Today has been a pretty busy day around here.  We spent a lot of the day cleaning, rearranging, organizing, and stuff like that.  My Dad came by to see Elliana, and then my Grandma called wanting to know if she could keep her for awhile, so we let her while we ran our errands and did some of our organizing. 

Strangely I still feel the urge to clean.  The urge started last night after Elliana went to sleep, and I think it’s because she went to bed early.  That left me with all this extra time on my hands that I didn’t know what to do with, so I spent 4 hours in the nursery cleaning, rearranging, organizing, packing up clothes that don’t fit, and unpacking clothes that will fit in the very near future.  She’s growing so fast!

I’ve been thinking about my “junk cabinet” in the kitchen.  It a really deep cabinet in the corner of the kitchen that I toss random junk into.  These days it mostly contains a ton of computer parts and a couple of laptops I was saving for parts, but I haven’t touched any of them in months. I keep telling myself one day something will happen and I’ll need a part, but if I haven’t touched them in months the reality is I can ditch all of them. Everything in there is already outdated by now. I can’t use most of it unless someone happens to bring an older computer to me that needs something I already have, so tonight they’re getting tossed. 

I’ll just have to wait until Elliana goes to sleep before I start pulling it all out.  Right now Hubby is having Daddy/Daughter time with her for playtime.  Hopefully he’ll wear her out so she’ll be ready to go to sleep at 10:30.  I know it’s wishful thinking, but these days I’m doing a lot of that!

Wow.  We managed to have another good night last night.  Even after battling belly troubles we still managed to get Elliana to go to sleep at 11:45.  She went down 2 nights in a row before midnight?  She slept all night in her own bed? That’s a success in my book.  If we can get her on this schedule maybe we can eventually start backing her up 15-30 minutes at a time until she’s sleeping when I’d like her to. 

Currently she’s back in bed with me, but I don’t mind that.  Both mornings she’s awakened around 6 for a morning feeding, and I have no trouble letting her sleep with me from there on out.  It makes it easier to feed, and it’s easier to wake her up that way.   Right now she’s snuggled up against my side as I use my netbook.  Having my little girl on one side and Hubby on the other just feels right.

Yep, Hubby is still in bed, but I’m letting him enjoy the time he gets to sleep late this morning.  All this nasty weather has him home.  They still had snow on the ground when round 2 hit yesterday, so there’s definitely no way he could get to the jobsite today.  It’s up a steep mountain road that doesn’t get plowed.

Hopefully after he wakes up today we can get some stuff done.  I’ve got to go pay my property taxes on my business property, talk to our insurance guy about term insurance quotes, and then hopefully we can get our taxes done. I’m going to call our accountant, Cheryl, as soon as her office opens up with the hopes that she can work us in. Otherwise Hubby will have to take another day off work to do taxes. Honestly if we can get them done this will be the earliest we’ve ever done them. We’re normally waiting forever for some of Hubby’s stuff to arrive in the mail, but this year his beat mine!  I’m just thankful we won’t have to pay in this year due to the credits we get for Elliana.  That’s a big help.

Yesterday I successfully got Elliana to wake up at 8:30am, and that began our start of a new schedule.  Normally she fights me in the mornings and almost always refuses to wake up no matter what I do. 

Yesterday I noticed her moving around at 8:30am, so I grabbed her up, changed her diaper, and changed her clothes.  That did the trick, and we were well on our way to hopefully sleeping before 1am.  She successfully went down in her pack n play for 2 1 hour naps.  She fell asleep in her swing for her 3rd nap, and had a 4th nap at her Grandma Kayce and PopPops house last night.  I was worried the 4th nap might hurt our efforts, but she successfully went to sleep at 11:30pm and slept ’til 6:30am!

I was worried this morning when I couldn’t get her to wake up at 8:30, but she woke herself up at 9am.  She went down for her nap at 11:30 just like yesterday, so hopefully we’re making some progress.

Now I just have to make sure my aunt Trenia keeps her awake instead of letting her sleep when she’s at her house this evening.  She won’t be there long, but because of the weather I don’t want to drag her out in the cold rain while we go shopping. 

Hubby has to pick up a few things for work, and I need to get groceries.  I’m going to check out the Delta faucets while Hubby’s doing his shopping because I’m tired of the faucet in the kitchen leaking. We’ve fixed it 4 times just since I’ve been home from the hospital! 4 times in 3 months is way too much for me, so I’d rather just get a new one, and I may splurge if I find a nice one I like.

Right now I’m going to go grab myself a bite to eat while Elliana is out.  She’s snuggled up to her dolly (that I only let her sleep with when I’m awake and watching her), and she’s out cold.  Hopefully she’ll sleep for an hour and wake up in a good mood!

I feel like the world’s worst Mom today.  I just can’t understand why I can’t get my daughter to sleep.

We’re still having sleep issues, and here lately they seem to only be getting worse.  Elliana has gotten to a point where she won’t sleep in her own bed at night at all.  My options are to stay up all night with her crying every single time I try to lay her down, hold her all night while she sleeps, or give up and put her in bed with me. 

Of course I normally choose the 3rd option.  If I lay down with her in my bed she’ll sleep from 10pm to 6am, but if she’s in her own bed she wakes herself up every 10 minutes or so flailing her arms wildly. 

Naptime has been different for the most part.  She normally has no problem sleeping in her own bed for naps, but the last few days she’s absolutely refused.  Today she’s woken herself up every single time I’ve tried to lay her down.

Of course it makes me feel like I’m a horrible mother because she’s screaming to the top of her lungs through complete exhaustion, but she still will not sleep.  I tried laying down on our bed with her, I tried putting her in her bouncy seat.  She slept for about 20 minutes when I put her in her swing in front of the big tv that we bought on Black Friday last year. She fell asleep watching Barney, and that’s something I vowed I’d never let her watch. I hate Barney, but I find myself doing many things I said I’d never do for the sake of her sleeping.

I’ve paced the floor with her on my shoulder.  I’ve rocked her, and the exhaustion finally got to her about 15 minutes ago.  She let me put her in her swing, but I don’t know how long she’ll stay there.  She keeps crying out in her sleep, but she’s not waking herself up this time. 

She’s never cried through her sleep like that before, so that makes me wonder if it’s her stomach bothering her today.  I gave her Mylicon earlier, and it did nothing.  I gave her Gripe Water, and that didn’t seem to help either.  I know there’s nothing else I can do, but days like this make me feel like I’m not doing my job as her mother correctly.

When we leave the house she’s a completely different baby, and we have the opposite problem.  When we’re out and about she wants to sleep the whole time.  When I take her next door to my Grandma’s she seems to instantly fall asleep and stay asleep until I take her home.

What is it about my house that keeps this child from sleeping?  It makes me wonder what in the world I’m doing wrong even though I know this is just one of those things we have to work through.  I just want my little girl to sleep.  I’d like her to sleep in her own bed, but for right now I just want her to sleep.  Period.