July 26

I finally caught some of Isla's smiles on camera! She is also starting to make more happy sounds...i.e. sounds that are not grunts or cries.

It is so rewarding to see her smiles and hear those happy sounds, however brief they may be. Those first few weeks were so hard because she never seemed happy. We worked so hard to keep her fed and rested and content, and it just never seemed to be enough. Audrey was the same way as a newborn, and I just kept asking myself with both of them, "What if she doesn't like me? What if she is going to be grumpy like this forever? What if she never smiles? What if something is wrong with her?"

Obviously, those are silly worries, and I should know better this time around. But between the sleep deprivation and general stressfulness of life with two little ones, it's easy to forget how short-lived this period of life will be. But then I get a glimpse of these sweet, smiling face, and all of those silly worries are quickly forgotten!!

July 25

Tonight, Audrey wanted me to take pictures of her and all of us. It turned into a fun little family photo shoot. If I would have known we would be taking so many pictures, I would have combed Audrey's hair and put some clothes on her!!




The sleep saga with Audrey continues. Nap time seems to be the biggest struggle. Today she was in and out of bed for 30 minutes, she screamed for 30 minutes, and then I let her come out of her room. Almost immediately, she fell asleep on the couch and slept for an hour and a half there. She was obviously tired, but she refused to sleep in her room. She is showing us her stubborn side!

Bedtime was better...she only got up once and she was asleep (on the floor by her bed) by 8:30 (about 30 minutes after we started the process). Last night, Audrey slept through the night and Isla slept all the way until 4:30...hopefully we will all sleep that well again tonight!!

July 24

We were feeling adventurous tonight, so we took both girls to the Muni to see Hairspray.

I was kind of nervous about taking a 2 year old and a 2 month old to a 2 1/2 hour long show that started 30 minutes after the 2 year old's bedtime! But it went fairly well.

Audrey was super excited to go see a show! Daniel has taken her to a few rehearsals for Hairspray, so she sort of knew what to expect. (Daniel is on the board of directors for the Muni and is in charge of all the sound, so he occasionally drops in on rehearsals and occasionally takes Audrey with him).

I knew she wouldn't be able to follow the plot of Hairspray. And I knew most everything would go over her head (which was a good thing in some cases!). But she did like the dancing and singing and especially the lights. If you asked her about the show, she would probably tell you about the lights. Every time the background lights changed color, she would point it out. "Ooh, blue! Oh Yellow! Yellow is my favorite!" At the end of every song, she would always say rather loudly, "What are we going to do now?"

She sat and watched carefully for the first 45 minutes or so. Then she started to get a little more restless...talking and moving around. We were hoping she would just fall asleep, but I think she was too excited. We decided to leave at intermission before things turned disastrous.

This whole Muni adventure made for a great bedtime with Audrey! She fell asleep on the way home. She woke up a little as we changed her and moved her to bed, but she quickly fell back asleep. In her bed too...we'll see if she stays there all night!

July 23

With all this talk about her sister, baby Isla is feeling a little left out on the blog. So let's talk about Isla for a little bit before we get into all of Audrey's sleeping woes.

Isla is getting a lot better about holding her head up for brief periods of time when you are holding her. I tried to get a picture of her doing it today, though I didn't get any great shots. She is also starting to smile a little more frequently too, but again, I haven't captured any smiles on camera yet.

Last night, Isla was even a better sleeper than her big sister. Isla woke up once around 3 am, but she slept pretty well the rest of the night. Audrey, on the other hand, was up at 3 am as well...plus she was up at 4:30 and 5:00. She did finally go back to sleep until almost 8 am though (laying on the floor right in front of the door to her room).

The sleeping struggles continued today. Sorry for another long winded post. I just have to record these things, as I know someday I will look back and laugh at myself for stressing so much about this.

Naptime was horrible today. Part of the problem may be our inconsistencies in dealing with her. We've never dealt with a kid who won't stay in bed before, so we keep experimenting and trying different things to see if anything will work. We know what we want Audrey to do when it comes to sleep and bedtime:

1. Audrey will continue to take a nap, or at least have an hour of quiet time in her room.
2. Audrey will continue to go to bed at 8:00.
3. Audrey will sleep in her room by herself.

I think all of those things are both good for Audrey and for our family. The problem is--how do we go about getting her to do those things? I'm determined that we will make this work, but I don't know how to go about doing it.

Yesterday, putting her back in bed over and over again seemed to work well. But today, that turned into a game. She would laugh and run back to bed as soon as she saw us coming. Not good. We put a childproof cover on the door handle so she could no longer open the door, but that resulted in the most horrible screaming/kicking fit, which was more than my nerves could handle today. So we switched to another new strategy tonight that seemed to work fairly well.

I decided to just make a bed for her on the floor tonight, since she seems so intent on sleeping there. Then I agreed to leave her door open, as she pleaded over and over again, "Please Mom. Leave door open. Just a little bit." Then I sat outside her door, facing away from her. She could see me and know that I was present, but I wasn't giving her a lot of attention.

It seemed to work. As long as I stayed by the door, she laid on her makeshift bed on the floor and didn't move a muscle. It probably took about 20 minutes, and then she fell asleep without too much fuss.

I really don't want to have to sit by her door every nap and bed time until she falls asleep. It's kind of hard to do when there is a little baby around that needs attention too! I am hoping that this is just a temporary thing to help her get over whatever separation anxiety she seems to have. At the same time, it feels like this is turning into a control issue--who is really in charge here anyway??

