Why won’t my babies sleep?

I ask this every morning, it seems.  Sacha has been a bad sleeper since birth.  He used to have to sleep on our chests until he was almost 3 months, then he just decided that sleep was optional and started waking up every hour or so wanting nothing but to be nursed. Even now, at 2 years of age, he still wakes up at night, sometimes too often to keep track.

Kees started out as a miracle sleeper.  He slept a solid 8 hours at night until he was 3 months old.  Then it all went to crap. It started with one night waking.  Then 2.  Now, over a month later, he wakes up every 2 hours, sometimes more often. He doesn’t always require nursing to go back down, but the sleep disturbance is really getting to me.

We have every sleep book there is.  They are in a leaning tower of ass-vice on my night stand.

The thing is, my kids are very happy.  They are not cranky.  They are not fussy.  They are good nappers. I know that the night wakings are not affecting their state of being.

It’s mine (and my dear partner in crime’s) that I worry about.

I know many of you are thinking “Just let him cry it out!  In 3 days, it will be all over and things will be right as reign.”  I think the same thing.

It sure as hell did NOT work for Sacha. We tried.  God KNOWS how we tried.  But Kees is a different little person, so maybe it could work.

And then when I hear him cry, I just cannot do it.  I get anxious.  I get frustrated.  I get angry.

I don’t think letting him cry-it-out is for me.

Should I just resign myself to the fact that my babies don’t sleep?

Drosophila is a genus of small flies, belonging to the family Drosophilidae, whose members are often called “fruit flies” or more appropriately vinegar flies, wine flies, pomace flies, grape flies, and picked fruit-flies, a reference to the characteristic of many species to linger around overripe or rotting fruit. (taken from wikipedia).

They linger.  They reproduce like crazy. They suck billy goat.

Fortunately, there is a sure fire way to rid yourself of them and have a good time while doing it.

How to get rid of fruit flies:

1. Buy a bottle of Magnotta Vidal Ice Wine from your local liquor store.  It runs about $30-50 per bottle.
2. Pour an ounce or so into a small espresso cup.
3. Leave the cup on counter overnight.
4. Drink rest of Magnotta Vidal Ice Wine.  Play a little Wii Teniis.
5. Wake up completely hung over and sick from overdoing it on the ice wine Wii Tennis and find that fruit flies also enjoy Magnotta Vidal Ice Wine:

Poor buggers.  Just don’t know when to stop.  But, if you have to die at all, drowning in ice wine would probably be right up there on my list of ways to go.

Men are wimps when it comes to being sick.  Every cough will kill them, every sore throat maim their manhood, and every tummy ache sends them straight to the couch for some immediate TV and self-loving.  Wait, not that kind.  Get your mind out tha gutter.

And they learn early.

Sacha was sick on Friday.  All he wanted was to watch The Lion King (or “Grand Kitty Kah”) and lay on the couch with his two friends, Chatters and Chelsea.  And since I am inclined, as a mom, to avoid whining from those of feeble tummies (who had already puked all over me and himself and the floor of Walmart), I let him.

**Turned out he had myringitis, an inflammation of the eardrum, which causes blisters to form on said drum and then they pop.  And seeing how this affects the middle ear, his sense of balance was wacked out, which made him puke no less than 3 times after that blister popped.  Coolio.  Oh, and it is common for blood to trickle out of the ear when this happens.  How’s THAT for parenting funsies?!

Since Sacha turned the big TWO last week, we have started thinking about potty training. I purchased a potty and placed it in the bathroom and waited for Sacha to figure it out on his own.  He’s a smart kid.  He can do it.

Sacha came to tell me “caca” (which he always does before or during a poop).  I asked him if he wanted to sit on his potty, and he did.  Unfortunately, by the time I put Kees down and got Sacha’s pants down and diaper off and socks off (as requested by the training two-year-old), he had already pooped.  BUT he insisted on sitting on the potty anyway.  He tapped his feet and kept checking in the pot to see if anything had happened.  Kees and I just sat next to him and played.  Then, Sacha looked down, then stood up and pointed in the potty.  I looked and saw…

PEE!  He actually peed in the potty!  Party time!  Kiss Kiss Hug Hug Pat on the Back I am SO Proud of YOU Have a Chocolate!

He later awoke from his nap with a dry diaper and insisted on sitting on the potty again to pee.  Which he did.  BOO YA!

I am the world’s best super-mom!  My kid can potty train himself!  Throw away all diapers, baby!  Penis on a mission coming through!

Then he peed in his diaper all afternoon.  And before his bath, in which he ALWAYS pees as soon as his toes touch the water, I asked him if he wanted to pee.  He placated me by sitting on the potty, but nothing.  So he got up, went into the tub, and peed there.

Must now dig diapers out of trash.

And order potty training books.

Onward, Potty Soldiers!

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If you are wondering where the hell I’ve been, I will tell you that I am “borrowing” my innerwebs from an unsuspecting kind neighbour.  It is not always stable or very strong.  On top of that, I am actually embracing what it means to blog “guilt-free” and loving it.

