Admitting Is The First Step

Homegirl is almost 1-year-old and still not sleeping through the night consistently. There, I said it. I am owning it and admitting it.

"Oh my child is 5 months and is sleeping 12 hours a night. It's such a beautiful thing. I don't know how I could go on without the sleep." It's statements like these that make me want to bodyslam people. Apparently it's not a very normal thing that a baby who is almost a toddler isn't sleeping through the night. But at least we're not like we used to be: wake up, play for three hours, then back asleep. Now she wakes up, we change her buns, and give her a bottle, and *poof* back to sleep.

And yes, we let her have her bottle in bed. I can already feel the scornful looks from you mothers who are against this. But you know what? At 3:30 in the morning, I am in no mood to bottle feed Nyla. I love my child, desperately. But I swear the day she learned to hold a bottle by herself was the best day of my life. It will only be trumped when she is potty-trained.

So we've got about two weeks until Nyla turns 1..don't even get me started on that subject! But here comes 14 days, and in those 14 days, I'd like to get this sleeping business under control. I doubt that's in Nyla's agenda though. We will see!

The Pack-N-Play

Nyla has a new favorite habit: she loves to throw things out of her Pack-N-Play. She loves to launch her toys across the room. Who would've known that babies can throw so well?

Her favorite time to unload her area is in the morning. She sits to drink her juice and I think she starts to strategically plan out her throws. Within ten minutes, she has the whole living room strewn with toys, blankets, teddy bears, and books. She likes having so much stuff with her just so she can chuck it out onto the floor.

It's all good though, because her second favorite thing to do is pick everything up and give it to me. Nyla just loves picking up stuff, one by one, and bringing them to me (or whoever is with her). She will pick up anything just to bring it to someone, and within a very short time, you will have a two-foot stack of stuff next to you. From there, it's my job to put the stuff away. At least she's considerate enough to bring all the stuff back.

Hopefully This Won't Last

Our morning routine is the following: Nyla wakes up, I go to change her diaper, and then she hangs out in her Pack-N-Play and drinks some juice. She is still wearing her pajamas because we don't change those until after she eats breakfast, just in case feeding time is disastrous. 

The other morning, she had on her two-piece pajama set and was happily playing by herself. Then the monster came out and she was not amused to be in her Pack-N-Play. "Nyla, let me finish washing these dishes and then I'll get you" I called to her. Apparently she didn't like this answer at all, because when I got over to her, she had kicked her pants off. She was so irritated, she took off her pants.

Let's hope this isn't a little habit that she carries through her life. I can just see it: she'll be in 1st grade, a kid will get on her nerves, and homegirl will take her pants off and be ready to fight. *sigh* What am I going to do with this girl? 

I Thought She Liked To Read

You know, common sense is apparently not my strong suit. I think to myself, "Oh, Nyla really likes to read and look at these wonderful cardboard books that she can't tear! Let's get her some of these." This little idea worked for a few months. Then Miss Thing learned how to chew books and gnaw pieces off.

Now we have a whole litter of books that look like this:

And those missing pieces off of the books? She eats them. If we don't pay super close attention to her, she will completely mush the cardboard and swallow it, which is followed by some super dramatic coughing and a regurgitation of the book. Mmm...nummy.

I guess it's time to find an alternative to these cardboard books. The library has these Indestructible Books brand that we may have to try.

Her Favorite Things

Like Okie, we have taught our daughter some tricks to do to impress people. Yes, I am comparing our daughter to our dog. They know similar tricks! Here is a list of Nyla's favorite things to do on a daily basis, including some of her tricks:

1. Roll over onto her back and chew on her toes
2. High five*
3. Sit down (on command)*
4. Give kiss*
5. Hold hands*
6. Walking, almost running, away from mommy
7. Climbing up stairs
8. Speaking words: mama, baba, baby, pretty (really just comes out ppppttttfffsshshhh, but I understand)
9. Sliding downstairs
10. Pulling out all the pots and pans, slamming them around, and then leaving them all over the house
11. Standing at the windows giving herself kisses...needless to say, there are tongue and lip marks on all the windows at about the 36" height
12. Hiding our cell phones

Oh, the asterisk denotes that Okie can do those tricks too! See, we love our girls!

Slow Down, Life

I just cannot believe that 11 months have gone by since we welcomed Nylabelle into this world. In 30 days, she is going to turn 1. It's impossible for me to wrap my head around this. I feel like it was just yesterday that she was born; but then again, it seems like lightyears ago that we were brand-new parents with a 2-week-old baby. It was just yesterday that I was waddling around with a humongous belly, but I can't really remember being pregnant (if that makes sense). All those sleepless nights were difficult and long to endure, but now looking back, I feel like I blinked once and she was grown.

I don't want my life to go by this fast with her. I don't want our lives to go by like this. We're going to turn around and she's going to be going to kindergarten. I feel like I waited for Nyla forever, and now that she's here, life is just going to fly by. That's not fair. I get very teary when I think about how fast this year has gone and how fast our lives will inevitably go. I just need to remember to stay in the moment with our little family.

The Problem With Think-Alizing

Hmph. Grumpy Mommy doesn't really cover what I am today. Our sweet girl (I say "sweet" loosely) wasn't having anything to do with sleeping last night. We put her down around 9:30 and she did okay. Did I go to sleep? No. I was having a hell of a time falling asleep last night. I should have taken that as a premonition of what was to come.

