The ups and downs of SLEEP

This is a post that I imagine no one but me will care about, but since I'm really using this blog as a journal for myself and Maya to look back on someday I wanted to document it.  Plus, we might reach this same point with her little sister and in my sleep deprived state it will be a good reminder of what helped with Maya.

Maya has always been a relatively good sleeper, but it became very tough in the last few months.  It all started when she cut her molars, then she came down with bronchitis, then we were met with some sort of 18 month scream in the middle of the night sleep regression, most of this while I entered first trimester of pregnancy with the sheer exhaustion and nausea that comes along with it. Through all of this we went into full fledged survival mode.  All the good sleep habits we had established were thrown out the window so the entire family could get some sort of sleep each night.  Well, this had become exhausting.  It was taking a whole lot of effort to get her to sleep each night and naps were an even bigger struggle.  We were all a bit frustrated.

It started to become clear that the rocking before sleep was becoming detrimental to the entire process.  Although Maya and I both loved the snuggles, she was restless, couldn't get comfortable (in part to my growing belly) and it had simply become habit over the last few months.  She would finally fall asleep in my arms and then the transfer to the bed would wake her up and she would be confused and pissed.  But, we didn't know how to switch gears!  The tactics we had tried in the past were just not working this time around.  Plus, she is working on some more teeth and we are all struggling with colds so it didn't seem fair to just let her cry in the midst of that, but something needed to be done.

Out of ideas, one night I put her in the crib after stories and a couple minutes of snuggles and just sat on the floor next to it.  She wasn't happy, but only cried for about 10 minutes or so before settling down and falling asleep.  By the fourth night, zero tears when I put her down!  Two nights ago after stories, she pointed right at her crib and said "Maya Bed".  I asked her if she was ready to go lay down in her bed, she looked at me and said "Yep".  I was SHOCKED.  We went over, I laid her down and she went right to sleep.  Same story the last two nights.  This really was what we all needed.

There is one last step, I need to get myself out of the room while she falls asleep, but we will get there.  I've moved from sitting on the floor next to her crib, to the chair on the other side of the room so that will be the next step.  But, honestly at this point, sitting in her room for 10-15 minutes of peace and quiet while she is settling down isn't so bad and I'm counting it as a huge success (at least until we hit a new setback or transition)!

More proof that she really is growing up.  The baby in her in disappearing more and more each day.

Glasses

We discovered that Maya has a pretty bad case of astigmatism, which at this point only requires glasses to fix.  Hopefully we will be able to avoid the patching and surgery (although her Daddy thinks she would make a great pirate).  We picked them up yesterday and so far she has really taken to them, which was a bit of a surprise to me.  She was very proud when all of the kids in her class wanted to check them out.   We think she looks pretty dang cute!

"Maya did it"

She has picked this phrase up in the last couple days and it is taking over our lives!  Translation from Maya speak - "Maya will do it all by herself", aka "Maya doesn't need your help, Mommy and Daddy, so stop bugging me and leave me alone". 

As much as I applaud her new found independence and the confidence she has gained in herself, every little task takes five times as long to accomplish.  Which, for the most part I can deal with, except for when we are trying to get out the door each and every morning.

Hair!

She doesn't have much... but we picked her up from daycare the other day to find her first ponytail.  Apparently she didn't want to be left out :-)

"More, more ducks"

I have many childhood memories of walking down to the local pond with a bag of stale bread in hand and feeding it to ducks.  We bundled up on a sunny, yet very cold morning and took Maya down to the park for her first duck feeding experience.  I was a little worried she might get intimidated by them, but she certainly didn't and loved it.  After the ducks were fed, we walked over and enjoyed the nearly empty playground all to ourselves.

Christmas fun

A little late posting these pictures - but we spent Christmas eve with the Sarion family, a quiet Christmas morning at home and had Christmas dinner at the Joneses.  Maya thoroughly enjoyed the presents and we had such a great time sharing it with family.  And yes, she wore the same dress both days.

Enjoying her new Elmo book

Big smiles while playing with Mommy

Snuggles Christmas morning

A favorite gift (while giving Daddy five)

Feeding her new baby, "Baby milk"

Colors and puzzles with Bennett

The family

The Holiday Season

The holiday traditions have become so much fun now that Maya is old enough to understand and partake.  Here she is in action.

Heading out to find the perfect tree.

 Enjoying the spiced cider with Daddy.

Helping to put up the ornaments.  She didn't quite understand what we were doing at first, but once she caught on she didn't want it to end.  After we ran out of non-breakable ornaments, she decided she would just take them off the tree and put them back on.  Endless fun!

We celebrated Christmas with the Knowles family a week early - here she is tearing into her first present.  

She loved the magnetic alphabet she received and kindly "forced" Uncle Preston to play with her for most of the afternoon!

.

Bennett discovered a much easier way to play with his new basketball hoop.

Cousins checking out Grandma and Granpa's Christmas tree.

The best we could get with the two of them!  Pictures of busy toddlers is not easy.

We held our annual cookie baking day with the Knowles girls.  It was a bit more chaotic with little ones, but also more fun.  The cute little redhead is Avery, a fried of Bennett's.

The kids decorated cookies, which Maya didn't quite understand at first.  She figured she should just eat them all.

But once she figured it out, there was no stopping her.

She became quite bossy in which decorations she wanted.

The final spread and the hard workers (we are just missing Grandma in the picture).