Bug = 2 years 5 months
Bub = 7 months 1 day

Linus and Sleep

Linus has often come into our room in the middle of the night. Sometimes Bob would get him back into his own bed, but usually that’s too much work for a comatose Bob and Linus stays snuggled up with Daddy all night. When Linus was sick recently, he started coming in with us almost every night (usually between 1am and 3am).

Ada and Sleep

I’m not having much luck getting Ada to nap in the bedroom (in the cot or on our bed) during the day. I’m trying to stay cool and persist in trying it. I won’t leave her to cry, so I often spend 10 minutes feeding and settling her, only to find I have to shift her to the hammock to get her to sleep anyway.

I’m just going to try to envision the day – eventually – when I put her down in her cot, wander away briefly to deal with a toddler issue, and return to find her sound asleep.

Ada is now spending all night every night in bed with me. Now that she’s bigger I’m not nearly as nervous about her being in bed with us, plus with the cot no longer beside the bed at arms’ reach , it feels like such work to transfer her to the cot at 11pm!

Happy Family

So, in summary, the four of us now seem to be spending the greater part of most nights in the same bed. Four people shoulder-to-shoulder in a queen size bed didn’t work particularly well for us. I felt stuck in one position all night, which would have been uncomfortable enough, but of course I had to manoeuvre myself into breastfeeding position a few times during each night as well!

I had a brainwave a couple of weeks ago – why not top and tail? We sleep with just a duvet over us (i.e. with no top-sheet), so it’s easy for Bob and Linus to sleep with their heads at the foot-end of the bed.

Eureka! Now Bob, Ada and I go to bed together as normal, and if Linus comes in during the night, Bob takes his pillow down the other end of the bed and a lot of foot-cuddling goes on for the rest of the night. There’s significantly more space for everyone, and I for one am really enjoying comfortably sharing the bed with my whole family.

Bug = 2 years 5 months
Bub = 7 months 4 days

I bathe my kids VERY rarely… it’s always so cold in Dunedin, it uses so much water, and in spite of makers of baby bath products advocating it as a lovely way to get babies relaxed before bed, the five minutes of post-bath screaming while I dress both my babies has always detracted somewhat from the pleasures of the bath itself. Since Linus has been a toddler, the post-bath screaming has stopped, but the other two factors still apply.

All that might change now. Tonight I discovered the most beautiful thing about Ada being able to sit by herself – bath time with her brother! Previously, baths have meant mum or dad painfully hovering over the bath holding Ada every minute, or joining the kids in the bath.

But now that Ada’s sitting so strongly, she requires just a casual arm behind her. Ada had an absolute ball in the bath watching and splashing her brother and (almost) giggling at him. I can’t wait to do it again!!! (<-- I'm very excited - I don't often indulge in three exclamation points.)

Bug = 2 years 5 months
Bub = 7 months 1 day

On Wednesday, the kids and I joined Nana and the two six-year-olds in her care (RR and G) to take the train from Dunedin to Port Chalmers and back. It was a one-off event – Dunedin doesn’t operate any passenger rail services except for excursions. We had a good time, and it was short enough (20 minutes out, 20 minutes back) that it didn’t Linus didn’t have his attention span stretched and I didn’t have my patience tested.

Unfortunately the photos I took are pretty dismal. Even with the flash on the camera, the motion on the train made most of the pictures I took pretty blurry. So you’ll have to use your imagination, or look at the ODT’s photos to get a feel for the occasion.

Bug = 2 years 4 months
Bub = 6 months 27 days

Don’t panic – I won’t go into detail or provide photos, but on Sunday when we changed one of Ada’s nappies it became clear that she had managed to actually swallow some of the carrot that she’d been torturing for a week or two.

Bug = 2 years 4 months
Bub = 6 months 25 days

As previously mentioned, I’ve shifted our bedroom around so that the cot is more accessible, and yesterday Ada had her first nap in her cot. She has often slept in there for substantial parts of the night, but we’d never tried it for naps.

Yesterday I closed the curtains, gave her a feed until she fell asleep, then put her in the cot. She had a wee grizzle while she was on my shoulder during the transition, but by the time I tucked her in she was asleep again. She slept for over an hour, which is probably an above average length of nap for her these days.

I’ll keep trying the same technique whenever the conditions are right… I imagine it will be quite a while until she’ll actually fall asleep in the cot (rather than on me during a feed). Based on my experience with Linus though, it’s just a matter of being patient and eventually she’ll fall asleep on her own when she’s ready.