The story continues.

Today, I called Telus to find out what the frick was going on. They said that they hooked up our phone from their end and that it should be working. So the fact that I was told to stay at home and wait for them all damn day when, in fact, I didn’t have to be there at all really pissed me off. What’s worse: I went to the house to check if the phone worked: it doesn’t. No dial tone. Nadda.

I then waited for the Amazing Persona (even though they are very un-amazing in their service) cable guy to come around and hook up our cable internet. He called at noon, saying that there may be a problem. He said that if our house was the one he was thinking of, the house construction crew buried the trench in the front yard a couple of months ago before he was able to connect the cable from the house to the main box and down the street.  He then confirmed his suspicions by coming to the house and checking things out. He adds that the cable box and phone box (and lines) run adjacent to each other. He then tells me that he will look into the specifics of fixing this problem and get back to me next week. The front yard will need to be dug up.

My first question, obviously, is that of payment. Seeing how this home was to be cable (and phone) ready upon possession, I really don’t think I should be paying for the cable company’s retardedness for KNOWING that the cable was not hooked up but not doing anything about it until the humble consumer calls to set up cable internet service. Also, I should not be paying for the retardedness of the construction crew who filled in a trench before the appropriate utility hook ups were made.

Methinks the same issue of digging up the front yard will accompany the phone installation. Again, I am not paying for retardedness.

In conclusion, my disrecommendation for the day is Persona. Boo on Persona. And boo on dumbass construction guys for filling a trench before its time. And boo on not being able to start any landscaping until next year, leaving me with a yard that looks like this:

Moving sucks.

I flew out with the boys and my mom, leaving Tony and my step dad behind to drive the car across the country. Air Canada lost Kees’s car seat.  That’s right, a car seat. What’s more, they seemed to care very little about this until I told them that if they didn’t find my seat, I would be taking their loaner car seat with me to my destination, 500 km away.  Then, lo and behold, the car seat showed up. Hmmm…

After an exhausting day of flying with the boys and adjusting to the time change, Sacha had a night terror that night.  It involved screaming as though being attacked by an ax murderer for 45 minutes.  Meanwhile, Kees woke up to eat.  I grabbed Kees, ran to my mom’s room, told her to change Kees and bring him back to me, then my mom attempted to calm Sacha.  It was not pretty.  The next morning, my mother-in-law offered to lend me her new Honda Fit to drive into town and get a Starbucks, just to give me some time to myself.  I was hesitant, but I did it.  I pull into the parking lot and PSSHHHHHH: the front tire of the car blew out.  That’s right, I blew the front tire.  Of my in-laws new car.  Farking heck.

We are now reunited as a family, so the nights are better (for me), but our movers have been delayed by a few days, so we have to wait longer to get into our new house.  In the meantime, we are staying with my parents.  Our cat, who had taken possession of the new vacant house, went into total freak-out mode and cowered in a corner for 24 hours, refusing to eat, poop, pee, or meow.  Did I mention he was also losing hair?  Fortunately, my grandmother offered to babysit him at her house until we are settled.  I don’t know if she realizes that may be a few weeks and a few pounds of cat hair.

Of course, we will all be separated again next week when Tony has to go away for training for his new job.  He will be away for 2 weeks (home on the weekend) so setting up the house by myself when the movers arrive should be super-duper.  Especially since I will be so rested from the shitastic blissful sleep I’ll be getting.

And now, my disrecommendation for the day: Telus.  Telus sucks.  We called them over 2 months ago to get our phone service set up.  We booked the appointment for today.  I called them last night to confirm and asked that they call me at my mom’s before they showed up, seeing how the house is vacant and I would have to go let them in.  They were hunky dory with that.

So today rolls around.  No phone call.  Nothing. I’m waiting around the house ALL DAMN DAY with an almost-two-year-old who desperately wants to go to the park.  I call Telus at 4:30 pm asking what is going on.  She tells me that there is no reason why our service won’t be hooked up today, but that it may take until 8:00 pm.  If they don’t show up, she tells me to call at 7:30 am tomorrow morning to get it sorted out.  Cheese and rice!  It is now 9:26 pm. I still have no phone.  I guess I will be hanging around the house all damn day tomorrow, too.

I highly disrecommend Telus.  I also highly disrecommend moving with small children across the country.

To cope with these irritants, I highly recommend Starbucks Cream Liqueur.

That is all.  Over and out.

Today was the first of many goodbyes.

When we were sent out here two years ago, we were sent with my husband’s best friend and his wife.  Both guys were in university together and part of a scholarship program that involved a contract of employment anywhere in Canada upon graduation. They were fortunate and got sent to the same small city and the same small store to work.

In that time, we all became parents of boys.  Our weekend visits went from relaxing dinners, games and movies to bibs and diapers; we enjoyed everything about it.

Although neither of us really liked living here, having each other made a world of difference on our outlook.  Now the contracts are up and we are all headed back to our respective origins.  They leave tomorrow, we leave next week.

Today was the first of many goodbyes to friends that placed fond memories in my heart in a place I otherwise would have loathed.