Dekker and Laela were just gorgeous OUT OF THIS WORLD this morning!

My day started with me feeling very overwhelmed. Laela had a relatively short night, and I felt like a rag doll – pretty much unable to hold myself up, much less my kids. I knew we were going out in the evening, and I knew I had lots of things to remember, yet I couldn’t really pinpoint what I needed to write down and keep track of or get ready. I just felt scattered. It took a long time for me to actually surface. I threw on old sweats and a long sleeves shirt and socks, and then got Dekker out of bed. It was definitely a jammie day. Deks ate breakfast pretty well, and as soon as he was done, I brought the kids downstairs for some Glee and toys. It was definitely a tv kind of morning. Dekker had a meltdown as soon as we got downstairs, I forget why. But he finally moped his way over to my chair where I was sitting in an effort to give him space, and he reached up to me, asking “Uff?” Of course, my boy. I picked him up and cuddled right in for a few minutes while Laela slept nearby in her bouncy chair.

It was only a few minutes of cuddles before she woke and cried, and I knew she was hungry. I had made her a bottle in advance any everything, knowing it would only be a matter of time. I hate those situations where I have to end one on one time with one kid and swap for the other. I know thats part of having two kids, but Dekker cuddles don’t come around too terribly often anymore and it broke my heart thinking I might have to break his heart. I just started talking to him and pointed out that Laela was crying. He nodded. Maybe we should feed her? He nodded. Did he want to get down? “No.” Ok… So I waited another minute or so and asked if he wanted to go check on Laela. “No.” He knew. So I finally said “I think we should go see Laela” and he slid off my lap and went to her side. My big boy. I fed her while she was still in her bouncy chair, so it wasn’t like I dropped him so I could cuddle her instead. And he sat beside me the entire time on the floor. I was so amazed at him and his concern for Laela, and his desire to be involved and protective.

I felt very covered today. Let’s be honest. I felt completely exhausted, and I was grumpy all the way from yesterday evening. I didn’t have my head on straight, and I hadn’t accomplished anything. All these things were true today. Yet, I felt peaceful. I could tell that, today especially, God had me covered. Not that these things would necessarily go away. They will likely be back tomorrow. But today, I felt like God gave me a break. He helped me have a positive attitude, and feeling an even bigger, even more overwhelming LOVE for my babies. I think we would all do better in life and in our relationships if we are quicker to forgive. And I don’t just mean the big stuff, or the fights with our spouses. I mean forgiving Dekker for taking five minutes doing down the stairs, or Laela waking up the second I lay her down. These are not big things. Why do I make them so big?! So I was blessed with that kind of attitude, which really helped my day be awesome.

Brady was home by 5:30, bearing exciting things! We purchased a new and waaay better stroller off of a Facebook sale page, and it is exactly what we hoped it would be! How often does that happen?? Also, he brought stuff for making jam! Willa is coming to help me make jam tomorrow morning and after scouring my house, I had everything except fruit and sugar. Does that even make sense?! So Brady came with that as well. I warmed us all up some leftover before we hit the road at 6:00, and headed out to trick or treat in my hometown.

My kids were the cutest kids of all the kids, bar none.

We hit my parents house first, and then a few other houses of friends. We counted later and I think we only hit six houses, yet we were in town for 1.5 hours! But it was SUCH a good evening 🙂 Laela was asleep for most of it but she was the cutest little elephant anyone has ever seen. Shockingly cute. And Dekker was easily the most timid dinosaur anyone has ever seen, but once we got some candy into him, he warmed up. Plus the last house we visited had a puppy, which was a HUGE win! Also a win for us, considering we scored a box of K-Cups! Jocelyn, you win for best house tonight!!!

Laela was pretty finished by the time we were headed home, but only cried for the first ten seconds of the drive. Dekker was pumped.

 

He had SUCH a great time, even though he was so shy. I know they’re little, but I think both of our kids felt very loved tonight by the people they encountered. I know I could sure tell they were loved!

