PANTS.

So, we've been battling some seriously bad sleep in our house.  To anyone who's shocked: welcome to my blog!  I'm glad you've stopped by.  My interests include running and making babies that never sleep.  To the rest of you: sorry.  I know.  it's so tiresome.  but this one is interesting!  Because it's all about how stupid I can be!

Because, see, I do This Thing, where a piece of information enters my brain, and something flickers and tells me it's significant, but I choose to dismiss it.  I really think there should be a name for that phenomenon, because although my skillz are exceptional, I know everyone does this.  This happens to me allll the time at work, I figure stuff out and don't say anything, and then it turns out the thought I had was right and nobody believes me because I didn't say anything. Another, less flattering example: when Grace was about seven or eight months old, she woke up in the middle of the night, at a time when she'd mostly stopped waking.  I got her out of bed and it was like nursing a little chunk of asphalt.  Damn, I thought, I really need to turn on the air conditioning, it's hot in here!  The next day, I kept thinking, jeeeeez kid, what the heck?  Stop WHINING!  And then?  After I'd dragged her all over kingdom come, running errands, I took one look at her sitting in the shopping cart, with red-rimmed, glassy eyes, saw her let out a big heavy sigh, and thought, "oh my SHIT, she is SICK.  Mommy fail.  NURSE FAIL!!!! AUGH!"  And yes, she had, like, a 432 degree fever.  So my point is, I'm sometimes a little slow on the uptake.

...whiiich is important to the story.  Because for the last week or so, Katie developed the extremely (un)charming habit of waking upwards of six times a night, waking only a few times a night but staying awake for an hour or more (a true Gracie special), and generally sleeping horribly all-around.  Which did not exactly have a positive impact on her personality.  About a week ago, I scooped her and was nursing her when I thought, dang, her little legs are COLD.  Here, let me just warm them up on my warm belly.  And put her back to bed.  Lather, rinse, repeat, ad finitum. 

And then?  A few evenings ago, it occurred to me: PANTS.  Who the hell can sleep when they're cold?  Yeah.  So I put pants on the poor kid before she went to bed.  She woke up twice that night.  Since she slept well, her naps were also better (although that is another story for another day, right there).  Was it a fluke?  Nope.  Next two nights, same thing.

The secret is pants. 

(OK.  the secret is not freezing your baby.  But for a massively SIDS-paranoid person like me, I prefer to think of the secret as pants rather than warmth.)

Walt Disney Was a Sick, Sick Man.

This morning on the news, they were talking about sad movies*, which of course necessitated showing some of the most gut-wrenching clips in movie history.

And you know how, when you were little, it was really sad and kind of scary when Bambi's mom died?

Yeah.  Try watching it after you have kids, when he's wandering in the snow and calling for his mom, and you know she's not coming.  I DEFY you to sit through that without wanting to curl up in the fetal position and vomit for awhile.

*I don't actually know the point of the story, because before they could get to it, they started showing Debra Winger saying good bye to her sons, and I had a psychotic break.

5

Remember when I was pregnant, and every time I posted an update, I was all, "ZOMG, I know this will shock you, but this pregnancy is SO DIFFERENT from the first one!!"  And eventually, you were all like, "yeah, DUH, you've mentioned that before"?? 

The new theme is "WTF, how has it been X many months already?!?!?"  Because, seriously, wtf, this kid's first year is flying by at the speed of light.  And I know I keep saying this, but how on EARTH has it been five months?  That's almost half a year!

We had another big month around here.  Katie started eating peas, along with her cereal (and her secret watermelon), which she seems to like so far.  Our girls are eaters, what can I say?  She's starting to tripod sit, although she still refuses to roll from her back to her tummy.  She's started doing That Thing Gracie used to do with towels, blankets, random you-name-it fabrics, where she pores over them as if they hold the secrets of the universe.

She took her first trip to the beach!  She did not like Lake Michigan.  Maybe she shares my utter disgust with natural bodies of water?  Smart girl.

