Sleep, Glorious Sleep

Two things new mom's worry about most: Sleeping and Feeding. The theme of this winter break was sleep.

I love winter break. It is great break from work and all of the stresses of daily life. It feels like maternity leave all over again, but with a happy-go-lucky 7.75 month old....not a screaming newborn. Our major goal was to help EG learn to sleep through the night and sleep better.

SLEEP:
Prior to Break: We knew that we were tried of getting up at night with EG before xmas break. She had been waking up at 10ish for milk, 1ish for rocking, and up for the day at 5ish. She took two long naps a day (1.5 hours each). It was bearable, but barely.

During Break Week 1: Ninna came to stay with us for 5 days, which was great. She took excellent care of EG and they had a blast together. We all went to M's family xmas and EG did great. She maintained her good nap schedule during Ninna's visit, but Ninna likes to sleep with baby at night. Soooo....EG co-slept with Ninna for 5 nights. Yup. 5 nights of constant care and snuggles. They both loved it.

After Ninna left it was hell. EG went back to her crib and woke up every 2 hours all night long. We indulged her for two nights and got up with her, rocked her, feed her, etc...in order for her to adjust back to the crib and to make sure she was done teething.....and then we did it. We let her cry it out. She cried on and off for 30 minutes...then silence.

During Break Week 2: EG learned to sleep by herself all night long. She goes to sleep at 6:45 p.m. and stays in her crib all night. She might wake up once or twice and fuss for less than 30 seconds and then right back to sleep. The last two mornings she has slept till 6:00a.m. -- which is our goal. It ROCKS. We are actually sleeping and enjoying our nights alone.

Her daytime sleep has declined to a 30-45 minutes morning nap and a 45-60 minute afternoon nap, which is fine. The best part --- she is sooooo happy all day long. She only fusses when she is hungry or ready for a nap. She just laughs and smiles the entire rest of the day. She does need some quiet time in the late afternoon and that is usually when we run a short errand and she relaxs in her car seat and might sleep for 5 or 10 minutes.

Overall, CIO (Cry-it-Out) is not fun. I am sure we will continue to have to work at it as her schedule gets off, but it is sooo worth the happiness that a good night sleep does for the entire family. She was ready. We were ready. It worked for us.

E-