There she goes!

From The Wonder Weeks:
"Some babies have such a strong natural drive to master skills, that they don’t take the time to sleep until they are successful. You see this behavior already at a rather young age. These babies allow themselves no sleep before they have reached their goal. It demands much of them, and of you. That is a personal quality that can be very useful later in life, but at this young age these children must sometimes be protected from themselves."

The night I wrote the last entry (and spoke of how her night time sleep is usually great) Makena woke up multiple times. And she woke up crying many times the next night. And the night after that she awoke screaming and cried so hard I thought something was wrong. I picked her up and walked around the house and let her drink from her cup. She finally calmed down. We let her play for a little while and then we all went to bed together. It has been a rough week. She is having a harder time than normal napping, and getting her to fall asleep at night has involved a lot of tears and fighting.

Maybe she was coming down with a cold? Maybe her teeth were hurting? Maybe she was having bad dreams? Maybe it was just separation anxiety? Maybe she's not going to bed early enough? Maybe she just isn't tired? Maybe she was mad that I blogged about her and this was revenge?

Or, maybe she was so immersed in learning a new skill that focusing on it took every ounce of her being. And then, she finally did it..

She walked!!



I'm afraid she hasn't quite mastered it yet, which I'm pretty sure means we're due for a few more tough nights.

She'd been standing for a while now, and even standing up straight from a sitting position all on her own. She's done a few steps towards us, and a few from the couch to the chair. But this was the most we've seen! And how fitting that it was all for Elmo. lol.

Tonight she seems to be coming down with a cold. She has a fever of 101.6 and her nose was red and running. She was nursing a lot today and getting mad that the milk stops flowing after a while! Normally she's a quick 3-5 minute nurser, so after 10-12 minutes she was getting super frustrated (and I should have unlatched her when she stopped sucking and was just fussing, but I didn't) and she bit me. Not hard enough for me to react, but enough where the next time she nursed on that side it hurt, and sure enough I have a tiny little puncture mark. It happened once before, and a little saline water and Lansinoh on it heals it up in no time.

Pam rocked her to sleep and I heard her take her to lay down and the next thing I knew an hour had passed and I looked at the monitor and they were both asleep.

I used to be quite the early bed goer. But now, these night time quiet hours are so wonderful. It's my "me" time. And since Pam wakes up with Makena in the mornings and let's me get some extra sleep, this is my time to get stuff done. Or at least I SHOULD be getting something done...I've got some craft projects in my head and keep meaning to jump right in.

On that note, I need to look for fabric.