this. MOST. It is getting exhausting. We have tried the following techniques to put her to bed:

• Lay her down and leave. Results: HA! As if.
• Rock her until she falls asleep. Results: Works occasionally. Usually results in a lot of "keep myself awake" writhing, swinging legs and efforts to free herself from Mommy's lap.
• Lay down with her. Results: She uses this as playtime and tries to see how many times she can climb on Mommy or kick Mommy before Mommy gets fed up and takes her back to the rocking chair.
• Sit next to bed and put her back in bed whenever she gets out. Results: This was a suggestion taken from someone who watches one of those Nanny shows. It does NOT work for us. Olivia thinks it is a game. It gets exhausting after putting her back in bed the 20th time. After about 137 times, I get so frustrated that I start snapping at her and have to resist the urge to yank her back into bed (the not so gentle and Mommy-like way). I hate this.
• Stand next to the bed and command her to keep her head on her pillow whenever she moves. Results: This was a suggestion from my brother with five kids, and it has actually been the most successful. For the times I've tried it, it usually gets her to fall asleep in about a half-hour, but it can be a LONG half-hour. Plus, I think that my sample is skewed because I had rocked her awhile before and it was a later-than-normal bed time. It gets exhausting because she will do basically the same thing as with rocking. She kicks her legs, changes positions, moves her pillow...and I start to lose my patience. I tried this tonight and had to say a million Hail Mary's to keep myself calm while watching her make a fool out of me by jumping around and climbing out of bed and disobeying. I worked furiously to resist the urge to spank her. I succeeded only by finally returning to the rocker and held her tight while she screamed until she passed out from sheer exhaustion.

I am tired of this. I may be more desperate tonight than usual because my husband just left for a 4-night business trip, so I don't have any back-up today, but still. Does anyone have ANY suggestions? She is not getting enough sleep and I don't get ANYTHING done at all (including blogging...have you noticed?) because I spend all the spare hours of my day trying to put her to bed. I will try just about anything.

She just passed out from sheer exhaustion

Olivia woke up around 4 a.m. and refused to go back to sleep. Instead, she climbed on and kicked me for two hours while I laid in her bed and tried to get her to settle down. She napped from 8-10 a.m., and I was determined to keep her up until bedtime.

Until my sinus pain and allergies decided to double-team me and make me not care anymore.

Olivia gets really clumsy when she's really tired, which has resulted in at least four Mommy rescues after she stumbled and fell into various hard surfaces. One of these resulted in one of those long, silent screams and a little (very little) bleeding.

So when she wanted to sit in my lap with pacy and blankie a few minutes ago, I consented. She fell asleep in two minutes. I'm waking her up in a half hour because a 4 p.m. nap? NOT IDEAL. And I need her to go to bed on time. I NEED that. I may be jeopardizing bedtime as it is. But the poor girl was so tired, and I couldn't imagine any other way to get her to survive into the evening.

*Sigh* Maybe she's affected by the air pressure and pollen too. If so, we are in for a long Spring.

Exhausted

Olivia woke up at 3 a.m., and I heard her in the living room, crying "Mommy!" with terror in her voice. Something spooked her to the point that she was afraid to walk much further in the dark in pursuit of Mommy even though she knows exactly where I am. It was probably nothing more than a car driving by or a gust of wind. She's rather sensitive to sounds during certain stages of sleep, and even more sensitive when she knows Daddy's not home. It makes me thankful that our house is built on a slab and we have no creaky floorboards, but there are still other sounds that can rouse her on occasion.

I laid with her in bed for an hour until she fell back asleep. She was obviously tired, but she needed the comfort of knowing that Mommy was RIGHT THERE. When she woke up, still fussy, at 6 a.m., I knew she was still tired. I pulled her into bed with me, and she dosed off right away.

The weather here has somehow become stuck on "ALL HUMID ALL THE TIME". I was not ready for this to happen until mid-June. I want to say "Rain already!" The air is heavy with moisture, and with the temperature climbing it is not so comfortable around here.

When Olivia wakes up from her nap, she's going to want to go outside. I'm not ready for the onslaught of pollen AND humidity today. Please, rain, show up so I have an excuse to stay in.