Even though he really didn’t want to be, Dekker is in bed. Laela is in her U-pillow, having some nudist time. Brady and I are waiting for the bath to finish running. I am anticipating eating a snack and drinking some new lemon tea while watching My Name is Earl. And then sleep, hopefully. Miss Laela needs to give in to sleep sooner than 1:00am or I’m going to gray very, very quickly.

Good night, everyone! Hope you all had a beautiful day.

It was a pretty hem haw type of day. The kidlets woke up fairly early, which wasn’t my favorite thing, but we lived. While I was feeding Laela first thing before getting Dekker out of bed, I spoke with my mom on the phone. I haven’t spent much time with her the past week and she leaves tomorrow to visit one of her sisters. I’m sad that we’ve missed each other so much. However, she asked to come out to see us this morning!! So she drove out pretty quickly after our phone call and was over before Dekker was done breakfast. He was THRILLED to see her, and asked her to read him book after book. It was lovely to watch them together again. Seemed like he hadn’t seen her in years!

My mom and I got the kids downstairs and we visited while Dekker played and Laela slept on her chest. As the title of the post suggests, it was super low key and uneventful. We played downstairs for a little while before Dekker asked to go upstairs for lunch. His communication is getting better so fast! Its rare that we can’t figure out what he wants. So we all hauled back upstairs and sat down for lunch. Dekker had an apple and toast while my mom and I had eggs. Then Dekker went to bed, fuss-free. My mom and I visited for another fifteen minutes-ish before she had to leave. It was sad. I’ve gotten so used to seeing her more often, and I think its gonna be a big shock to have another almost week without her. I love you, mom!

I dozed/slacked the afternoon off until Brady was on his way home. Then I prepared supper and felt very wifey, having everything on the table upon his arrival. Dekker was even up and ready, and Laela was content, sleeping in the mamaroo. Once we had all finished eating, I took a quick drive to a nearby town to drop off some toques I made for a friend for her kids to wear on Halloween, and I made it home in time to be part of Dekker’s bedtime. Now he’s in bed, Laela is sleeping in the U-pillow, Brady is making his lunch, and the bath is running as I type away. I wish we had brownies. It feels like a brownie day. As if we don’t have enough food in our house! We have been so ridiculously blessed in that department. We have a massive ancient chest freezer downstairs and I think it would take a lot of arranging to fit anything else in it. Seriously. Its a lot of food. So I think I’ll turn off the whining about the brownies…

So as you guys can see, it wasn’t a riveting day. Nice, but quiet. I’m nervous about the next few week days. Bradys schedule is crazy and he’ll likely end up working late most days. Except tomorrow, because we’re taking the offspring trick or treating! It’ll still be a full day though, and I’m alone Friday. I do have a friend coming over on Monday, which helps!! But I’m alone Tuesday and Wednesday too. Maybe I’ve just been spoiled, and shouldn’t desire my daily dose of company/help, but I miss all my ladies when they’re not here. Could be an interesting test for me to see how I fare on my own with my kids for a few days. Usually, when I’ve felt lonely and stir crazy, I keep busy with crocheting or writing or things like that, but I don’t currently have the gumption, or that many hands. We’ll see, we’ll see.

Can’t wait to bundle my kids up in their costumes tomorrow and go show them off around Dalmeny!!!

As I mentioned a few days ago, Dekker has started officially using manners. It still takes prompting probably 80-90% of the time, but it counts. “Please” and “thank you” are pronounced “dease” and “sisou.”

The other day, Dekker was in a particularly good mood for mimicking, and I took that opportunity to ask him to say all the polite words. Now that I know he can, and now that he knows that I know, we use them constantly. Every single time he wants something, I ask him to say please. Of course, being that he’s two, if I ask him to wait one minute, he responds with “Dease! Dease! Dease!” Its so sweet, and its hard to say know when he’s being so polite. I love him.

