Tired.

I am always amazed at the places Jane can sleep soundly - that are NOT her bed.

She is hands down the worst sleeper in our family. All of my kids have slept in bed with me until they weaned (around 2 years old) and then very easily transitioned into their own beds. Not Jane. She seeks me out wherever I am. She wakes up 5 or 6 times a night and comes looking for me. She usually ends up on the couch or floor in the basement if I am doing laundry (above) or the office floor if I am working in there (below.)

"I am so tired." Is the thought that runs through my head most often during the day. I thought about it recently - about how much harder it is becoming for me to get by on little sleep and if it's due to aging or just being worn down over time. Then I realized that I have been getting up multiple times a night for over 6 years - since Jacob was not yet sleeping through the night when Jane was born.

Man, no wonder I'm tired.

I hatched a 2 part plan to get myself some sleep, which I am hoping will improve my overall health - particularly that of my joints. (I'm sure my attitude can only improve with more sleep too!)

STEP ONE  - Rebekah needs to get her drivers license (and start driving herself to early morning seminary, 4am ski trips, YW's on Wednesday nights, cast parties and other late night events.)

STEP TWO - Jane needs to sleep through the night. In her own bed.

I've never believed in letting my kids "cry it out" - even Ferber himself said that what "Ferberizing" has become was not what he had intended. Anyway, about a year ago we did try it with Jane - in desperation. She screamed with 110% intensity for 3-4 hours for 2 nights & then we gave up. Firstly, with that going on she had everyone in the house awake - and with work, school, seminary, etc for the rest of us we couldn't all be up all night. Secondly, I couldn't keep it up when it's just not something I believe in. My heart was not in it, and I just couldn't put her or myself through it.

So, my new tactic. WHATEVER IT TAKES. She has very vivid nightmares and looks for me for comfort to go back to sleep. I needed her to get in the habit of staying in bed, realizing it was just a dream and going back to sleep. I decided the best way would be gradual separation.

I hauled the spare mattress into her room and put it right up against her little bed. I spent a week of nights like that. Actually not bad sleep, since each time she woke up I just had to reach out and hold her hand (requiring very little wakefulness.)

After a week I moved into Emily's bed across the room, but pulled Jane's bed into the center of the room. A week later - her bed was back on her side and I was still in Emily's bed. (Em was temporarily shifted to my bed.) Each morning that she woke up having stayed in her bed even if she had woken and I had gone to her for comfort, she got a small prize (a tub of new play dough, a plastic animal, a new polly pocket, a treat.)

I am delighted to report that for the last 2 nights she has slept in her bed and I in mine. Each member of this family has been in their own bed the entire night. I know it's only been 2 nights - and maybe a little too early for celebration, but this is the most progress we've ever had!

We leave on Sunday for vacation and I am a little worried about regression while we are gone, but hope even if she's "off" while we're away, she will quickly get back into it when we get home.

More than anything this experience has confirmed something about mothering (at least my mothering) that I have been thinking a lot more about lately. Each child really needs to be individually parented. They each come with their own sets of talents and challenges. What works for one (or 3) may not work for another. Of course, we will always have family rules, guidelines, standards and goals but they will sometimes need to be altered a little with each child. My challenge and goal as a mother is to discover what works best for each of them, and then do it.

 Now with a little more sleep under my belt, I feel fully equipped to do just that.

NY Weather

It's no secret that my adjustment to living in NY was slow and painful. After almost 12 years of living here, I am quite at home and happy and can't imagine our family living anywhere else.

However, there is one thing that I will probably never adjust to - and that is NY weather. It is bitterly cold and freezing for about 5 months of the year and super sticky hot & humid for about another 5 - 6 months of the year. (Man, oh man do we ever enjoy those few nice weeks!)

Other than it's just not nice very much - it is also completely unpredictable and can be 78 and sunny one day with a freak snowstorm the next (usually in April, right as all my bulbs have bloomed, killing them swiftly.)

We've had that kind of crazy weather lately.