We are intent on sticking to our guns and making sure that she does get good rest each day and night. But many more gray hairs may be added to my head in the process!!!

July 22

(This was supposed to be posted yesterday, but I got sidetracked by Audrey's sleeping issues. So here it is today!)
VBS is over! That is a huge relief. It went well, and the kids seemed to enjoy it. Hopefully they learned something about Jesus too!

The Moby Wrap came in handy this week. It worked fairly well at keeping Isla content and asleep, and it allowed me to be hands free. Plus, it looked somewhat authentic with my costume as well.

And now for today's sleeping update:

Today was better than yesterday. There was very little screaming from Audrey. At both naptime and bedtime, she did go through the whole getting out of bed and opening the door routine several times. But we didn't even have to put her back in bed. Once she saw one of us come into the room, she walked right back to her bed and got in it.

At both naptime and bedtime, she did eventually go to sleep after a few rounds of being in and out of bed. But she went to sleep on the floor instead of in her bed. I don't understand what happened to make her bed an undesirable place to sleep. I really don't care if she wants to sleep on the floor for naptime. As long as she is in her room and not screaming, I'm fine with it.

I'm not sure if she can make it all night on the floor though. And I really don't want to deal with her waking up in the middle of the night. Tonight, she fell asleep on the floor in front of her door. Daniel successfully managed to move her from the floor to her bed without waking her up, so right now she is in bed asleep. Hopefully she will stay there all night long!

Just one more thought before I quit writing:

Tonight, Daniel graciously allowed me to abandon him at bedtime again, leaving him alone to deal with all of these sleep troubles. I went with some friends to see the final Harry Potter movie. It was a nice reward after a long week of work at VBS.

I was an extremely reluctant Harry Potter reader. Everyone loved the books so much, but I was stubbornly determined to avoid all the hype. I was not going to jump on the Harry Potter bandwagon.

Somehow my friend Kellie managed to convince me to read the books. Of course, I was instantly hooked! Once I finished the last book, I knew there were still a few more movies to be made. So it wasn't really the end yet. But now that I have watched the final movie, it really is the end of Harry Potter. Although, there is now a theme park...

July 21

So, let's talk about how my daughter, who has been an awesome sleeper for the past two years, is now refusing to sleep.

Today at naptime, she cried for 60 minutes and slept for 0 minutes. After the first 10 minutes, I went upstairs to check on her. She said she needed to go potty, so I took her to the bathroom and she went. I put her back in bed, and she started crying as soon as I started to leave the room. I tucked her in one last time, then left with her still crying. Screaming is really a more accurate term.

She continued screaming. Daniel eventually came home from work at the 45 minute point to see if he could get her to calm down and sleep. (She woke up at 5:30 this morning after a late night last night. She was very, very tired...probably overtired...and we knew she really needed to sleep).

Daniel went up to discover that she had peed the bed. He cleaned her and the bed up and tried to put her back to sleep, but he didn't have any luck. She continued to scream.

Finally, we gave in and let her get up. When we got her up, we discovered that she had peed the bed again! I am pretty sure the peeing was a result of the tantrum or just her being defiant because she was mad at us. Very frustrating!! I hated giving in to her tantrum, but we couldn't let her keep crying all day long!!
After Daniel went back to work, Audrey ended up falling asleep on the couch! She has never done that before for us. Definite proof that she was exhausted and needed a nap.

Naptimes have sometimes been difficult lately, so it didn't surprise me too much to have her fight us on her nap. Bedtime has been going smoothly for a long time, so even after the rough nap today, I expected her to go right to sleep tonight.

I was at church tearing down after VBS. So Daniel had both of the girls at bedtime by himself, which is not an easy task. All seemed to be going well, until Daniel got up to leave her room. And the screaming resumed.

I was just talking to someone tonight about how Audrey sometimes screams at bedtime, but she doesn't get out of bed. Plus, the door to her room is really hard to open, so she doesn't know how to open it. So at least we don't have to deal with her getting out of bed and out of her room.

At least we didn't have to deal with it until tonight.

Audrey not only figured out that she was capable of getting up out of bed by herself, she also figured out that she can open the door all by herself. So that's what she did. Over and over and over again.

Daniel eventually called me to come home and help. We employed Super Nanny's technique of putting her straight back in bed every time she got up. It took a while, but eventually it worked. She quieted down at 10:00, about 1 1/2 hours after the whole bedtime routine began.

I'm trying to muster up some sympathy for Audrey. She has been separated from us a lot lately--first with Isla's birth, then recently with her trip to Daniel's parents, and VBS this week has kept me busy and away from her. But really it is hard for me to feel bad for her. I am mostly just extremely frustrated and completely exhausted. With a baby that is still up a couple of times a night and a crazy week of VBS, this is not good timing for Audrey to give us a hard time.

I read this blog post today, which was a good reminder that all of this is just a phase. It will not last forever! And I"m hoping it won't last much longer than today. =)

July 20

Day 3 of VBS went really well...probably the best night yet! This picture was in our Wool Shop. The kids are making felted wool soaps, and they are pretty cool.

I have decided that I have a love/hate relationship with VBS. I love helping and planning and all of that. But it also stresses me out! Especially with baby Isla in the picture...things are a bit more stressful than normal this year. We are making it work though, and tomorrow night is the last night!