This evening, we decided to be lazy and order supper from the Red Bull. And by “decided” I mean that it was about 3:30 before I realized I hadn’t pulled my planned dinner out of the freezer. So take-out it is! Elvira and I ordered pasta dishes while Brady got a burger and fries. Dekker never eats enough to order something bigger than a kids meal, so we opted to feed him leftovers, and he could have tastes from our food. He was eyeing up Bradys french fries as soon as they arrived on the table. He pointed and whined. And whined. Brady said to Dekker “What do you say?” Dekker, wide eyed – “Fries.” What could we say?! Or do??! We gave him some fries. He is so adorable.

That was the highlight of my day 🙂 Now I am tired and heading to the tub. The last couple of days, we’ve been having dessert once Dekker is down, but we didn’t tonight, so perhaps I’ll get a snack in the tub like I’ve grown so accustomed to. I’m pretty sure there’s pumpkin pie in my fridge…

You know how its so hard to do all those dirty, time consuming though small jobs throughout your house? Perhaps you, like me, avoid them like the plague. However, they make you angry every time you see them. Whether you have a good excuse not to do them, like me (having a baby puts lame jobs on the back burner) or you have zero excuse, or you actually do them, I think we can all agree that we’d rather be doing something (anything) else.

My mother in law is visiting. Hi Elvira! She came out to meet her latest grandchild, visit Brady and I, get in a bunch of playtime with Dekker, and to WORK! But new baby or not, we did everything in our power to prepare for her visit and get the house ready for a visitor. We’ve kept our house pretty together since right before Laela was born, so the only real tasks we’ve been maintaining are the dishes and laundry. We were confident there wasn’t much to do. However, I gave Elvira full run of the house to do any chores she could really find. Without pointing out any flaws or making me feel embarrassed, she did all the jobs that I truly, truly hate. Without even knowing I hated them that much!! She dusted, and dusted, and dusted. Shelves, table tops, light fixtures. She washed the fronts of our cabinets and appliances. She even cleaned the inside of the cabinet under the sink that holds our garbage can. That was the job on my mind as I typed earlier about the jobs that make you angry when you see them. SUCH a relief. Likely the dirtiest place in my house. Wait, I take it back. That was the microwave, which she cleaned as well. I can’t remember the last time I wiped out my microwave. It may have been in the year 20-never…

She ran around my house, cleaned,did dishes, locked herself outside once, and did lots of other things. We even sat together and organized all the gift bags and tissue paper piling up on a table in our dining room. While it was nice to see the big mess of love and support in the way of gifts, it was a huge mess, only getting bigger. My house was in decent shape before her arrival, but it is looking pretty mighty fine now.

Aside from all the cleaning, we had a nice quiet day together. Brady had to work so Dekker hung out with the ladies all day, which I’m pretty sure he quite enjoyed. Tomorrow Brady will be home again with all of us for Elvira’s last day of visiting. We’ll quite miss having her around. Dekker has warmed up to her very sweetly, and Laela is full of smiles for her already! Sure guys, tell me that reaction smiles don’t happy yet, but they do. Just once in a while, but they do. My little darling daughter is so pleasant 🙂 I wish you could all meet her at this stage!

It is evening. We’ve all gone our separate ways for the night so Dekker is sleeping, Elvira is probably reading, and we’re up with Laela, running a tub. I feel so very blessed to be where I am with the people I am with. God is good.

We had a lovely night last night, with Laela only waking once at 3:20 before we woke with her at 8:00. She cuddled with me on the bed until 8:30 when Brady had finished showering up and getting ready for the day. Then he cuddled with her while I got ready. At 9:00, we surfaced and got Dekker up and dressed. Elvira came upstairs shortly after Dekker was seated for breakfast. I dressed Laela and Brady packed the diaper bag, we made some coffee, and were off! we were actually surprisingly relaxed and efficient. That always feels good. We were even a couple minutes early to church.

