January 2011

I always used to think that Bill Cosby was so funny, especially when he talked about kids (think, “Chocolate Cake for Breakfast”). But lately the one that I keep thinking of is “The Same Thing Happens Every Night”. That’s what it’s like after dinner now that we have a toddler with her own opinions. Once she hears it’s time for bath and the diaper has to come off she runs away, goes limp if you pick her up, faceplants on the ground and kicks and wails…anything to postpone the inevitable. I guess she’s just having too much fun, but it’s like flicking a switch. One moment she happy as a clam, and the next you’d think that we were getting ready for our nightly torture session…we don’t do that EVERY night 😉

It has gotten a little bit better recently because she is in a good place when it comes to the bath, but still not the diaper. What’s even worse than “the same thing happens every night” is “the same thing happens every morning”. By this I mean that she likes to wake up between 4-5am pretty much every single day. I swear we are getting less sleep than when we had to wake up to feed her multiple times during the night. This happens no matter when we put her to sleep at night. If anyone has any suggestions, please don’t hold back.

This past week Helena had her first experience with snow where she could actually enjoy it. We took her outside while I shoveled and she alternated between absolutely loving the snow and being very upset when the wind gusts blew it right in her face. We also took Helena on her first snowshoeing expedition outside the womb. It was met with mixed reviews by her, but I think she mostly liked it and at least we got some exercise. There are some decent trails at our local Audubon Society, but there are some better trails further away that we may need to try with her in the future. We got some cute pictures of her in the snow, which shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone.