Quinn still cries in her carseat. On occasion she is relaxed, but I can’t figure out what it is about those times. There are days I put her in after a long nap, a full tummy and a dry diaper and she howls. I don’t know what the magic bullet is or when she might decide it isn’t so bad. I do know if she is tired that is it 100% likely she will be upset. I am really hoping by the holidays it will be better because I know we will have some much running around that we will need and want to do….

OK - off to bed, off to bed….

Sleep Updates
Well, so Monday night went really well. I was laying with Tyler by 6:46pm and he was out at 7:25pm. While that sounds like a long time, it was a nice, drifting off to sleep. He wasn’t crazy, fussing or whining very much. He slept until 6am. So that was 10.5 hours and it was so nice to have both kids out by 7:30pm.

This evening wasn’t that bad. This sleep thing is just killing me. Tonight we went over to Chris’ parents and tried to pack in dinner and a quick trick or treat trek to a neighbor’s house. I should have known we wouldn’t get out of there by 6pm. We had a lot of fun and the kids looked so cute. But as we were leaving to trick or treat at 6:15pm and Tyler was trying to grab some glass vases, I knew - he was tired and it was going to be an interesting night. We had him back home and in bed at 7pm, but he was too would up and throwing a tantrum about crackers. He was also trying to climb out of bed and i wasn’t fighting it. He needed to decompress from all the excitement. We had him eat some crackers, drink some water and I brushed his teeth. We were back in bed at 7:51pm and he was out by 8:25pm. The falling asleep was pretty much like Monday, but that first 25 minutes was much more energetic and fussy. I was expecting him to go a lot longer.

At this point, I am ready to just swear off all social interactions in the evening. It will be at least a week until we see the fall out from returning to Standard Time and seeing where the bedtime is going to fall. I don’t even care when it is, I just want to know for sure to we can organize around it. That way when we do decide to do things, I am not freaking out the whole time watching the clock. {sigh}

As I told Chris if he had been going to bed like a dream for the last two months, I probably wouldn’t be so paranoid about pushing it one night. But at this point, Chris and I are tired and tired of dreading Tyler’s bedtime. Things got so much better once Tyler was weaned and I know once we get the nighttime stuff figured out it will get even better.

Intensity
Geez, my Mom called me intense today. That stirred up some fun mental messages for me. Then I started wondering if my friends think I’m intense? Do people dread being around me? Is my blog too intense? How do I not be intense? {sigh} Doesn’t this tire you out? It sure does me. Whenever I feel I am trying the hardest, I end up feeling like I am failing. At those times, I get upset and say a lot of things that my son picks up. I say “stupid” this or that a lot - a word I hate because I use it on myself all the time. That gets said in front of my son. He says “dammit” and was saying “wuck you, mama” in bed the last two nights. Now this one I swear we haven’t used in front of him, but who knows, I probably said it when I was mad. He has no idea what he is saying, but we need to get that one nuked pronto. Yeah, I am doing a bang up job here, aren’t I?

Then to add to the excitement, Tyler said while trying to go to sleep tonight “penis tickles”. I am almost positive I saw him doing some exploring while laying in bed tonight. It is all normal and fine, but I am just not ready for that yet, ya know? One thing at a time, please? :-p

I am trying to change some thing about how I operate with this book study. And while several lights are turning on and I am having several “a-ha” moments, it is going to take me a while to get to a point where I can catch myself when I am about to flip my lid. I am trying though. Change takes time and old habits die hard. But at least when I do react or say something I regret - I think about it a lot more. I look at what my anger is really about and how I could have handled the situation differently. I will get there, but when I fail, I just feel really bad. Ug, I really want to talk more about the stuff I am learning in this class. Maybe tomorrow I will try to do that. The stuff makes so much sense if I could just articulate it.

Can Quinn stay a baby?
There is so much complexity surrounding my toddler that I relish the simplicity of my little girl. Her smiles are so sweet and so simple. It is not going to last because she will grow up, but I cherish her smiles and coos, especially during challenging moments. Tyler has his moments too - the “it’s okay, mama” is nice to hear when I need a pic me up. Poor girl probably wishes I realized how old she is - I keep needing to remember to have toys and thing for her to play with. She loves grabing at her toys and likes having her hands busy.

Onward folks. I need to get to bed. I’m telling you if there is one thing you learn from parenthood it is the importance of sleep for the entire family unit. When one person loses sleep, it affects the whole unit. It is such a difference maker. Chris took some pics of the kids that I will post soon.

