February 19, 2007

Travels with Grace and Sleeping with Mary

On Friday of last week Miss Grace and I hopped on a plane with 11 of my Scholars and headed to Dallas for the National Texas McNair Conference at the University of North Texas. Grace was supposed to be a lap baby- but the fates were shining on us and we had an excellent flight to Dallas (plane wasn't full and I used Grace's car seat) Grace was an outstanding conference attendee- She snoozed most of the time due to a little bit of a cold and when she did fuss- it was just until I could find a quiet secluded place to feed her. I had an excellent weekend of talking to Grace and watching her pretty face as she goo'g and gah'd and gurgled at me. She is QUITE the talker- even more than Mary was at this age.

The conference went well. The Scholars were well behaved and we had no "incidents" like we did last year. The Scholars who presented their research did a great job and scored well. I think they were pleasantly surprised that it wasn't as tough as they had made it out to be in their minds. The folks who went to see the conference- learned a few things on what to say and how to present.

On the trip back- Grace was in my arms for the hour (full plane!) and quietly snoozed and drooled on mama. Mary was very happy to see us and had a good weekend with Daddy.

We're working on Mary's sleep. As many of you know we've had our more than fair share of 12:30 am squeaks from Mary and our routine has been to hold her and rock her until she falls asleep again. Well- that's just not going to work any longer. When Marty is on evenings or midnights- I just can't hold and rock her AND care for Grace too. Mama just doesn't have enough arms and SERIOUSLY- my limited sleep was/is suffering. Marty and I talked and we're going to work on being consistent with Mary. We will not be picking her up and we will be gently guiding her back to her bed. She cried and cried last night and was up and down a few times between 12:30 and 2:00 am.

Marty and I took turns going in and telling her the same stuff: "mama/daddy are not going to hold you" "let's get back into bed" "Lay down" "here is your paci" repeat- over and over until you hear the ragged almost done crying sigh of a toddler. Both Marty and I are pretty tired today and I expect that this will be very long week for all of us to "re-learn" the whole sleep thang.

On a good news front- Grace slept in her crib from 9:00 pm until 3:00 am. She has a wee bit of a cold and was snorking and snarfing as she tried to eat at the breast. Poor bugga couldn't BREATHE!

ok- that's my update for now.....

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