Update: I’m embarassed to admit it took me two days to realize I’d written all of this BACKWARD structurally — 7/5/7 instead of 5/7/5. Does that make it KuHai?

Back in my room — woe is me!
My 3am offense?
An obstacle course is mom.

Sharp toes dig into her thighs.
Clip, clip! Tomorrow.
She’s waited long enough now.

A contant stream of babble
Flows from my sweet lips
She covers her ears, oh why?

There’s more (bad poetry) where that came from. I have no idea why haiku seemed an apprpriate way to pass the time until she finally complained herself to sleep back in her room.

What amazes me is that I believe she crawled all over me, carrying on her monologue, for perhaps 30 minutes before I realized what time it was. Since she normally wakes me this way, I initially assumed it was at least 6:30am, maybe even 7…and just stormy outside. Uh…no.

I’m amazed, impressed, and astonished. Maya has been in her room for a nap since noon. It’s 3:10pm. Keep in mind, Maya usually naps about 1-1/2 hours at the most.

This new mattress rocks.

After a (mostly) sleepless night with Maya on the crib mattress on the floor, I learned (well, was reminded) that my folks had an extra new/nearly-new twin mattress languishing in their basement. If I couldn’t get the toddler bed together, would I be interested in it? Would I? Would I!

Last night, Maya woke briefly when I checked in on her at 10:15pm. She went back to sleep within a few minutes, with a little back-scratching, and I didn’t hear from her again until 7am, when I walked down the hall. I could hear the quiet chatter of her Laugh-n-Learn Puppy behind the door. She was lounging in bed, playing happily.

And now, this…a marathon nap. I’d started to think that she came to my bed simply for the luxury of my 2″ memory foam topper. I think I was right. This mattress doesn’t have the topper, but it’s heaven compared to a hard crib mattress. Poor kid…she *wanted* to sleep before, just couldn’t.

Oops! There goes the marathon. Upstairs with me!

I’m perhaps one of the least overly-anxious, neurotic parents I know — especially among my friends who are also first-time moms. Tonight, however, I found what inspires paranoia to rise for me: leaving a toddler in her own room, without the benefit of crib bars to keep her safe.

The big, heavy dresser? I’m just convinced that she will somehow (all less-than-20-pounds of her) bring it down on her head. The changing table just looks like a climbing wall. Never mind that my child isn’t *that* much of a climber. The room is fine. I know the room is fine. That doesn’t make it any less weird for her to be sans-crib.

For the love of God…she’s not even in a big, high bed. She’s on her crib mattress, on the floor. Why on the floor? Some friends picked up a couple of twin beds for their youngest kids, so passed their baby daughter’s crib/toddler bed on to me. After I took my crib apart, I tackled the job of putting the hand-me-down together. This is not exactly rocket science…but I’ve put enough furniture, cabinets, and other micellany together over the years that I know when four bolts are clearly not the correct ones for the crib (they were subbed for the original pieces), and five other pieces of hardware are missing. After a (fruitless) trip to Home Depot in search of replacement cam locks, I let it go. Maya’s mattress is on the floor…and I may end up getting her a full bed before long after all.

Anyway, back to paranoia. How much could happen?

I hear crying upstairs, and it’s oddly reassuring.

Oops…there’s a crash. Um…bye.

Update: All is well in toddler-land. She’s just banging on the door. Poor kid — wonder where she’ll end up sleeping?

Update 2:There’s nothing sweeter (okay, and funnier) than poking your nose in the door to find that your kid is sleeping with her cheek planted on the carpet…while her hips and legs are still on the mattress. Oh, and her not waking up during the nose-poking is pretty cool too. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

For perhaps the third night in a row, I’ve had to leave my (our) bedroom in the middle of the night. By this time of night, we co-sleep (she joins me in bed after her first wake up then nurses off/on through the night). Lately, though, around 4am, she’s restless. Maya tosses. She rolls around. She kicks me in the stomach. She rolls around some more. She crawls toward the edge of the bed. She pulls on my hair some. She rolls some more. Through all of this, she nurses for two seconds, then stops, then starts again.

I try to hold her, and she squirms out of my arms. She wants to be close, but not held. Then she kicks me again.

After several gentle warnings of “you must settle” and “go back to sleep, please,” Maya is in her crib, bawling pitifully, as if I’m the meanest, most heartless mommy to ever live on this earth. I’ve given up and am moving to the sofa.

No wonder I’ve been exhuasted during the day lately. It’s a good thing my sofa is comfortable. We need a bigger house. Maya needs her own room somday.

Update: 7:40am. The pitiful crying not only didn’t stop, it got worse. I went back to the bedroom after perhaps 10 minutes of escalation and picked up my shivering, sad little girl — who still struggled to get away, then clung to me like superglue. She decided that nursing again might not be so bad, and went back to sleep, thank God. Of course, then she decided that it was time to get up for the day at about 6:30. Honey! It’s Sunday! Yes, we’re going hiking today, but we sleep IN on Sunday!

While naps are still difficult, this was a good sign. I FINALLY got Maya to take a decent nap laying down (instead of in the swing). Of course, I had to crate the dogs, else this would only last two seconds! On to moving naps to the crib…someday.

