I charted Blake's waking & sleeping last night, even though he had a very unsettled day & skipped his afternoon nap entirely. The results were very, very encouraging. (I know I said there would be charts, but I'm not feeling up to charts today.) Two weeks ago he was sleeping restlessly & screaming for long periods in the middle of the night. He went to bed just before 7 pm, but woke often and didn't start sleeping long stretches until after 10, when I got into bed with him.

Now, he goes to bed by himself in his crib around 7 p.m. and sleeps until 1, with a quick nursing break every 2 hours. After 1 things get a little woolly because I'm too sleepy to deal with him effectively. The second half of our night usually sucks. But we are making SO MUCH PROGRESS! The simple fact that he can be put into his crib all dopey and fall asleep on his own is huge. The fact that he's doing his best sleeping in the crib is a total surprise. Suddenly the Boy & I have our bed back! I can fall asleep in 20 minutes or less, snuggled up to my husband! No more couch exile!

Our biggest problem now is his desire to play in the wee hours of the morning. But I'm told that it's just a developmental thing, and we'd have to deal with it no matter what his sleep habits. Once that's dealt with, then there's the problem that one of us is getting up with him 6 times a night.

But for the first time in months, I feel hopeful. I actually feel like I'll be able to see him through to healthy sleep habits without leaving him in his crib to cry all night long. Eeee! I have to be careful with hope; the feathers keep tickling me in sensitive places.

I've been indulging in the rankest geekery today and yesterday. I blame my dad; he got the house hooked up with baby highspeed & I don't have to wait my turn to use the internet any more. Consequently, I've been surfing like a turtle on fire!

I've also been tinkering with this page. First, I changed the banner. (Much to my satisfaction, the Boy stops to praise the new banner every time it's on-screen.) Then I joined a few mommy web rings. Then I added a separate archive page because I don't like the endless archive list in the side bar thing that Blogger now recommends for all. Then Blogger stopped working correctly, so I had to download & install Firefox (which I love). And with my new browser, I discovered FavIcons.

I really and truly had no clue that they were everywhere. Now I'm surfing around to see what people have put on their title bar. And I made my own crappy icon, because that was the logical final step.

All this geekery is making my back hurt. I'm just not built for endless hours at the computer anymore.

The fight with my mom about solid foods has escalated. I wanted to rant about it here & get some vitriol out of my system, but I suddenly realized that I'm too old to take my disputes to the Internet. If I want to bitch behind someone's back, the Boy will always listen. I don't need to post angry spiky one-sided arguments on an international forum that my parents can't even read. I have to grow up.

This isn't to say that I'm not mad. I'm just this side of furious. But I need to work it out myself. All you need to know is that we're having a fight about giving solid foods to Blake, and that the debate has turned very nasty. It'll blow over soon. But I probably shouldn't have said, "I'm glad that agreeing with you isn't a condition of our rent." That was kind of bratty.

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- Rocketbride's adventure of 7/18/2004 11:29:00 p.m.