Night Parenting

While I write this Wren is lying on the floor getting exercise time. He is blowing spit bubbles at the persian carpet and pressing up on his elbows. Next step is when he gets to push up on his hands. After briefing Joshua on the physiotherapy appointment he observed that I really enjoyed the evaluation because it gave me a framework of steps and stages and even SCORES by which I could engage Wren's behaviour. He claims to prefer the puzzle of the daily grunts and wriggles without context. I confess that he is partially right. I am very pleased to see development as a linear process rather than an impenetrable jungle of small gestures BUT I am not going to own the implied impatience with the present. I am very happy where Wren is now and think he is charming and very sweet and clever.

Today, the man at Subaru was also charming - probably because I paid him $600 for new tyres, alignment and service. He said "that looks like the Gerber baby, what a cute guy".

Oh WOW... Wren has just this minute rolled from back to front for the first time..... and wooo... over onto his back again. He didn't manage to get his left arm free complete ... oh... hang on... here he goes again and THE ARM IS FREE! Houston, the arm is free!

"Josh, can I now give him another POINT on the scale."

Yikes .... he is rolling over again onto his back. Its a regular workout over here.

Anyway, I was going to give a little summary of last night for those of you not bored out of your minds with our sleep travails [over onto his stomach AGAIN, arm tucked]. Last night was funny because we had issues with both Frost and Wren. Here it is:

8.30pm Frost to bed
8.35pm Frost complains that he is in the wrong room
8.40pm Frost complains he is not tired.
8.45pm Nurse Wren to bed.
8.50pm Frost pops in to explain he sometimes feels worried about scary thoughts and wants to sleep in our room. I explain the other room is closer to Daddy and he can hear us better [if Frost sleeps with us and Wren no-one gets much sleep some nights]
9pm Wren and Frost asleep.
10pm Frost has night terrors - he is alseep but speaking incoherently, crying and walking around flailing his arms. I sing a song to coax him back to bed. He remembers none of this the next day.
10.15pm Shannon to bed.
12.00 Wren wakes, nurses 2min.
2am Joshua to bed.
2.30am Wren wakes, nurses 12 mins
3.00am Wren nurses 2mins and again sometime before 4am
After 3am Frost comes in & I tell him to get into bed in our room and go to sleep.
5.30am Frost wakes up and sits up. Its light. He has wet his bed. I fumble over Josh to try and get the wet part off, fail, suggest he goes back to the other room. Tell him there are 2 more hours to sleep.
6.00am Wren has been disturbed and nurses again.
6.30 Shannon still awake but covers head with burp cloth and goes to sleep.
7.35 Shannon wakes. Joshua, Frost and Wren are asleep. Makes breakfast, turns on TV and pauses, makes lunch for Frost.
7.45 Frost wakes and gets ready for school.
8.00am Wren wakes and gets diaper changed and put in bed with some toys and Joshua.
8.15am Joshua wakes
8.20 We leave to drive carpool.

So, isnt' that fun? Today, as part of my sleep training preparedness plan I bought some darkening shades and drapes for our room. Yesterday, I bought Wren footed PJs so he can sleep in his crib alone - without the warmth of body or blanket. Poor wee sleep destroyer :) Ironically, although it was a bad night I got plenty of naps in there and feel okay. The trick is to go to bed early and nurse quickly so he doesn't really wake up and neither do I.