At the point in the service where Dekker started getting fidgety, Brady took him out to play toys in the back room. But Brady’s missed the last couple of services that way, so I passed Laela to Elvira and traded Brady out. I sat in the back listening to the service on the wall speaker, and played with Dekker. He was having a pretty rough time. He had gotten a nice long sleep but was very tired and warm. I unzipped his sweater in an effort to help but it didn’t do much. At one point, he was going for a toy and bumped his head on a table. It was barely a tap, but I expected a throw down. I tried to coax him over to me, but he shook his head and slowly sat down on the floor, as if contemplating his next move. I watched him lean against the tub of toys for a few seconds before his eyes glazed over. He bobbed a little. When he came back to earth, he burst out crying. He was completely whooped. I went and scooped him up and he cried into my neck for a good minute or two. Once he had calmed down a little, I asked him if he wanted to go down and play with the toys. He shook his head. I asked him to take pictures with me and he said no to that too. I pulled out my phone and turned the camera on and facing us anyway, just to see. He was stone faced. So I started making faces. It worked 🙂

 

It was fun. He was so cuddly and giggly. I adore that boy.

After church, we went to my parents for lunch. It was probably one of the yummiest meals I’ve eaten in a while, or it just really hit the spot, but we had hashbrown casserole, farmer sausage, and green beans with mushrooms in mushroom soup sauce and crunchy onions. I’m drooling just writing it out. Amazing. Once lunch was done, we abandoned the offspring and drove Elvira to Saskatoon to show her around the Daytona Showhome that Brady worked in, as well as a few other surrounding homes he had finished. It was fun to tour through them and to see Elvira so proud of Brady and his work. He truly is wonderful at his job. It was in the fourth house that I inquired about the time, and Brady said it was 4:30. My parents were expecting company to arrive at 4:30! So we booked it out of there and headed back to their place to snag our kids so they could enjoy their quiet evening with friends.

We arrived at their place shortly afterwards to a quiet group of four adults and my sleeping daughter in the living room, and Dekker still fast asleep in the computer room. It was sooo peaceful and quiet, and it really didn’t appear that we had put anyone out. We visited with everyone for a while, but Brady, Elvira, and I were all feeling quiet sleepy so we gathered up the kids, all of their stuff, and all of the food from the people at church, and drove home. We had crispy chicken salad for supper and had a really nice, much needed heart to heart afterwards. We’re all solidly tired at this point so it is soon bedtime.

Here’s hoping for another easy night with Laela. I’ve got a bit of crocheting to complete tomorrow afternoon, so I best be as rested as possible!

How do I feel so wiped out so early?? We had such a wonderful, restful night last night, yet I am completely whooped. Once Laela is done eating here, I’m gonna need my bath to wind down, and then sleep time. Too bad I already had my booze of the day.

Laela ate last night at 11:00pm, 4:30am, and then at 8:30am. We lay in bed and took our time feeding her before getting up. We got Dekker up and met Bradys mom upstairs for croissants and coffee. Once we were done, Dekker was itching to go downstairs, so we all piled downstairs and took a load off. Dekker played while we all visited and held Laela and played on our phones. It was such a relaxed day, all around. Its really not fair for me to be tired. But its the truth.

We had lunch of leftover pizza upstairs before Dekker went down for a nap. I think we were all feeling a bit groggy so we sat in the living room and visited a bit while I crocheted. It was nice to catch up, since we haven’t seen Bradys mom in quite some time, and we all lead crazy lives and rarely catch up on the phone.

Dekker slept over three hours this afternoon, which was incredible! I made a chicken spaghetti casserole for supper and I have to say that it was pretty much delicious. Its definitely one of my staple meals, because its easy and yummy, which is perfect for this time of my life! Any meal that comes together fast is a meal for my house! We ate the spaghetti and garden carrots that Elvira brought with her, and very soon after, Dekker was asking to go downstairs again. So we went with it until it was his bedtime. He was such a sweetheart going to bed tonight. He gave lots of kisses and waved goodbye. After a couple “Ninights” from him, Brady carried him off and put him down. He then proceeded to talk the entire time the three of us ate pumpkin pie and drank our drinks. Weirdo.

