How to make a ghetto toddler toy
 |
| Wash out an old sour cream or margarine container |
 |
| Hoard a ton of bread tags (or buttons, if you are fancy) |
 |
| Cut a slot in the top of the container |
 |
| Drop bread tags into the slot! So fun! (No, YOU’RE a total slot. Haha.) |
 |
| Fun, free toddler entertainment! |
 |
| Here is a covert shot I took in church of D playing with his new toy. He loved it! |
Quick update
Today’s myringotomy seemed to go well, and D is in excellent spirits!
The hospital warned us he would probably be tired and nauseated, but other than the first 30 minutes or so post-surgery, he’s been pretty much his usual self.
He ate Goldfish crackers and cheesies on the ride home, along with apple juice and a popsicle. He even ate a decent amount of rice and carrots at dinner. I’m SO glad he is doing well.
Longer post on the procedure is coming, for those of you whose kiddos might also be undergoing a myringotomy. All in all, I’m so relieved it’s over, and I’m so proud of my brave little toaster.
xoxo
Surgery day
We are about to go into the hospital for D’s ear surgery.
Nervous stomach is in full effect. He’s just so little. I’m starting to get freaked out. How am I going to leave him alone with doctors and nurses he doesn’t know?
Prayers and positive thoughts for our little D are appreciated!
The best day
Yesterday was my 29th birthday — hmmm, had better update the blog’s sidebar description to reflect that! — and it was pretty darn amazing.
It felt like the best birthday I’ve had in ages, and I think that is because of several reasons:
- I wasn’t stuck doing all of the monotonous everyday chores (diapers, dishes, cooking, laundry) that consume a LOT of time in my daily life
- I got to eat out at breakfast, lunch, and supper (VERY SPECIAL AND AWESOME)
- I got to go on a real date with Darling Husband (dinner and pool-playing)
- I got some very thoughtful, lovely, awesome presents that I REALLY wanted
- So many phone calls, texts, emails, tweets, and Facebook messages made me feel very special
I think as mothers — especially mothers of very young children — we are so accustomed to doing everything and BEING everything for everyone else, that we forget what it’s like to do or be anything just for ourselves.
I mean REALLY forget.
So when all of a sudden, there is a day when you are showered with gifts and attention, and people are telling you how much you deserve it, how hard you work, etc. you are … shocked. And it’s really wonderful, but just … so different! So nice! Wow, SO GREAT!
My birthday was exactly such a day, and it was a good reminder that I don’t (shouldn’t) need to go 364 days before feeling like that again.
I need to carve out more time for myself, and find little ways to capture that feeling of appreciated and deserving. Deserving of a cupcake, alone at naptime, or of taking an hour to paint my nails. Deserving of a thoroughly awesome date out with Darling Husband, where we can talk uninterrupted.
I deserve it.
My family deserves me at my best.
And I need days like this in order to BE at my best.
 |
| My delicious Black & White cupcake (thanks, Little Sis) that I ate during naptime, while watching delightfully trashy reality television shows about teenage moms. And then I painted cupcakes on my nails, and it was kind of the best thing ever! |
Where there’s a will, there’s some sleep
It seemed like D would never sleep well. Do you remember that? He was a very, very, very bad sleeper.
He would wake up every two hours all night, and it very slowwwwly increased until we hit four-hour stretches.
I was a bleary-eyed zombie every day. I thought I would never feel rested again.
It wasn’t until D was 13 (THIRTEEN!) months that he slept through the night. And I started feeling normal again.
(Then, of course, I got preggo again that month, so I knew my sleeping days were numbered — and all the more precious!)
I blamed D’s sleep habits on breastfeeding. I was sure that he was waking up so often because he was hungry, so I would nurse him.
I’m not saying that was a great idea or a horrible idea. It’s just a fact. It got him back to sleep, and so I did it. I would have done ANYTHING (short of giving him an elephant tranquilizer) to get some sleep.
When we stopped breastfeeding at 13 months, BOOM! He slept through the night. He turned into an incredible sleeper, and he still is.
These days, he goes to bed between 8 and 8:30 p.m. and sleeps straight through to around 8 a.m. LOVE IT.
Of course, I wonder if he would have done that earlier if I had been a little tougher about the midnight boobage, but mainly I just thank God he’s finally a good sleeper.
And now we have C.
She is a very different child from D. From the beginning, she has slept longer stretches. She has needed to nurse much less in the night than her brother (a.k.a. she is my favourite — j/k).
However, C is colicky, and D was not.
And that makes a huge difference.
With D, I was up every couple of hours all night, but he went down for the night reasonably early. He was a good-natured little guy for the most part, and didn’t have a problem getting to sleep (just staying asleep).
With C, she spends a good chunk of her evening crying and fussing. Every evening. And she will not sleep.
She will just demand to be carried around while draped over your arm, face-down, while you make shushing sounds loudly, jiggle and dance, and hold a soother in her piehole.
Last night (technically EARLIER THIS MORNING), it was 12:30 a.m. when I finally got her to sleep and collapsed into my own bed. I was up feeding her at 5, and then brought her into our bed to feed her at 7 (and have been awake ever since).
Despite last night, C has shown signs of getting better. There have been a couple of nights when I got her to sleep around 9:30 or 10. I know it will get better. At some point.
I am writing this post to myself as a reminder that at some point, C WILL go to sleep at the same time as D.
There WILL be a magic time when I put them BOTH to bed, and they both WILL sleep through the night.
It will be my choice how I spend a few whole HOURS of time in the evening, because I won’t be pacing and jiggling a crying baby until after midnight.
Not sure when that day will come, but I just have to remember that it WILL.
As featured on …
Heather's Handmade Life 