Freaking me out
One quick thing. So I think I am going to change my template soon and remove all the albums - they are outdated anyway and I don’t have time to do more. I also think that I might move to Wordpress if I can find the time. Chris had put a site counter on his site that tracked referrals from other URLs. Here is the freaky thing - you can go to Yahoo or Google, go to the image search and put in toddlerhood and 40 images down, two of Tyler get returned. How wierd is that to know that random people can do a search and see a picture of my kid. It actually freaks me out and makes me uncomfortable. Those pictures were returned because of how Chris had categorized them in the URL. Still…I know the Internet is wide open, but it really hit home and now that I have kids, it bothers me a lot more. I will still have some kind of links to the pics we keep of the kids.

..and everything is a tunnel these days - under the coffee table or any table. And my favorite just now - up his shorts. He is sitting there with a coal car saying “tunnel” and trying to shove the coal car up his pants leg… :-p

Well - he just moved onto the VHS tapes, but for the last 25 minutes was engaged in play with his Fisher Price Rock Quarry set. I don’t think they make this one anymore because I can’t find it anywhere. The one they have now I think it the Little People one and the one I got for Tyler on Craigslist I think is geared a little older. Anyway, he loves the digger and bulldoazer that came with it. I just showed him a new feature that I found and he was engaged with that. I live to here him talk as he plays. A while ago he was talking and saying “how’s that, how’s that people?” as he was plaing. Then he makes all the sounds for the trucks - it cracks me up.

I was able to get my little meerkat (the nickname has stuck - I will post a picture of a meerkat soon) down for a nap, thankfully. We are headed to my inlaws later and I didn’t want her to be too fussy.

Well - just wanted to let you know that Tyler hit the hay at 7:30pm and was up at 6am. Well, Tyler wants to play with me now, so I will sign off. More later.

Knowing that soon it would be dark very early, this past Friday we got a little wild and crazy. We went to Central Market at 6pm, had dinner and let Tyler play on the playground for a good while. We then went in and did our grocery shopping and left the store at 8pm. We had a great time and I am glad we did it. It brought back memories of Chris and I grocery shopping at midnight at the HEB on Red River. I used to love that. Man, we sure didn’t know how good we had it in college…

We thought with all that activity that Tyler would fall alseep quite easily. Nope. He finally fell asleep at 10pm. And was up at 6am. Eight hours of sleep - not enough. It just drives home to us that whatever phase Tyler is in - he needs to be in bed early. He gets so wound up and wired and has great difficulty winding that mind back down. As much as I love adventures, I think we should focus on our kids sleep at the moment. Once we re-established a good routine and figured out when bedtime is, we can experiment with pushing it a bit. Before we know it, our kids will be older and it won’t be as big of a deal. For now, I think Chris and I would be better off cuddling on the couch at home and given the disconnected state of our relationship at the moment - I think that is a good thing. It would be a “win-win” all around for our little family.

Oh, I was asking Chris why we had never thought of doing dinner at Central Market before - it is so wonderful. Even if you are sans kids - it is relaxing, you can get wine and beer and there is usually a band playing. There was a great jazz band that night. Great ambience.

Sad Thoughts
While at Central Market, Chris had gone inside with Tyler and I was sitting on a bench outside feeding Quinn. She was done so I was getting her back in the sling and putting my backpack in as a woman walked by. In my head, I had this glimpse of how she may see me - a single Mom with her baby. That thought hit me so hard in my gut. I immediately thought about how much I want to shelter and protect Quinn and surround her with love and smiles. I thought about the Moms that want that for thier babies, but can’t provide it because they are homeless or in scary environments or situations. I wanted to cry for the Mom and for the baby. I wanted to go out and help every single one of them. I realized how lucky I am for everything that I have and for a husband who is so gentle, loving and involved. I am more than blessed and I know that. This moment reminded me where I could be. I snuggled Quinn so tight and then went to see my hubby and son. We are so, so lucky.

Feeding Chase
Tyler has a new job that he does very well. He unscews the dog food container, scoops out food for Chase and puts it in his dog bowl. He then puts the lid back on and delivers the food to Chase. When you ask Tyler if he wants to feed Chase, he immediately responds “okay”. I am trying to experiment with little things that Tyler enjoys doing and really stays focused on. I commented in an earlier post that cleaning windows isn’t quite his thing…. It is so cool to see this little person so excited about a small task!

Alright, time for Quinn to take her nap (she is sititng next to me in the bouncy seat playing with cube).

Daylight Savings Time should have helped on both ends…but he was in bed at 9pm and up at 5am. {sigh}

We had some great and spontaneous fun this weekend that I haven’t told you about. Maybe during nap I can get to it….

