Parenting Fail or Just Sleep Deprivation?

Apologies for not writing lately... I've got a few posts coming, but will start with this one!

At the Tot's 15 month appointment, the doctor was concerned that he wasn't yet walking. He is cruising around, and the fastest crawler in the East, but hasn't decided it is worth his time and effort to actually walk. I am actually not that concerned... he seems very steady and I think he is going to walk any day now. The doctor thinks we should start Early Intervention... the Preemie Parents Worst Nightmare. Or Best, depending on how you look at it. But we have not had to do any early intervention yet, since he is tracking pretty normal overall.

So, I make the call, and suffice it to say, there is a lot of bureaucracy in this process. We are going to finally have our first meeting with these folks; they have to come out and do "paperwork" to set up the initial evaluation to see if the Tot qualifies. I finally fit this into my schedule (not easy with a job... ugh). So this lovely lady shows up to our apartment last night. I had treats ready for Noodles so she wouldn't bark, and the house was.... well, it just was. I was going to say clean, but anyway.

Sidetrack.... The Tot has a cold. There is snot everywhere... there has been very little sleep.

OK, so she shows up and The Tot is playing in the family room, and Noodles does her "Welcome Barking" and I lead Her into the family room and shut the kiddie gate behind me.

Her: Ooh, nice gate. Is that for the dog or the baby?
Me: um, the baby... the dog has freedom, the baby doesn't yet. I mean he will... we don't keep him locked up in here, its a pretty small apartment... uh, anyway, have a seat.

So, we start to fill out the paperwork, and I am distracted by shooing Noodles away (who just wants this dang woman to pet her) and trying to keep the baby from eating the batteries in the remote control. Awesome.

She explains this extremely lengthy process and I sign my name on a bunch of papers and then she fills out our Home Report:

Her: So, I am just writing that you have an UN-restrained dog... that is important for the Evaluator to know
Me: Oh, I'm so sorry... well, she can be "restrained" (I did in fact do air quotes).
Her: well, that's nice..... (Noodles is now trying to get inside her purse)

Then she starts writing again and the Tot crawls over to her and pulls himself up to the coffee table, and I smell a whiff of a dirty diaper.

Her: Hello there, big boy! (she turns to me and says in the same sing song voice) Well, these corners are sharp aren't they, huh? (as she rubs the corner of the table)
Me: uh yes they are.... sharpity sharp sharp....(nervous laughter from me)
Her: Oh wow Mom, he has a stuffy nose huh?
Me: Oh yeah, let me get that.... (I reach over to try to wipe the glob coming out of his nose and he collapses and crawls away screaming)

And she continues to write... I assume about my tantrum-throwing-snot-running-out-of-his-nose-baby- about-to-impale-himself-on-the-coffee-table parenting fail. But who knows, maybe she wrote down January 2014.

 Here he is, crawling fast!

Sleep

We are blessed with a good sleeper.  Around 3 months old, I put the Tot down at 8:30pm and he slept until 6:00am. These days he is in bed by 7:30pm or so, and up like an alarm clock at 6:00am.  Yes, there are hiccups along the way... when he is teething the sleeping isn't perfect.  Also when he gets sick, sleeping obviously is interrupted. And every so often we will have a week or so of "odd" sleep where he won't want to go to bed and/or will wake up with what I think are nightmares.  But that is rare.

The Tot also wakes up great.  We live in a one bedroom apartment in NYC, so from day one, (or more accurately, day 17 when he came home from the NICU) he has slept in our room.  We had a co-sleeper bed and once he outgrew that, we moved him to the pack-n-play in our bedroom.  So, he is in our bedroom. For those of you that are saying to yourself now "get that kid out of your bedroom", well... we might do that if we could.  But there is no where else to put the little spud.  We also like him in our room. Like I said, he is a good sleeper, so there seems no reason to chance what is working.  Oh, my point... he wakes up so happy!  At 6:00am, I can hear him stir and then he grabs some toys (we always keep toys in the PNP (pack-n-play) and a few binkies.  So when he wakes up, he plays, chats with himself, sometimes he "sings" to himself and generally has a good time.  Once I am fully awake, we get up and start our day, always with smiles.

There are many things to love about this Tot, but that is by far one of my favorite,  He is a good sleeper, and a great waker!

Reading his book in the morning