12:30. No nap yet. She came soooooo close, but fought it with all her will. Fine, lunchtime. Can you see where this is going?

Again, Maya fell asleep with her head on the highchair tray. Providence gave me an opportunity to snap the photo I missed yesterday. I turned on the camera, and Maya instantly woke up. Of course. I removed the highchair tray and set it aside, then put Maya in the swing for a nap.

She SCREAMED with all her strength, squealing even (that high-pitched screech that can shatter glass) insisting that she is NOT. TIRED. The squealing stopped, and this is what I saw:

As soon as I tried to move her head onto the back of the chair, she woke. Again. Guess it’s time to sell the swing and move naps to the crib permanently. As soon as her head touched the crib sheet, the insistent screaming began again:

After a few moments of this screechiness, silence reigned supreme in the household.

Don’t argue with mama, little one. Mama *will* win. It might take DAYS for her to do it, but she WILL win.

Maya skipped her morning nap. I tried to convince her it was a good idea, but it just wasn’t happening. We moved on to lunch, and I settled her in her highchair with mac-n-cheese and chopped broccoli — which she started munching right away.

As I ate (and talked to a friend on IM), I realized she was pretttttty quiet behind me. I turned around to see a baby with her head planted in her lunch.

I settled her back and reclined her highchair seat…still kicking myself for not taking a “before” photo.

In the past, I questioned the value of having a real highchair (at one point, I think I told my mom I might as well have gotten a booster seat, but that was pre-self-feeding).

No more questioning. The removable trays have already proved invaluable, and now the reclining seat shows its weight in gold.

***blink***

***blink***

When it’s dawn sometime in the 5:00-5:30am range, by 6:00am, the baby is not understanding of the idea that mama is not ready to get up yet.

On a recent Car Talk, Tom & Ray proposed the idea of a double-dipping daylight saving time, where sometime in June, the clock would move back a second hour, then move forward again in August. I’m all for it.

Back on the topic of today’s earlier post, a gal on the September Mommies group posted this article about one family’s struggle to help their son sleep through the night. The methods sound similar to those of the No Cry Sleep Solution (which I’ve been *meaning* to re-read), and I decided to give it a try.

First of all, Maya DID eat earlier than usual today, and at this particular meal, ate a full 4 ounces of peach-mango-applesauce, followed by what’s I’d estimate to be at LEAST 8 ounces of oatmeal. After that, she had a bath, a good poop (poor kid had been fighting for it all day), and a change of clothing. She played around for a little while, then it got to be about that time…so she nursed, and as she started to nod off, I told her it was time for bed.

This was 7:30pm.

We walked to the bedroom, and I laid her down in the crib. As is her norm, she started to cry and fuss. I talked to her gently, telling her that it was night-night time, and offered her a pacifier. Bingo. She went to sleep.

8:00pm…baby awake.

I went to the crib’s side and coaxed her, stroked her back, gave her some cold meds (we’ve both been itchy/sneezy today — allergies?), and gave her some motrin when she started pulling on her ears (could be teething, could be ears - note to self: ask doctor next week).

An HOUR later, she’s finally back to sleep. My back is a bit sore from bending over the crib.

Surely, this can work. After all, at her grandparents’ house, she’s learned that when it’s between 7-8pm, it’s time to sleep, and she does so with only a few minutes of fussing (that used to be worse). She can learn to do the same here, right?

It’s not that I mind cosleeping. Really, there’s very little that could possibly be more charming that waking up to a smiling baby grabbing your nose and waiting for you to go “HONK!” in return. She laughs at me, and we slowly start the day. Just the same, she rolls into me, and I really would love to sleep on my back…or my belly…or any other way than on my side. Is that too much to ask?

We’ll see how this works.

My mommy group friends are well aware of our “issues” with Maya’s sleeping in the evenings. Ever since she started teething hard, she doesn’t want to sleep in her crib once bedtime hits. On me, fine. In the crib, not-so-fine. She can be out cold, but as soon as she’s within inches of the crib mattress, she wakes up. MAD.

Last night, instead of nursing, she was playing…and wanting to nibble on my nipple (OUCH).

“Bedtime!” I told her in a cheery voice.

We wandered off to the crib, and I sat (rather than laid) her down. “G’night, Peanut!”

Holding my breath, I left the room, and left my bedside lamp on its dimmest setting, so if she wasn’t ready to doze, she could see enough to play on her own. Within minutes, she started to fuss and cry. It wasn’t the all-out-my-heart-is-broken wail, so I left her alone. After about 10 minutes, just as I was about to grab her…silence. Baby had gone to sleep!

Perhaps 1-1/2 hours later, I heard a cry. Before I finished what I’d been working on, the cry ceased again. Hooray!

Later still, off to bed with me. As I peeked into the crib, here’s what I saw.

That’s a FOOT next to Maya’s head, people.

My poor baby had fallen asleep SITTING UP, CRYING. *sniff*

Amazingly, she was sleeping really soundly in this awkward position. I debated leaving her as is, but thinking of how sore *my* back would be after sleeping like this, I just couldn’t do it. After stretching her legs out from underneath her, I went to bed.

Yes, she still ended up in bed with me later, but I have no idea what time…without contacts, reading the clock is a challenge.