Sleep? Say what?

This weekend was exhausting and sleep deprived for us all.

For some odd unexplainable reason Noah would not go to sleep on Friday night. He was exhausted which is what caused me to activate the bedtime sequence, but after I nursed him he just got restless and could not get comfortable. After 45 minutes I was so frustrated I gave up. I brought him down to Mark in the office and we played for almost an hour. I couldn’t stay grumpy because he was being giddy, chatty and brain-splittingly cute. Finally he was plum tuckered and he went to sleep without a lot of commotion.

As I mentioned Saturday we had plans to spend the afternoon in Green Lane Park with my Mom and her family. We had to leave our place a little before noon to get there on time – and since I wanted Noah to nap in the car we kept him up through his normal morning nap. He slept well during the hour drive but of course we got to the park at one and he was still a bit sleep deprived. He was smiling and chatty when we got him out of the car and was playing happily independently on a blanket for awhile but when my cousin Tammy’s 9 month old son Evan started to cry loudly Noah chimed in. From that moment on it was as if Noah was afraid of Evan. He’d start to cry a bit just to look at him. Noah doesn’t cry very often these days so I was a bit flustered about what to do. I got even more flustered when the baby sunscreen we used on him caused his eyes to get red and his nose to break out into a rash. Luckily this dissipated quickly and he cheered up. There was plenty of mesmerizing activity for him to watch, so much in fact that we couldn’t get him to nap despite the fact that he was obviously exhausted. The heat wasn’t too bad because we had shade and a nice breeze, but it was still really sticky and I don’t think that was of much help either. My Mom bounced him diligently for what seemed like an hour – but no nap was to be had. But overall he was a little trooper – relatively good natured for a trying but fun afternoon with family. Mark, Noah and I went back to my Mom’s place to wash up and then go out to dinner. Noah fell asleep in the car ride to Mom’s place so Mark drove in circles for a bit so he could get about twenty minutes of rest. It must have done the trick because he was a champ at Applebees of Qtown. When we left to drive home at 8pm I was certain he would conk right out. WRONG. Not only did he stay awake for the entire hour drive, it took an additional hour to get him to sleep once we got home. Once again the hour before bed he just laughed, babbled and rolled around. Until suddenly at 9:45 he just stopped giggling, closed his eyes and dozed off.

Yesterday Noah napped well and went to bed promptly – in his crib for the first time. We moved his crib from his nursery to our bedroom yesterday. Mark and I spent all morning looking for the assembly instructions and turned up squat. So we finally decided to wing it and just took it apart so we could move it upstairs. Luckily it wasn’t too difficult. Not as difficult as the war I’m waging against the ants. Yesterday morning I freaked out when there were ants all over the floor in Noah’s nursery. I soon realized it was I who put them there. Seems a bunch of the ants who’ve been taking over our living room had made their home in the diaper bag I left there the evening before, and when I moved it to the nursery they decided to all come out and explore the new terrain. We can’t really annihilate the damn things with bug spray because the chemicals and fumes aren’t good for Noah – so I’ve been vacuuming up ants as I see them. Of course they’re probably starting their new colony in the vacuum bag which I have yet to empty. And in the midst of my ant-fueled hysteria a giant gross thousand leggery thing came out from nowhere and scared the bejezus out of me. I started shrieking and I swooped down to rescue Noah from the floor. Mark killed it and scolded me for my over-the-top reaction, lest Noah freak out too. I knew exactly what he meant but it was an emotional reaction that I didn’t have time to think about or modify. Not sure I’ll be able to get a handle on that one. Especially if I ever see a roach. Nothing is more disgusting and horrifying to me.

Mark nudged me awake this morning and pointed at Noah lying awake in the crib. I thought he was doing one of those “look at our cute boy” things we do, until I looked at the clock and realized it was 1:20 AM. I guess when Noah started to shuffle about in anticipation of a feeding I didn’t wake up as I usually do because the crib, though right by the bed isn’t right next to the bed. So by the time I scooped him up he was completely awake – which doesn’t usually happen. It took me fifty minutes to feed him, get him back to sleep and put him back in the crib. I hope I quickly get better at hearing him start signaling for a feeding. I don’t want to have to get us both back to sleep every night - that’s one of the reasons we moved the crib.

So the newest super cute thing is that Noah is regularly asking for clarification. He’s constantly making this high pitched “Huh?” sound. Mark and I echo it so we sound like one very confused group of folk.