Sleep...

Oh man, if there's one single thing that's perpetually insane in parenthood, it's sleep.  Either my sleep, my two-year-old's sleep, or the baby's sleep.

We've yet to experience a night where the three of us sleep soundly for the entire evening.  On the other hand, Shaun sleeps all night most nights. Hey, at least one of us does.

Update from the other night:  C did wonderfully in falling asleep at Michelle's house and slept until I got there to pick her up.  She stayed asleep getting into her car seat, and then into the house but woke up when she got into her bed.  So I fed her and put her back to sleep, thinking that perhaps we would at least have enough of a repeat of the previous night (where she slept twelve hours), for me to get a good night's rest.

Yeah.

Um, no such luck.  She woke about 3 times besides that.  The following night she woke twice.  Last night, she woke 4 times.  I just don't understand why some nights she sleeps through, and others, not so much.  Anyone?

No correlation with daytime sleep.  In fact, let's not even talk about daytime sleep.  That's all over the place.

Which makes napping rather difficult for me.  I'll snuggle down on the couch when both girls are asleep and inevitably, one will wake up OR I won't be able to shut my brain off to fall asleep, fearing that one of the will wake up.  Vicious cycle.

However, there are perks.  C is putting herself to sleep fairly regularly, with minimal fussing.  Every day she gets more coordinated and thus, more easily able to soothe herself back to sleep.

Today, both girls fell asleep in the car on the way home from church and I managed to get them both into their beds where they each took a 2.5 hour nap.

More delightful?  So did I.

Bean is completely potty trained, including at night.  For awhile, it was making her wake up a bit earlier in the morning, but lately, she's been sleeping her regular amount at night and still somehow procrastinating in the morning from going potty.  I swear, I don't know where the kid gets her bladder control.

Her naps have been sporadic for a week or so due to random circumstance (and fun outings).  Her behavior became atrocious as a result.  I had thought that she had reached a point where she could go napless and be OK.  Maybe once and awhile, but in actuality, she needs naps as much as she ever did.   The tough part is getting her enough exercise and activity for her to take a nap early enough in the day so that she wakes early enough in the afternoon to go to bed easily at night.

(Now there's a delicate operation).

Anyway, as much as it ever was, sleep is important to me.  It's important that I sleep.  It's insanely important that my kids sleep.  And when it works?  We're all a lot happier.

When it doesn't?

Ooooo boy.  It makes for some of the most frustrating days.

But I know it won't last forever.  I try to remember that it's not so much the single days as it is the culmination of what the girls are learning about sleep through all of the days.  One day, they'll all fall asleep easily, stay asleep all night, and sleep late, late in the morning. 

And that's when I'll know I have teenagers.