Sunday, December 28, 2008

Energizer Bunny

Claire's sleeping habits are driving me nuts. The last two nights she went to sleep at 11pm; tonight was about 10:30pm. She has behaved a little too well for a kid running on limited sleep (other than a full screaming meltdown right before dinner tonight which resulted in a 5-minute time out in her room). I don't know if the reason for this energy is Christmas excitement or that our routine is different (me being on vacation and Kyle took a little time off too) but I don't like having a child awake this many hours of the day. By 8:30pm I'm ready to be done with kid stuff, and I also haven't been able to go to bed early because of her. I've decided she needs at least 1-2 hours of vigorous activity each day to get to bed on time, and realistically we'll never get that most days - especially during the winter. So it looks as though my Energizer Bunny will drive me nutty this whole winter.

Today was low key. I stayed in bed a while this morning, but couldn't get back to sleep because Kyle and the kids were a little loud. I finally got up to figure out why Molly was crying too much. She seemed to have a small fever this morning (teething?) so I gave her some Motrin and she perked up and her mood improved. In the afternoon I exchanged some Christmas gifts and left Kyle home with the kids. Tonight after dinner Claire unexpectedly gave me a foot massage which I thought was amazingly sweet and endearing. I don't know where she got the idea to do that.

Yesterday we had a more exciting day. The day started with Claire's final ice skating lesson - she's already begging for more lessons - and then Claire and I had lunch together at Waffle House. We returned home so Kyle could make a haircut appointment, and two hours later when he returned Claire and I had fully decorated her dollhouse for the holidays. We made fake snow and a fake snowman, put greenery and holly berries in the window boxes, put up a Christmas tree in the living room of the house, wrapped miniature presents, and made stockings that we hung in the room. It was cute and a lot of work! Papa arrived soon after for a belated Christmas dinner. We had a nice evening and a good dinner (my mom sent food over for us, so the only cooking I did was to make mashed potatoes). Both Lily and Molly called him 'Papa' and Lily demanded to be held by him the entire time. Molly was super cranky (a precursor to her crankiness this morning) so I was happy when the twins went to bed. Papa did his best to help exhaust Claire, making up fun "obstacle courses" in the basement, but somehow she still stayed up late after he left.

Tomorrow I've got the nanny for just one day this week, so I'm currently debating a "me" day versus a Claire and me day. Or maybe I'll split the day between time with her and time alone. I get so few days to get stuff done without kids that it's hard to give up a chance like this.

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