We all petered out pretty early (poor Peter who must have always left things early…) so we went out separate ways around 9:00am. We still have a good few days of visiting ahead of us so I think its nice that we’re all comfortable to separate earlier in the night. My bath is running and I am nice and full from pumpkin pie and apricot brandy/sprite. Time for some mindless Netflix before sleeping, and then church tomorrow.

Is it wrong that I’m anticipating church more when I have a new baby to show off?

It was a crazy busy day!! We had so many errands to run. It was probably our busiest day since Laela was born.

We had two appointments to hit. Brady had chiropractic at 1:00 and we had Dekker’s preliminary testing for his new eye specialist at 2:15. We were in the city a bit too early to go straight to chiro, so we stopped at City Hospital to get Dekker some new patches. The last time Brady went to pick some up, they only had the junior sizes for girls. Well, they have a “gender neutral” pack, but they’re completely glittery. Not too masculine if you ask me. But we were out and needed patches, so Brady had bought the next size up, which truly was the only option. I want to say here, before everyone jumps on what I’m about to say, that I think Dekker is gorgeous. Daily, I am struck by my love for him, and besides his wonderful character and personality, I think he is completely beautiful. That being said, his patch makes him look different. Some kids would even think he’s scary, or strange. These medium sized patches make him look silly, and it breaks my heart :'( So yesterday, I called the hospital to see if they had junior sized boy patches and they said yes. They didn’t. I was pretty ripped, since I encountered the woman I had spoken with, and she was DETERMINED that I had asked for junior patches on their own, without specifying gender. Then she tried to sell me the sparkly ones. Then she tried to sell me the bigger ones. I was doing everything in my power to be polite and not argue with her, but I finally just walked out. She wanted to keep arguing and I was fuming, so it had to be done. Grrr…

We headed to chiro next, and got to show Laela off to Dr. Mike 🙂 I had been waiting to, and it was nice to see his interest in her and his usual teasing with Dekker. Of course, Brady felt sooo much better after the treatment, and we left happy, as usual.

We headed to Midtown Mall next. This was our biggest stop, as Dekker’s second opinion ophthalmologist is int he Midtown Tower. We were nice and early so we grabbed some New York Fries for lunch. Dekker loved them 🙂 Sure, call us bad parents for just feeding him fries, but it was a special treat.

 

We headed upstairs right afterwards and were sent to a waiting room with toys and kids and The Wiggles. Dekker was entertained, but it was nap time. As in, Dekker often naps around 2:00, and he was scheduled for his appointment at 2:15. We didn’t wait too long, and were probably in the exam room around 2:30. The lady that ran all the tests with Dekker introduced herself, and then read over all the health information and medical history I had filled out in the car on the way. The last question on the form was the standard “Is there any other information you can give us to help us treat your child better?” question, to which I answered “Dekker is the best little boy in the whole world. He is very sensitive, so please don’t be put off if he cries. He is truly wonderful.” I saw her smile a little while reading it, and then keep on with asking her questions and putting information into the computer. Now I have to say, she is probably always great with the kids she sees, but I felt very good about writing what I did when I watched her interact with Dekker. He did cry. Absolutely. Right in the beginning, he didn’t want her to touch his glasses, or mess with his patch, or patch his other eye, or anything. She just smiled and let him have his fit, and then kept going. She was incredible with him, and he knew it! He started responding to her so sweetly. He would lean forward and give her big, mischievous smiles. She said something at one point about him scaring her, and he got all coy and quietly said “Boo.” She jumped 🙂 I loved watching them. Once his tests were over, she gave us the great news that the patch had done its job! Both of Dekker’s eyes are of the same strength! One is still definitely in, but its not only the right eye. He doesn’t have a dominant eye at the moment, and thats incredible. She recommended that we still patch, but we can alternate it so the right eye won’t suffer. She answered all of our questions, including the question of surgery. He will need it. And thats ok. I just wanted to hear it from someone else. We still haven’t heard it from the doctor, and we won’t until January (ugh) but at this office, things are just way less rushed. Of course, I wish we could see the doctor sooner, but I like the feel so much better. The moment the door closed behind us as we left, Brady and I both agreed that we’ll be coming to this doctor instead of our original ophthalmologist. I really like the idea of this second doctor doing Dekker’s surgery as opposed to someone who rushes the process a bit more than necessary. We are so relieved after Dekker’s appointment today. I thank all of you for covering us in prayers!

