Baby girl really has us in a tailspin. For the past 1 1/2 months, she has woken up in the middle of the night almost every night. Sometimes it's easy enough to get her to sleep, but most of the time, she's up for the count.
Anywhere between 2, 3, 4, 5 am.... she wants to get up. read a book. drink some milk. watch mickey mouse. we have tried a number of things - rocking her back to sleep. letting her cry it out. giving her milk. reading a little to her. giving her teething gel (which - actually in the last few days, we do think she may be cutting another tooth). praying over her. rubbing a "calm and relaxing" essential oil over her. pre-bedtime baths with lavender / "sleepy time" baby wash. keeping her up later. feeding her more food so she'd have a fuller belly.
We've tried A LOT of things! And - in desperation - I've reached out to some people to ask for advice. Pediatrician and several friends said that perhaps she has "nigh terrors." I looked it up / based on the description / I'm glad to say that I do not think that's it. What seems to resonate with her "symptoms" is something called sleep regression.... something that seems to be attributed to toddlers of a certain age who are developing rapidly.
Maybe she's growing and has growing pains? Maybe her mind is racing because she is starting to talk a lot? Whatever it is - pretty much we are resolved to the fact that she just has to "outgrow" whatever this is.
It's been pretty tough. (Especially since I'm not sleeping well during the week. Monday and Thursday nights - I'm pretty much pulling an all-nighter to prep for teaching on Tuesdays and Fridays.) Todd has been getting up with her on many of those nights because he knows I'm working.
whew.... we'll get through this! On the positive side... Isabella has done something new this week: she's started using a little child's potty! Several weeks ago, she started telling us before she was going to go poo. So, we put the potty out. She was not interested in trying it out 'til this week. So far - she's poo-ed 3 times and pee-ed once in the thing. wahoo!
She is pretty possessive these days (almost 2!). In the photo above, she kept walking around in Todd's shoes saying MY daddy's shoes. MY daddy.
Also, she is still the absolute MOST adorable thing when it comes to hugging on and loving on animals. She even sees photos of animals and will lean in / kiss them! She demands attention when she or anyone else is leaving. "Bye" "BYE" she yells until she gets a response. Depending on who it is, she will hold out her arms and indicate that she wants a hug. Sometimes she'll lean in an give a kiss or blow a kiss with her hand. She IS affectionate!
Enclosed are some photos of the kids that have not made it to the blog earlier this fall.
We've been to the fair.
Mercer's school had their annual fall festival, so Mercer dressed up for the day.
We went to a baseball game. 
We've been on hikes and to new playgrounds with cool equipment.
We've been working in the community garden.
We went to a high school football game for the school that I teach (4 or 5 of my high school students are on the team).
Basically, on the weekends - we jam in as much family fun as we can!
Now, we're about to enter the holidays and festivities of the late fall season. There will be lots to blog about in the coming weeks!!
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