Sleepless Night

      Well, in a dramatic twist of irony after writing a post about how my baby sleeps at night, my baby has decided to stop sleeping at night.  I know most parents deal with a lot of sleepless night, and to be honest, until the last week, we have had very, very few.  And, to be fair, Bella really just needs to be replugged (have her paci put back in.)  For Lily we called this "hitting snooze", because we really only had to do it in the mornings to get her to sleep a little longer.  But last night was bad - real bad.  And since I have been a little under (note - the first time I typed "under" it auto-corrected to "nude" - glad I caught that) the weather, my gracious hubby tried to take the hit and took Bella to the living room in a bassinet to sleep next to him so that I wouldn't hear her.  Unfortunately, at 3 a.m., she was so unhappy that everybody, including Lily, could hear her.  I nursed her, and both girls went back to sleep.  Then, at 6 a.m., we heard blood-curdling screams from Lily's room.  John went in, and she was screaming about her lights.  Not whining, screaming.  I have unplugged her cute little lights, because she was turning them on and playing late into the night instead of sleeping.  Last night, she convinced her sweet babysitter to plug them in, and they were on when she fell asleep.  I unplugged them when I checked on her.  And she knew it the moment she woke up at 6 and was not happy about it.  Thankfully, (for me, not John), John got her and cuddled with her for a while until they all got up around 6:45.  I slept until 7:45 and feel more well-rested than I have in a while.  John should get a giant medal for what he pulled off last night, and I am forever grateful to have a husband who wants to take care of me.
      This morning, after all the drama of the night before, we realized that Bella has her first little tooth poking through that bottom gum.  I am so glad there is a reason for the insanity!  Though, I am a little concerned for what this may foreshadow, since teething lasts for ages.  Why does no one tell you that?  I should have included that one in Things I Did Not Expect about Motherhood.  Today she has wanted to be held every moment, which really isn't asking much, is it?
      Since we had a sweet friend coming over for lunch today I was trying to pick up my house.  Then I found this.



What?  You can't tell what that is?  It is blueberries tucked into the lid of a bottle sitting on my still uncleaned end table.  Fantastic.  And, later, while the friends were here, I found this.



I am not sure why I didn't think to put them there myself.  Lily really is a crack up.  Yesterday I asked her if she wanted to go "tee tee potty."  She looked at me and said, "I'm not ready yet."  At least she is honest, and apparently listening to everything we say about her so she can use it against us.  While I was carrying Bella around picking up the house, Lily was in time-out in my closet.  The latest thing that she has started to scream from time out is, "I LOVE YOU, MOM!"  This is not a sweet, "I love you, Mom," it is a rage-filled, angry, throwing things, "I LOVE YOU, MOM!"  And that is the only time she has ever said it.  At least now I know that she knows how.
      And, as Bella screamed instead of napping this afternoon, I rocked her back to sleep and thought about how different my sweet girls already are.  Lily could never be rocked back to sleep.  But, Bella gave in and drifted into a sweet, teething slumber, and I realized she is different than Lily already.  God has given me two distinct gifts with their little personalities and nuances.  And it is my job to learn and shape them.  Even on the crazy days (and nights) when I feel like I might lose my mind if I hear one more whimper.  It is exciting to me to think about the plans that God has for their lives - it could be anything!  He is already using them mightily to shape me to be more like him - though I am sadly very slow in this.
      Though, with all of that said, I still hope that teething is something we can all adjust to with fewer sleepless nights.  I don't like learning that way.

Our House: Craft Room

      At long last, it is my pleasure to say that I have "finished" my craft room.  I am sure there will be tweaking and adding along the way as I use it and figure out what works best, as well as find fun inspiration to add to it.  But, I feel like it is decorated, and I really like the way that it turned out.  (I should, since it has taken what seems like forever to complete, and I got to pick out everything.)  Some of the before pictures are in this post.  You can see how I painted the room in this post, and you can see all about the plaid wall in this post.  Oh, and the pillows on the bed are in this post.  I really have been trying to finish this for months, so it feels good to be able to say that I am done.  Here it is!






After seeing a craft room on this blog, I knew I needed peg board.  I cut the peg board with a jigsaw (as glimpsed in this post) and painted it the same blue as the plaid on the walls.  I did shapes that mimicked the pattern of the curtains.  It was so fun to organize all the random things that normally float around onto the handy peg-board - John now has peg board envy.  After having two girls, I realized that I have a lot of ribbon, and now it is delightfully organized.  I used an extra pillow case that matches the sheets on the bed to make a cover for my sewing machine and sewed a ribbon around it and added a little bling.  It took about 20 minutes and was so simple!



I spray painted some black shelves that I already had and lined them with my ever-growing tulle collection.  Never know when you might need to make a tutu.  Above is my 6 miles of Baker's Twine.  That is right - I said 6 miles.  If you live in the Little Rock area, please ask me for some - I will never go through this much.



I saw this pin cushion idea on that same blog referenced above and had an extra frame and extra fabric - perfect!  I also love that there is room to hang the ironing board and craft apron tucked away behind the door.



I recovered a lamp shade with the rest of the pillowcase and used grosgrain ribbon to disguise the lines, and I got a cheap cream sham on clearance and sewed lavender fleece ruffles onto it to give it a little more life.  Since none of our family lives in town and seems to always come in packs, it is nice to have an extra bed.



I had a craft closet at our old house, and most of the stuff in the closet is directly from what I did there.  I am glad it still is quite functional.




