Mommy By The Book » sleeping http://www.mommybythebook.com Attempting to navigate my way through motherhood Tue, 22 Nov 2011 05:06:32 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.5 A list http://www.mommybythebook.com/2010/10/08/a-list/ http://www.mommybythebook.com/2010/10/08/a-list/#comments Fri, 08 Oct 2010 22:25:28 +0000 Rachel http://www.mommybythebook.com/?p=242 Not to be a downer or anything, but I’ve had a running list in my head of Things That Must Go.  So here you go:

1.  Cinnamon Twists from Taco Bell.  Today I went through the drive-thru and the girl happily informed me that the cinnamon twists were free for “customer appreciation”.  Score!  But . . . → Read More: A list]]> Not to be a downer or anything, but I’ve had a running list in my head of Things That Must Go.  So here you go:

1.  Cinnamon Twists from Taco Bell.  Today I went through the drive-thru and the girl happily informed me that the cinnamon twists were free for “customer appreciation”.  Score!  But wait- when I started eating them I realized these weren’t a good gift.  These deep-fried, sugar coated pieces of deliciousness were an abomination!  Why?  Because they are so deceiving!  Because they are basically flavorful styrofoam you think that these morsels are light as air and can’t possibly contain loads of calories and fat, so you keep eating them.  Cut to 20 years down the road and I have to have a cardiologist on speed dial.

2.  Noisy office chairs.  I don’t need my coworkers receiving notification every time I move.  It’s made me all self-conscious because this chair is so freaking loud I feel like moving too much is disruptive, ergo the odd hip cramps throughout the day, which in turn make me limp like a 90 year old.  Am I going to need a hip replacement in addition to heart surgery?

3.  40 hour work weeks.  I’m fairly certain we can get the same amount of work done in 35 hours a week, tops, dontcha think?

4.  Daily commutes.  Someone out there has GOT to be working on some sort of teleportation invention, right??  Screw a new version of the iPhone, I need a teleporter!

5.  Nightmares.  The kiddo woke up screaming 3 times last night.  She’s still too young to really vocalize that she had a nightmare, but if she inherited my genes I’m pretty confident the poor kid is being chased by giant spiders that want her to eat her kidneys and force her to take a calculus test while she sleeps.

6.  Thinking too hard to try to accomplish a blog post.  Oy, it’s Friday (OH MY GOODNESS GRACIOUS I AM SO HAPPY IT IS FRIDAY WORDS CANNOT EXPRESS MY JOY!).  Time to veg.  Peace out.

]]> http://www.mommybythebook.com/2010/10/08/a-list/feed/ 2 Sweet dreams http://www.mommybythebook.com/2009/10/20/sweet-dreams/ http://www.mommybythebook.com/2009/10/20/sweet-dreams/#comments Tue, 20 Oct 2009 19:01:10 +0000 Rachel http://www.mommybythebook.com/?p=67 One of the biggest challenges we’ve faced with our daughter is sleep.  She is over a year old now, and still rarely sleeps through the night.  At one point, as an infant, she would often wake up 6+ times a night.  As you can imagine, we felt like zombies.  And believe me, we tried . . . → Read More: Sweet dreams]]> One of the biggest challenges we’ve faced with our daughter is sleep.  She is over a year old now, and still rarely sleeps through the night.  At one point, as an infant, she would often wake up 6+ times a night.  As you can imagine, we felt like zombies.  And believe me, we tried everything, at least it seemed that way.  She just isn’t a good sleeper, end of story.

The hubby and I often fantasize about sleep.  Sweet, sweet sleep…  An uninterrupted eight hours of blissful shut-eye…

But, you know what?  These days, I don’t really mind getting up with my little girl at 4:00 in the morning. I groan as I hear her cries floating from the other room, mentally willing her to just go back to sleep.  I sigh as I roll out of bed.  Now that it is getting colder leaving my warm bed carries even more of a sting than it did before, and I groan again.

I stumble into my baby’s room, one eye barely cracked as I approach the crib, where she is standing with arms outreached for me.  I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t help but scoop her up with her beloved blankie and sit down to rock her in the dark.

It’s a rare and precious moment.  She is still- something that never happens through the course of the day anymore.  I cuddle her, my arms full of baby.  I look at her long legs draped across my lap, her feet dangling off the edge, and I think about how she used to fit on just one arm of mine.

We rock quietly, and I can hear her give a deep and contented sigh.  Her soft body rises and falls with her breaths, and without realizing it I rock to the rythm of her breathing.

When I can tell she is good and sleepy, I carefully stand up to place her in her crib, whispering “night-night” to her again before I tip-toe out.

As I slide back under my comforter, I feel relieved that she is asleep and cross my fingers she will stay in that state for a few more hours.  At the same time though, I am grateful for the peaceful moment spent together in the dark.  I feel a warmth spread through me as I recall her long eyelashes resting on her cheeks, the shape of her mouth as she drifts to sleep.

Sometimes, when she does sleep through the night, I miss her.

She won’t need me for much longer.  Eventually she will be a “big girl”.  Independent, unafraid, and happy to be on her own.  And when that happens, I will probably lie awake at night, wishing I could go in to cuddle her in the quiet darkness.

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