Last night was hard on everyone. We are trying to help Claire learn to fall asleep in the crib. Hours of crying later, she’s either starting to understand or she was simply too exhausted not to sleep.
This morning she woke at 6 a.m., ate, played briefly, and fell asleep in the swing around 7:15. As of 11:15 she remains asleep, though she is stirring slowly awake.
All morning I tippy-toed around the living/dining/kitchen area, because the longer she sleeps, the better off we’ll be this afternoon. I make it a kind of game: how quietly can I open the refrigerator and extract the milk? Can I retrieve a knife to spread peanut butter without clinking other cutlery? Claire is such a light sleeper. My joints creak and crack (always have). Sometimes when I move and one cracks, it startles her in her sleep. Yet the hum of the dishwasher doesn’t. It’s the sudden abrupt sounds, even small ones, that penetrate her sleep.
We’re headed to M&K’s home for dinner. (They are the Emergency Backup Parents.) We’re bringing apple pie and pork-sage sausage stuffing. M&K are cooking the turkey and other goodies, and another family will be there with yummy food too. In all there will be six adults, two toddlers, and a baby in a small two-bedroom condo. Since Claire is good for about two hours of contented wakefulness upon awakening, this means that if she sleeps until 11:30, then wakes to eat, when we show up at 1:30 (when dinner will be served), she will be at the point of needing to nap. But she’ll be in a strange place with lots of stimulation, so either she’ll cry there, or she’ll be so stimulated that she’ll be awake for hours and then she, Husband, and I will pay with hours of crying later. I have struggled with wanting to stay home, to hide in my protected little bubble of familiar space and routine. But one must rise to the challenge, eh?
That’s the way of life with babies. It’s survivable. And dammit, I want some turkey!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Happy Thanksgiving, and a special first Thanksgiving to Claire.
Happy thanksgiving to you and yours. Here’s hoping Claire cooperated today and often when fussy babies are around other kids, they do get mesmerized.
Interesting that she doesn’t mind the dishwasher’s hum.
Have you ever packed her up in the car and taken her for a drive during one of her crying jags? Supposedly, the motion and sound of a car lulls almost all babies to sleep.
Do you have one of those sound machines? (that makes the sound of waves or crickets or babbling brooks or white noise depending on the setting you select) Maybe she’d find a repetitive sound like the waves, or a non-sound, like the white noise, soothing.
I’m not a mother so I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about. (smile)
I do know that my parents used the car trick when my brothers and I were babies. And my mother swears that it worked every time.
Happy Thanksgiving, friend.
I’m thankful for your friendship.
We try to take her in the car, but the problem is that she cries when we have to stop, and in the Bay Area, most of the traffic is stop and go. She’s happiest when we’re moving, but that’s a little tough to do here.
We do have a white-noise CD in her bedroom that plays constantly. We’re thinking about replacing it with a white noise machine. The thing is, I don’t want to give up the rest of the house to white noise. I want her to learn to sleep in her crib. And eventually she will. I will prevail. 🙂
I’m thankful for you, too. I hope you enjoyed the day.