BIG STORM # 1

I LOVE snow. As far as I'm concerned, there's no point in it being cold if it isn't going to snow. It doesn't really snow that much here, but every now & then we get dumped on.

February 25th - there had been dire predictions of a big storm all week. It's so funny here the way people panic if they think it's going to snow. Everyone rushes to the store and buys lots of milk and bread. I don't get it. Anyway, I usually ignore the storm predictions - because more often than not, they are wrong. That Thursday afternoon it had started snowing and they sent all the kids home early from school (seriously - they freak out.) We enjoyed having after school activities canceled and a chance to stay home and just play as a family. As I went to bed it was still coming down hard, but I wasn't counting on a snow day for the following day - too often I've done that and been disappointed.

Well, we ended up getting over 2 feet of snow in 24 hours and it was WONDERFUL for us. I know a lot of areas had issues, like trees falling and loss of power (and later, flooding as it all melted.) I felt mildly guilty that we were so well off but all we did was stay home and play. Rick worked from home, we watched TV, played games, made cinnamon rolls, hung out together and enjoyed a break from the routine. Rick went out periodically to shovel (bless his heart) and bek made money shoveling for neighbors who she has a standing arrangement with. Jacob asked her to shovel a lot and "... make one billion dollars. So we can buy all the Lego in the world."

Our snowstorm / snow day tradition is to make cinnamon rolls. This year Emily made a batch all by herself (I made the dough, but she did the rest.)

They turned out great - and we took some frosted & fresh out of the oven to our neighbors who were shoveling.

Hooray for snow days!

BIG STORM #2

April 14th - a typical Sunday morning. Rick had left by 6:30am for his High Council duties and I slept as long as I could after the kids had woken up until they were sticking their little faces right up to mine and begging for breakfast.

We were all getting ready for church when the phone rang. It was the Bishop announcing that they were canceling the 2nd two hours of church due to the extreme weather and just having a brief sacrament meeting with testimonies for those who wished to attend. Rick has been on the high council for 6 years. Most Sundays I get the kids ready & take them to church by myself. It took me 3.2 seconds to decide we did not want to go out in the 70 mph winds and rain to do that and it would be a "break day" for me. Not long after that I received several e-mails and a call from our home teacher to let me know that the town our chapel is in had declared a state of emergency and were only allowing essential vehicles on the road and that church was indeed, cancelled.

Rick came home a little later and we all had a very relaxing family day. After the rain stopped later that day, we ventured for a walk to check it out. We were very lucky not to have lost power, any trees or had any wind damage to our house. Most of our friends and neighbors were not so lucky. Our poor Bishops family (5 kids, and the youngest only 2 months old) had no power for 6 days after this!

A section of someone's roof that had blown off (and been stopped by the tree.)

There were power lines down everywhere!

This tree took power out for this street just up from our house, where two families in our ward live. Probably about 1/2 our ward lost power, heat and hot water. It was Wednesday before most people had their power back on. School was canceled Monday and had a delayed start Tuesday - mostly because of all the downed power lines and trees covering roads making it dangerous to travel. My town was not as badly hit as the one just over from us (where the church is.) Seminary was canceled for 3 days, as were all Wed night activities, since the building had no heat or electricity. SO MANY huge trees came down, taking chunks of the sidewalk with them.

THIS WEEK

 A water main burst, and all the kids were sent home from school early again on Monday. We've all been told to boil our water before using it or to use bottled water for 3 days. We're usually devoted SIGG users, but I did go buy a bunch of bottled water. We should be back to normal soon.


So, we've learned that electricity, heat and fresh water are nice things to have!


Phew - what next?
Hurry up spring and summer. Oh wait - they're just as unpredictable as any other season around here!

Jellyfish & Otter

At the end of every swimming session they have a "badge week" where the kids have an opportunity to pass off their skill to earn the next badge. Since Jacob and Jane are in the same class - it can be hard when one of them earns a badge and the other doesn't.

Thankfully, this time, we didn't need to worry about that.

Jacob is becoming quite the little backstroker! Of course, Jane just wants to keep up with Jake and Emily and works hard at everything to do so.

I am so stinkin' proud of them.