Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Crying it out...

I have never been a fan of the "crying it out" method, but I'm finding that it has it's merits. Both with Lauren and with Addison so far I mostly nursed them or rocked them to sleep, which is one of the nicest things in the world to do. However, it makes it almost impossible for them to go to sleep any other way. Some nights that's just fine, but other nights I really want Addie to go to sleep so I can get a couple of things done before I crash for the night. Those nights I try nursing her and rocking her and giving her a bottle and giving her Tylenol... and she still doesn't seem sleepy and I've just spent and hour an a half just trying to settle her down and it's now 10 o'clock and past MY bedtime. It gets frustrating. The past three nights I've tried everything and she won't settle down. She pushes away from me when I try to rock her or nurse her, and refuses a bottle. So I eventually give up and put her in her crib with a kiss, and a sippy cup of water, a binky and a teether toy. The first night she cried for about 5 minutes, then I went in and silently comforted her and left. Then she cried for 10 minutes and I gave in and picked her up and brought her back to my bed. She was so tired from the crying that she fell right to sleep and I moved her into her crib later. Last night she cried for less than 5 minutes, then I heard nothing. So I was worried that something happened, but I didn't want to go in there in case she was awake and would start crying again if she saw me. It took all of my willpower to wait, but I did, and when I checked on her 10 minutes later she was sleeping peacefully! Then tonight, we did the whole bedtime routine, then I put her down to sleep. She knew what was up and tried to climb up me as I laid her down in the crib. She cried for about 5 minutes and I haven't heard anything in about 10 so I'll go check on her in a minute. They say it's an important skill to learn, to put yourself to sleep, so hopefully she's learning that and not feeling abandoned by her Mommy. Mommy is much happier to see her in the morning after a good night's sleep!



Lauren has been much better about bedtime. She really liked sharing a room with Addison, and she went to sleep sooner because she knew she couldn't have lights on or make a lot of noise. Lately she's been sleeping in the guest room because she can't hear her music over the sound of the crying, but I expect that they will share a room again in the near future.



We're enjoying a week off. Lauren slept over at Linnea's on Saturday, and we had dinner with the Careys, Careys and Wileys on Sunday night.Today Leila spent the day with us. We went to see Mr. Twisty, a free magician/comedy show at the Queensbury activity center, and then went to Friendly's for lunch. We have lots of other little activities planned, if I can keep up with them. Both girls will spend some time at daycare tomorrow and Thursday so I can do some other things (we're paying for it anyway!)



Bye for now...