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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!!
A picture is worth a thousand words! So - with that, I will not write much!
The temperature is in the 50's this evening. It's been sweater / jacket weather all day. It's pretty fantastic! Spur of the moment - we decided to go apple picking AND search out for the perfect pumpkin after Mercer's (cold) baseball game today.
We had a pretty great day, actually - as evidenced from the abundance of photos here. (There were really about 80 photos that we kept out of the over 100 that were taken. This is just a sample!)
A couple of things that were pleasant surprises:
1 - Mercer just jumping into a tree and scaling it to get to the apples at the top. He had a BLAST climbing trees and being rewarded with some plump juicy apples. I loved watching him explore overhead!
2 - The hayride at Burt's farm. It was great, actually! Sitting on hay (instead of a hay bale). Driving under a covered bridge. Going through a real pumpkin patch. There were these animatronic pumpkins, though, that were a bit cheesy, but the kids really liked them! They had little displays set up here and there too with farm equipment and pumpkins. I would recommend it. I'm sure we'll do it again sometime.
And this last little series - Isabella getting ready for bed tonight. She wanted to "feed" her frog milk instead of drinking it herself.
Maybe not so much with Mercer's school, but with mine!
I have a lot of work to do for EACH and EVERY lesson that I teach. It's kind of knocked me on my.... well, you know~ I have to admit, I am learning a lot, though. A lot about 8th graders. Even a bit about high schoolers as I have one class of 9th - 12th graders. Learning a lot about chemistry right now too! :)
We've done a few things -- a little something each weekend.
Hiking and letterboxing. Baby girl does not look like a baby here. (sniff sniff. seriously... sniff!) She did have fun launching rocks into the water. Mercer is practicing skipping his.
Backyard camping with friends Aaron and Alex (and their parents, of course). Isabella and I slept inside, though, admittedly!
Celebrating Mercer's adoption day (6 years). Mini-golf and milkshakes. (Plus a new toy - beyblades... which have been out forever, but he's never had. He was most excited by that!)
Little League Baseball. (Mercer is on the Sharks. He moved up a league....Todd is coaching this season too.) There are new things such as "coach pitch" and there are now kids playing catcher.
Isabella is a firecracker. She LOVES on everyone. Gives out so many hugs. Blows kisses to everyone. Hugs older women in grocery stores... and people at her daycare... and neighbors. And - what a phenomenal hugger she is. (Best. hugs. ever.) Still squeals when she sees animals. Doggie doggie doggie! We were at the ball park today. She runs around like crazy. Almost everyone she passes stops and comments on how friendly she is. What a beautiful baby she is. How much energy she has (yes - usually as one of us is chasing her down). What a joy.
Come to think of it - Mercer was much like that too (minus the overwhelming excitement and squealing over animals). LOVE that both of them (as toddlers) bring about a great deal of happiness to us... and others.
Isabella has the sweetest little voice. Talks a lot (still a lot of which is not understandable), but the cute little words that she does speak are just precious. She will repeat (or at least try to repeat) almost anything that you say after "Isabella, say ...." and she will. She's a little parrot. Also - if you ask her what does a doggie say "ruff ruff" then she pants with her tongue out. "what does a kitty say" meow? and she giggles. she will laugh out loud at you moo-ing like a cow.
Good stuff.... the stuff I never want to forget!