Then it was a midnight wake up and she didn't want to go back to sleep just with rocking. I, on the other hand, rocked myself to sleep and was awoken by Nylabelle slapping me on the face. Isn't she sweet?

Okay, new strategy: bottle!  That didn't work either. It was time for me to pull out the big guns: the projector and music! We went into her room and I turned her projector on, put her in her crib, and I climbed into the spare bed in her room. I just lay there perfectly still and she seemed to respond well to me just being in the room. She would pop up from time to time to make sure that I was still there, but for the most part, she was laying down. I thought to myself, "Ah, I'm home free!"

Therein lies the mistake. I feel like my motto about life is this: when you verbalize (or think-alize) something, it will not come true.

Not even an hour later, she was up and crying...again. There comes a time where a mother must know when to surrender. I put up my white flag and pulled her into bed with me. She knocked out! I mean, O-U-T, down for the count, asleep. "Oh yes, Elizabeth! She's going to sleep forever!" There I go again, think-alizing. Guess who was up at 7:14am trying to crawl all over? Miss Thang.

Needless to say, Mommy is tired.

PS: yes, I understand that think-alize is not a word. Let's just be humorous about it.

Awkward

Our girl has an innate ability to make people feel kind of awkward. Last night at dinner at Shari's, Nyla wanted to walk to every table and just stare at people. She would literally just stand there and stare; no smile, no waving, nothing. She just stood at their table and stared at them.

The people at first were like, "Oh you're so cute! Hi baby! Hi sweetie!" But after 30 very awkward seconds of no reaction, they would casually turn back to their dinner. Did Nyla move? No. Just stood perfectly still and continued to stare. What a weirdo! I love it!

Nyla in public is a sight to see, for sure. She walks, she grabs things, she tries to put everything in her mouth, and she laughs. That is until someone notices her, then she turns into a statue. And the look on her face says, "Oh, puh-leeeze."

Our WWE Star

Last night, I tried something new with Nyla at bedtime. Usually we put her to sleep with a bottle then transfer her to her crib. Now that homegirl is pushing 25 pounds, she's getting a little heavy to transfer down to her mattress. Last night when she finished her bottled, she wasn't all the way asleep; she just had drowsy eyes and was mumbling to herself. So I thought to myself, "Okay Elizabeth, let's put her in her crib and just lay down on the bed in the room." I turned on her projector and put her in her crib. She cried a little bit, but I kept my cool and just relaxed on the bed that's in her room. She realized that I was still in the room and calmed down and started to watch the projection. And then, our WWE star emerged.

All of a sudden, she was rolling all over her crib. Nyla went from being perfectly still to this roly-poly of an animal. She was turning over onto her back and putting her toes on the top rail of the crib. She would drop them, then furiously roll to the other side and stand up and start to bounce in her crib. Side to side, she was making her way all the way around her crib, pushing her mattress, pulling at the bumpers, sitting up on her knees then falling backwards and bouncing on her back. The whole time she was talking talking talking! She was just too funny.

I think when she gets into a real bed, we're going to have to make it a wrestling ring. Watch out, world! SummerSlam 2031 is going to be a good one! :)

Dreams Do Come True!

Last night Nyla slept for 13 hours...13 HOURS. She isn't feeling 100% and last night around 6:30, she started having an all-out breakdown. Crying, fussy, just in a stinky mood. I thought that I would rock her in the chair and she would fall asleep. That worked! I thought that she would sleep for maybe an hour

Still Counting

For the 328th day in a row, I got poop on my fingers while changing Nyla's diaper.

That pretty much sums up our lives together. Happy Thursday everyone!

Dirty Looks

Okay, moms of Baby Reading Time at the library. I was late today! Get over it and stop giving me dirty looks! "Oh look at that pathetic mom. She's late! Ugh, disrupting my 6-week-old's developing reading skills time." Get over yourself and your child. He just barfed on his blanket.

Today was the first time we went to Baby Reading Time at our library, and it really was fun! Nyla loved it and had a good time. I was a whopping three minutes late and was looked at like I had just interrupted the President speaking. Hello, I'm sorry. You all should understand! Thankfully, after the momentary side-eyes I was getting from everyone, they all went back to playing with their babies.

Since it was our first time, I felt like an idiot. Everyone else knew the words to the songs. Everyone else knew the movements/actions you were supposed to do with your baby. Everyone else seemed to know exactly what to do at what moment, except for me. I was lost. So on top of being late, I was also wrong with my moves and my song lyrics and my vocal tone. Disastrous. There is literally nothing more diminishing of one's spirit than not participating at the standard, you know? I felt great about being there; I was happy and excited to play with Nyla and listen to a story with her. But once the songs and movements started and everyone knew it but me, I felt the size of an ant and wanted to run for cover.

Thankfully the lady leading the group was really kind and didn't make me feel like a moron at all. And really, it's not about me is it? It's about my Nylabelle and she walked around and played with other kids and had a great time. That's the important part for me! Next week, though, I'll be on-time and prepared and ready to fa-la-la-la with all of them.

Here's the thing, though: when everyone was reading or singing along with the leader and their baby, I felt like I was among alien lifeforms. They were all speaking in baby tones and giggling and like in the zone with their baby. I mean a full circle of 15 or so adults just in a trance with their child. I felt like they were almost possessed by baby-ness. Am I supposed to be this way? Creeeeeeeeeeepy. I love Nyla, but I guess I just express it in a different way.