Go to Sleep Tyler!
…and now he says it back to us. I don’t think I have mentioned this, but we have been having a hell of a time with Tyler’s bedtime. It used to be around 8:30 to 9pm, but it is getting later and harder to ease Tyler to sleep. Chris lays there for 45 minutes next to him while he rolls around. From what I have read, a tired kid should fall asleep in 20 minutes or less. Another complication is that Tyler doesn’t sleep in - so no matter when he goes to sleep - he is still up between 6 and 7am. Lately his naps have been going longer and longer (2 to 2.5 hours). It feels like we are getting into a scary cycle and we need to break it.

We talked tonight and realized that we don’t really know when his bedtime is. He looks very tired sometimes around 6:30pm. As much as we may not believe it - our energetic bundle may be wanting to be asleep by 7pm. That will be hard on the way we like to spend our evenings, but it would be way better than what it is now. Chris and I would have our time back and Chris could once again look forward to getting Tyler to bed. He is not thrilled about the early bedtime in that he doesn’t get home until after 6pm sometimes, but that is just the way it is. At least we would have a happier kid in the long run.

The experiment starts tomorrow. The yucky part is breaking the cycle - meaning I have to wake him up from his nap after 1.5 hours. We *may* also give Tyler some Benadryl to make hiim drowsy tomorrow evening. We are going to have an early dinner at 5:30pm and then do our bath so that by 6:30pm it is a waiting game. The moment he fires some tired signals at us (rubbing eyes, yawning, slowing down, etc.), he is off to bed. It will be a quick “night-night” to everything and then to bed he goes. We will see what happens. If he falls asleep in anything less than 45 minutes, we will have a winner. Anyway, we do this for a week and note the times he goes to bed each night and then set the bedtime.

I hope we find what works - it has been really frustrating the last couple of weeks - mostly for Chris. {sign} I will keep you posted on our experiments.

Our Little Meerkat
I don’t know if I have ever mentioned, but you cannot hold Quinn over your shoulder to get her to sleep or relax. She immediately straighens her body and looks around when you do that - just like a little meerkat. It is so cute- it is almost like a reflex.

Sitting and Rolling
She isn’t totally sitting in her own, but can definitely hold her own for a spell. She is starting to do the tripod sit where she uses her hands to hold her up. Before we know it, she will be there. We gave her some tummy time today and she was propped up on her arms and moving those legs. When her body catches up to what her mind wants - she will be off and running folks!! She was so close from rolling from her back to her tummy and already rolls from her tummy to her back.

Quinn’s 1st concert
She saw Joe McDermott, the Austin Girls’ Choir and the Biscuit Brothers. They were all fabulous! The Biscuit Brothers have a show on PBS Saturday mornings and I want to check it out. They were very entertaining and interactive with the kids. Both Joe and the Brothers are great because they aren’t cheesy - they have the kind of acts that appeal to kids and adults, so parents love to bring their kids to see them.

Quinn wasn’t scared nor did she cry but once in the beginning. After that she was looking around and smiling. It was kind of loud as we were in front, but she seemed to really enjoy herself. Tyler took a while to warm up, but once the girls’ choir was up, he stood right in front of them snaking on cheddar bunnies. It was like he was trying to watch a movie up close. He loves girls. The other day he walked over to some middle school girls and was talking to them. We kept taking him away,but he would head right back over. He loves the ladies. We let me continue to stand there expect the time he tried to adjust the mike stand.

During the Biscuits he was slapping his legs and clapping, but got a litte restless. After a while he and Daddy went and ran around the Capitol grounds, which are lovely by the way. I think we will go and picnic there someday.

This Book is Amazing
It says it is focused on parenting, but you could totally apply it to relationships as well. It hits the nail on the head as far as interactions. When Chris and I are frustrated, instead of me really listening and being open minded about his feelings and experiences, I interrogate with loaded questions, judge the situation and try to fix it. That is exactly what I did with Tyler’s sleeping situation. I am leaning the value of listening and talking. I thought this statement, while it may seem obvious, the way it was stated seemed so profound:

“How we come to talk to ourselves is shaped by how others have talked with us.”

Think about the tapes that play in your head when you are under pressure, when you fail, when you are sad, when you succeed - you didn’t make those up. You are replaying messages that others gave you. I sit there and think about the tapes that I am helping Tyler to make and it gives me great pause. It think about my own tapes - and there are some tapes I really want to get rid of.

This book talkes about how relational our brain are and that they are constructed to be directly influenced by their interactions with other brains. I have to go to bed, but when I can construct a complete thought about this, I will post it. This book is so amazing…. Parenting from the Inside Out by Daniel Siegel…