Once that was all over, we were all pretty wiped. But we still had grocery shopping to do, among other things. While we were driving to our next location, Brady asked what we should do for supper. Eat in Saskatoon, at home, what would we make, etc. I reminded him his mom was picking supper up in North Battleford. We both snapped to attention. Elvira’s coming!!! Of course we knew this, but it had slipped our minds completely int he general chaos of the day. She was going to be at our place for supper. It was currently 4pm. We hit Walmart fast and ordered some pictures, picked up some craft stuff I need for Halloween, plus some winter boots for Dekker and a bunnyhug and jeans for Laela. We then went to Superstore for groceries, and back to Walmart to pick up the pictures. We quickly dropped in on my mom and picked up a few things before racing home. Elvira had been in our driveway for about five minutes. Sooo close! But she beat is. Its ok, we laughed together. But we felt awful. Our house was a mess, and now there were groceries all over the floor. I think she’ll stay anyway 😉

After a supper of pizza and breadsticks, and an evening of playing toys with Dekker and ooing and ahing over Laela, we are all packing it in early so Elvira can rest up from the drive and so we can wind down from the day. Tomorrow, I plan to crochet, and drink coffee and visit. Sooo looking forward to it!

My lovely friend, Willa, came over today. She is so lovely and dives right in, changing diapers, feeding bottles, reading books, playing toys, visiting with me, and helping with any chores I can scrape up. She even brings me Starbucks. I find it so refreshing to have someone in the house with me, not only to help with my kids and house, but to just keep me company as well. We had a really nice morning together and then, once Dekker had eaten his lunch, she headed back home to finish up her day.

I called this post “Split Attention” because its a reality in my house, and in anyone’s house if they have more than one kid. My firstborn now has to share my attention. And I have to say, Dekker is handling it like a champ. We have our moments once in a while, but I think most of them are out of a lack of comprehension. For instance, the other day Dekker wanted to go downstairs and when he went to open the baby gate, he took it to the face. He had a big cry and I cuddled him until he felt better, but he didn’t want to crawl down the stairs on his own. So I carried him down. Once we got to the bottom, I explained to him that I was just going to go get Laela and would be back right away. But he didn’t get it. He lay at the bottom of the stairs wailing like an abandoned animal. I was back at the stairs within seconds and he figured it out, thankfully. But ya, we have those moments.

Dekker’s comprehension has grown astronomically in the last few weeks. He is talking a lot more, learning constantly, and making us proud. His spells of high pitched screams are much less, which is a HUGE relief to us! And he almost never hits!!! These are two really big challenges we’ve faced over the last months, and we have worked diligently and consistently to correct them, seemingly to no avail. It got worse after Laela came home, but within probably the week, he improved and has only kept on in that direction. This evening, he was jumping on our bed and fell, and accidentally hit Brady’s face. His immediately stopped what he was doing and said “Oh, sorry!” He had never said “sorry” before! He clearly knows what it means. Just in the last couple of days, he’s started saying sorry, please, thank you, stop, help, and all kinds of things!! And he loves Laela. So much. I have seen no resentment towards her at all. They make a great pair.

