For sleep...

It's been awhile since I've had a solid night's sleep.  Say, maybe 7 months or so??? ;)  But this only makes me more thankful for rest when I get it.  Sleep is essential to life and I forget how good it can feel to be fully rested!

The last two nights have been a little more restful, though.  Why?!

Sound the dismal organ--duh, duh, duhhh...  We've been letting our little sweetie cry it out.  It is so hard, but so necessary.  Never before have I had to let a child do this, but 5 time's the charm, right?! ;)

Baby G has slept through the night at various points in her almost-7mos-old life.  But for the past few weeks she's gotten into the horrible habit of waking twice/night, usually with the first time happening between 10:30 and 12 and the second around 3.  Yuck!  On top of that, she was eating so much during sleeping hours, that I noticed she wasn't feeding as voraciously during the day.  That's a no-no and will lead to a self-perpetuating cycle.  Less milk during the day means more dependency on waking and eating at night... which means less and less sleep for mama (and daddy too, who is a light sleeper, poor guy!)

Something had to give.  I declared cry-it-out night one two nights ago and it wasn't half bad.  GG and I groggily slept through most of it.  In the end she cried 45 minutes around 3:30 and went back to sleep until 6 (for a total of 12 hours).  Bravo!  Night #2 went aok--she awoke at 1:50 and cried for a short while (I have no idea how long because I was so out of it!), 3:30 and cried 25 min (I folded laundry in the hallway and checked on her occasionally to make sure she was still breathing!), and then awoke at 5:20am to eat.  She had gone to bed at 6pm, so her total count was just shy of 11.5 hours.  Excellent.

We'll see how tonight goes.  I'm just excited to sleep (and am so thankful for the chance to grab a few extra winks!!!)

Last day of my month of thankfulness tomorrow.
God bless,