She went to sleep at 9pm. I went to bed at 10pm. She woke up a 6am.

Best baby in the world

I hit another wall today (possibly I have enough walls to construct a whole cottage now). My first attempts at leaving the house to write in public with Melander erupted into continual chaos and I think we were both relieved when we closed our laptops and accepted that keeping our children from killing each other and chatting about motherhood was going to be the best we could achieve that morning.

(Writing at Kidz Biz the adventure playground – good idea in theory, but not with child-friendship dramas, their constant need to be fed or cuddled better, and far too many people I know turning up there.)

Also I started to get that weird spacey ‘I didn’t have enough sleep last night’ feeling round about lunchtime. I counted up the hours I got to sleep last night and figured out a) last night was better than usual and b) maybe the problem is not enough sleep last WEEK?

Nap attempted this afternoon. Nap failed.

C is coming over soon, in the hopes of inspiration. I plan to drill my words out then and peer pressure her into doing the same. No talking. Have talked too much today!

My honey is lying on the bed reading Jeff VanderMeer’s Booklife and occasionally emerging to ask pertinent questions about my career like ‘you got paid for your last two contracts, right?’ It’s nice that he’s interested.

Raeli meanwhile is soaking up robot pop culture – the Iron Giant, followed by an Astro Boy marathon. She spent the morning interacting with other kids so I’m perfectly happy for her to veg out all afternoon – though she is drawing while she watches TV, heh. I used to do that. I was multi-skilling as a toddler.

Gah, baby is waking up (rocks chair, sends her back to sleep)

Nearly two months ago, I came across LJ evidence that Raeli had slept through the night for the first time… seven months and ten days after she was born.  At the time, I was grappling with broken night after broken night with Jemima and the thought of having to wait another six months was just a touch heart-breaking.  (mind you, at the time I would have settled quite happily for just one wake up between 11 & 6 which is pretty much my current routine, barring disasters)

Last night, Jem slept through.  Which is to say, she wouldn’t settle in the evening so I just put her in her bouncy chair and rocked her off with my foot every time she made a peep.  Round about the time I wanted to go to bed at 11, I woke her up (barely) for a feed and put her in the bassinet.

She slept.  She did not wake up at three, or four.  She kept going until six-thirty.  Not quite the eight hours that Raeli managed at seven months old but… I’ll take it.

I woke up feeling invigorated rather than confused (which is usually the effect more than five hours at a time does to me).  I woke Raeli up at 7.  The bribe to spend time with her baby sister actually worked.  She was washed, breakfasted and dressed 45 minutes before it was time to leave the house.  No tears, no tantrums.  For a while there we didn’t go a day without a meltdown from her…

Jem is snoozing in her chair.  Raeli is off at daycare.  Peace reigns.  As a parent, days like this are few and far between.  Usually you take the good with the hard.  The illusion of competence rarely lasts.  When it all works out perfectly, though… happy glow.  Happy happy glow.