This evening, during playtime in our room before Dekker goes to bed, he took a good spill. He was jumping away, and when he dropped down, he slammed his forehead on the wall. I was laying on my side on the bed and scooped him up before he could even start crying. I know, some people would likely leave him to see if he would just keep on truckin’, but if I took that hit, I would be crying. So without much forethought, I grabbed him on top of me like I used to do every evening. He cried and cried, but didn’t fight to get away at all. Eventually, he calmed, and just lay still, in a full on hug, on my chest. Or at least, it used to be my chest… Its been a while. He’s grown, apparently.

Holding him brought me back a little bit to before I was pregnant with Laela, and we could have cuddles like that every night. He is still my little boy, just a slightly bigger version. He just amazes me. I like to remind him that, when we were trying to conceive our very first baby, and I was praying to God, asking for one, he was exactly what I was asking for! I love him.

For those who pray, I ask for those prayers tonight to be for Dekker. Tomorrow, he has an eye appointment. He is going in for preliminary testing at the office of his second opinion doctor. He won’t, however, actually see the doctor tomorrow. Its just testing. What makes me nervous about the situation is that he sees his original ophthalmologist on November 7th. The chance of us actually getting a full opinion from Doctor2 before Doctor1 decides whether or not to put him on a surgery list is slim to none. I know that he’ll likely wait on the list for a while, but what if suddenly there’s some fast opening and we don’t have time to get in to Doctor2? I’m scared. I’m also scared for the sake of his eyes in general. I have never felt completely comfortable with his eye being patched, and I’ve watched him regress in a lot of ways. However, I have never felt complete peace about going against what the doctor said and getting rid of the patch. So now I fear for the eye that has been patched for the last two months. In the effort to strengthen the left eye, will the right eye have suffered miserably? It has barely been used for two months! How strong could an unused eye be??! I’m scared.

Please pray for my boy. I love him, and I want this whole thing to just be over.

Thank you so much for your thoughts on yesterdays post about room sharing!!! I didn’t respond to anyone but, in hopes that you responded because you had read the post, I figured I could throw my response on here 🙂 Lots of you had similar ideas and advice, so I bet a lot of it works, which is hopeful for me!

I should clarify – we very much plan for Dekker and Laela to share a room. We are, however, waiting until she hypothetically sleeps through the night. I’m glad some of you could relate to me in the way of wanting to switch them out. I would put them together in a room now if I didn’t think Laela would wake Dekker, but of course she would at this point. In that way, I could just get over myself and wait it out. Dekker was sleeping through at eight weeks and I don’t want to raise my hopes, but that would be sooo great if Laela did the same. Then, in just a few more weeks, they could be rooming. I know there would be some nights of adjustment and waking each other up, but I’m more than ok with that. I’m thinking this is probably my best option in the moment. If she won’t sleep through, we could have a problem.

The issue of Dekker waking is also my concern with putting Laela out of the room once she falls asleep. Wouldn’t her little sounds (or her cries when she wakes for food or a change) wake him beyond a point of going back? I suppose thats just a risk I’d take. Laela’s cradle is basically a tiny wooden crib on wheels, so we could just roll her out I suppose and give it a try?

About the tiptoeing, I TOTALLY agree that kids should be able to sleep through things. How would you ever have company over in the evenings if they couldn’t?! We were actually very intentional with that about Dekker. I made plenty of noise during his daytimes naps for sure, because I figured he’d sleep deeper at night and lighter in the day. We do the same with Laela in the day, and I think my tiptoeing so fearfully in the night is more based on my anxiety than it is a parenting tactic. I don’t try to be that way, I promise. Always something to work on, right?

The  white noise/music idea makes me a bit nervous, to be honest. For those who have done it, have you found your kids depend on it to fall asleep? Like, would you have to bring their music or white noise machine if you slept somewhere else?

I think I covered most of everyones ideas here. Oh, except the idea to buy a bigger house 🙂 On it! Literally. We’ve had our sights open for quite some time, and are hoping to move next year, Lord willing. I would love to have two kids rooms for sure, so the newbie could be in one and the other hypothetical kids in the other.