Here is the reality of that closet when you turn the corner.  You never know when you might need a Peep costume (John and I were Peeps for Halloween), and it also houses all of the picture frames that have yet to find a home in our new home.  It is a little crazy back there.



I love the view to the backyard, and the curtains (from Bed Bath and Beyond) were actually the first thing I bought for the room.  I am not sure how I decided that lavender should go with them or that there should be a plaid wall, but that is what I went with.



I felt like I needed a chalk board and a bulletin board of some sort, and John was kind enough to trim them out in, what else, trim.  I love the stuff.  The pictures above the bed are from our day at Wye Mountain, shown in this post.



While it is a bit unusual (I feel like I say that a lot about how I decorate), I really like it.  It suits me, and I am so excited about the projects that I will do here.  And if you live near me, you should come over and we can craft together!

The Miracle Blanket - How I Get My Babies to Sleep at Night

 So, I thought I was going to post pictures of my craft room today.  Then, I got sick and did next to nothing yesterday, so it still needs to be fluffed a bit before I post it.  Rest assured - it is worth the wait.  I love the way it has turned out.  Anyway, so I took pictures a while back of how I swaddle Bella and never ended up posting them.  Then, this morning as I was laying in bed at 8:30 still trying to recover from my cold, I received this email.

"How thankful am I that you told me about the baby straight jacket?? It's 
wonderful. Blog worthy. People. Need. To. Know. ;)
Hope y'all are well!
Love 
Anna"

     I am so glad that it is useful to others. This is a tip-off that we got from our friends Jason and Sarah  Pollack who had their first daughter, Hiba, while they were living in Bethlehem. We went and visited 
when Hiba was 6 weeks old, and Hiba was already sleeping through the night. And they gave us one as a gift before Lily arrived.
      

      So, here it is - The Miracle Blanket. I love that the tagline for it is, "The Gift of Sleep." And, for us 
it really has been. I will say this, I do believe our girls are genetically predisposed to sleeping well. Both John and I are sort of champion sleepers. But, both of our girls started sleeping long periods through the night (7 hours or more) by three weeks. Which I know is sort of freakish and wonderful, and I attribute a large part of it to the Miracle Blanket.

Here is how it works.  I usually swaddle Bella on the changing table and start with a squirmy girl.

Remove bow.  (Okay, a lot of people will not need to do this.)  Tuck little feet into the pocket at the 

bottom of the swaddle.

There are flaps on the inside.  Tuck one flap over the arm and behind the back.  Like so.

Repeat on the other side so that both arms are good and swaddled. This is why I call it a baby straight jacket.

Then, wrap the shorter of the flaps leftover around baby and tuck it in.

Lastly, wrap the longer, final flap all the way around baby.

      Both of my girls have loved sleeping in this. I put them in a sleep positioner in the bed so they can't roll around at all. I have continued to swaddle them long after it suggests, simply because it works for us. And, it will not work for all kids, but I think it is worth a shot. One downside is that you eventually 
have to put them to sleep without the swaddle, once they can really break free from it. We are approaching that day with Bella, and I am not looking forward to it. With Lily it only took one night of her crying it out before she got used to going to sleep without it. So, for us, it was definitely worth all of the sleep on the front end to have one slightly harder night about 8 months in. I even use it for nap times, and it really does almost instantly put Bella to sleep. And then she wakes up smiley - but I think that is just her sweet nature. 

I know there are lots of things that go into a child sleeping, and I do not by any means claim to be an 

expert.  This is what has worked for us, and thanks to the note from Anna, I decided to share it with 

you all today!

Time is Short

      Life with two little friends can seem long some days.  Sometimes I find myself mentally trying to think of all that I have to do to get them ready for anything.  Ready for the day, ready to be fed, ready for bed, and for that matter, ready for life.  No pressure or anything.  It can be daunting and exhausting.  And sometimes I wish it would go quickly, so that I can do the things that I want to do.  Things that do not always include changing a lot of diapers or spoon feeding someone.  One thing I value in life is efficiency - this can serve me well in being able to accomplish things, but it can also serve to create frustration where there needs to be none.  Children are not about efficiency - in fact, quite the contrary.  It is all about the time we spend investing into their lives.  The more, the better.  And I am realizing that it really is a short amount of time that I am given with them - especially this time when they are at home with me most of the time before they start school.  I want to embrace it.  Instead of dreading some of the monotony and tedium, I want to revel in the simplicity of their needs.  I know it will get more complex soon enough.
      And, because of the way I am wired to achieve, this can seem challenging.  So, I am asking the Lord to let me love the little things and the little moments.  I want to live it up and love these years of togetherness that we get, because it will never be like this again.  Here are a few snapshots of our time Thursday and Friday.




This is the girls helping me to finish the craft room.  I use the term "helping" loosely.  I had to fish a ball of batting out of Bella's mouth.




And since Thursday was the biggest day our Chick-fil-A has ever had (yea! and way to go amazing team and John!), John was working late.  I had some evening time to kill, so I gave them their first bath together since Bella can sit up so well now.  It was largely a success.



The next morning, I was getting ready to go, and I walked into the bathroom to find that Lily was putting John's hats onto her and Bella's heads.







Hilarious.  Yesterday afternoon, Bella was really quite fussy, and in an effort to pacify and entertain her while I was baking, I gave her a lot of Cheerios.  Her fine motor skills are just starting to develop, so it is super entertaining to watch her rake her hands and arms across the tray.  It also meant that I had to clean up a lot of Cheerios afterwards, but she was quite content for quite a while.  Worth it.










Here's to savoring these moments.