She does not sleep.  Ever.  Well, ok, no.  She does okay overnight.  She wakes up two or three times, and at least once a night pulls a total Gracie and stays awake for an hour, hour and a half, like it's time to party.  She will occasionally sleep past 6, which is awfully nice.  She does not, however, nap.  This weekend she took no naps at all, unless you count sleeping in the car or the twenty minutes on my chest (which I do not).  A typical nap is half an hour long.  Forty five minutes is great.  An hour is unheard of anymore.  But eh, we don't make babies that sleep, and once they hit toddlerhood, they generally do okay.  It's more frustrating when she's crabby as a result- for the last few days, she's been so overtired, it's like having a colicky newborn all over again, with the constant walking, the screaming every time we sit down, needing to be singing and playing with her and giving her 100% of our attention.  But this, too, shall pass.  Right?  Yeah.  it's all good.

The thing is, I don't have that much to say that's terribly interesting.  She's adorable and dimply and she likes to eat and play with her feet and doesn't like to sleep or play by herself and her big sister loves her like crazy and she's just awesome and even though it's only been five months, she must have always been here somehow, because I don't know what we ever did without her.

Gratuitious Gracie Shots

it's the damndest thing, she covers her face and she's GONE.

Ah-PRISE!!!

"NO, Mama.  I not want say cheese anymore."

CHEESE!! (just seconds after the previous picture.  She's a waffler, that one.)

Rolls

Check out that chub.  I took that picture because, for an entire year, before and after she was born, those rolls were 100% courtesy of moi.  It's kind of an amazing, crazy feeling.  I just wanted photographic evidence.

Now, though, we've started oatmeal.  And, I mean, just a few bites every night, so it's not like that is really packing on the pounds or anything.

She took to the spoon really well.  I was so sure she wasn't ready, that we'd try once, shrug and say, okay, maybe next month.  But she ate every last morsel with no tongue thrusting and only minimal loss of oaty goodness.

As you can see, she was a big fan.  Soooo, we're officially on solids.  For the first few weeks, it's just oats at dinnertime, and we'll ramp it up from there.

I, uh, may or may not have cheated on that....

But come on!  Watermelon season doesn't last forever!  And I am not made of stone.  Watermelon was an even bigger hit than oatmeal.  I know, you're shocked.

I Made Gwammy!!

Yesterday, getting ready for naptime, I ran some of Grace's stuffed animals upstairs while she played downstairs.  When I got back downstairs, she said, "I made Gwammy!!" 

....huh?  Gracie's speech is still frequently unintelligible, but I knew what she was saying here, and she was saying she made Grammy (excuse me, Gwammy).  Since that made, um, zero sense, I just smiled and said, "Okay!!" (as I frequently do when I have no earthly idea what the kid is talking about.) (Mother of the Year!!) 

She persisted in saying it, even after I'd acknowledged her, which is also not unusual, but then she grabbed me and dragged me back to the windows in the dining room.  This is what I saw:

I'll be damned.  She made Grammy.

Grace approaches the world at her own pace.  She rarely does anything ahead of schedule.  It doesn't matter, for the most part.  I know it doesn't.  But seeing her draw a face at 2.5 years old, even though I KNOW she was taught how to do it by her retired-teacher Grammy?  I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty cool.  While we were still standing there, she picked up the crayon and said, "Oop-ees, pants!  onnnnne pants, twoooo pants!"  and drew legs.  And my head, she exploded.

Now the only issue is getting her to stop drawing on the damn windows.

It MOSTLY works, though

For the most part, this is going well.  It really is.

But there are still days that suck so very, very hard, that there is just flat-out no way I'm going to enjoy them.  There's not a chance in hell I"ll look back on them fondly, or wish I'd enjoyed them more. 

Today is one of those days.  Not even for any terribly interesting or unique reasons, just because my younger child has decided that mom can sleep when she's dead, but of course, that means my youngest child is not sleeping, and let's just say she's not going to win any personality contests right about now (though she could TOTALLY win a screaming contest) and I am exhausted and worn down and I've just had it.

I'm really completely cool with wishing today away.  I just wish it, you know, worked.