 

I had a super nice day today. I spent the day with Jerilee, drinking coffee and FINALLY catching up with her! We haven’t actually seen each other since she came to the hospital to meet Laela. Love her. Tomorrow we’ll spend the morning with Willa, who I also haven’t seen in a while. Love her too. I’m so blessed to have so many friends nearby who love my family.

As always, God is good.

Before I get into the meat of the post, I just want to throw out a thank you to everyone on Facebook who encouraged me today. I had another crappy night last night, and woke up feeling like a total zombie. Not only had Laela taken an extra long time to get down in the first place, but anytime I was awake in the night, I heard Dekker quietly talking. It is not like him to wake in the night at all. Even though he was happy and fine and didn’t require any assistance from us, it made me dread the next day with him, knowing how tired he would be. I suppose a lot of my bad night was built on my bad attitude. That aside, today turned out to be a completely meltdown-free day!!! Thank you for the prayers, those who prayed. I do not remember the last day I had that didn’t involve a toddler fit, or a meltdown of my own. Or both. But Dekker was awesome and ate and played like a champ. He didn’t fuss over diaper changes, and was very gentle and doting on Laela. He started saying “please” for the first time EVER today, and when it was nap time, he giggled when I gave him his blanket, eagerly came in for a big kiss, and happily went into his bed. Easy peasy. Laela was very relaxed all day, as per usual, except she is a struggling little gassy girl. However, God granted me the exact sense of humour I needed to rename Laela “Little Miss Man Fart.” It suits. It was a solidly good day, way better than I thought it would be. So again, thanks everyone for wishing us well! It turned out 🙂 God is good.

This morning, I had an idea of what I wanted to post about, so even though I could make a whole post out of today in general, I’m opting for my original idea. I’m hoping for feedback and opinions. I know I’m not the first person to have to figure all this stuff out about having two kids. As the title suggests, I’m curious about room sharing. Before I go anywhere with this, I don’t want to get all controversial or anything. Bed sharing, co-sleeping, room sharing, whatever! I have no judgement towards doing or not doing any of these things. I am neutral. I am Switzerland.

I swore I would NEVER sleep my children in my room. Ever. For lots of reasons, most of which I don’t remember, if I’m being honest. Then, Dekker was born and his poor little self was so clogged up that he would gag and choke in the night, and we would have to flip him on his tummy and smack on him until he threw up wad after wad of mucous. Glamorous, right? Either way, room sharing was immediately our only option when we brought him home. And we all lived. He roomed with us for two months before we switched him to his own room. Now, we have two kids. And only two bedrooms upstairs. Therefore, we opted to share our room with Laela until she hypothetically sleeps through the night. (knock on wood) However, I discovered last night that I have a lot of anxiety tied to her being in our room.

Its not because I don’t want her around. That is 150% NOT the case! However, if we lay her down and she makes little sounds and twitches a little bit before she settles in and sleeps soundly, I lay wide awake, almost in fear of her waking. I find myself unable to roll over or adjust for the same reasons. Last night, it took a few tries to get her down, and I was quite frustrated with the situation, which never helps. But I was. When I was coming to the end of my rope, I lay her down and left the room. I figured that, if things really took a bad turn and she started wailing, I would either come back or Brady would hear her first and give it a try. I sat out in the living room, trying to wind down and cool off. I went back about a half hour later and the room was completely silent. Success!!! However, my first reaction was “Oh shoot, I’ll just sleep in the living room so I don’t wake Laela.” Which is nutty. It probably took me about two minutes to get into bed. I walked SO SLOWLY, and then once I was actually in bed, I did not move. It took me forever to fall asleep then, just waiting to hear her wake.

So. This is not an ideal situation for anyone involved. I know I need to work on just turning my mind off. Laela is new, and she will wake in the night, regardless of whether I roll over in bed or not. But if we had a third bedroom up here, I guarantee you she would be in it. I don’t know what another option would be. Parents of two kids, what have you done? Where does she fit??!