Sleep update

At some point on our trip home, we stopped feeding Anna when she wakes up in the middle of the night. Although this road to sleeping through the night seems to be a very long one, we can currently see progress. When I stopped nursing her at 8 months, she was still getting up at least 3-5 times/night. By the start of 2009 she was down to two feeds/night (and yes, she really did need a little something. Trust me, we tried not giving it to her!!), and a few weeks before her birthday she was down to one feed/night.

We still have to go in usually 1-3 times/night to help her find Sucky. Trust me, I realize that it would be better to let her find it on her own, but at 4 a.m. it's a lot easier to go give it to her so she goes back to sleep instead of ramping it up until she's fully awake and rarin' to go!

Last night Anna slept from 8-11:30, 11:30-4 and 4-6:10. Two Sucky replacements in 10 hours is a vast improvement from where we were a few months ago!

I keep expecting that one day I will go to bed and not wake up until 6:30 or 7. I suspect that I'll be wondering where Anna escaped to if I don't hear her until that time...

Ah, sleep. I remember the "good old days" where Ben would be in bed by 11:30 or midnight and I'd come to bed usually by 1 a.m. We'd get up sometime between 8:30-9:30 a.m. and be grumpy when students' parents called before 10! Lunch was usually around 1 or 2 p.m. and we ate dinner by 8 most nights.

Our current schedule is more like this:
5:30 a.m. - If Anna isn't up yet, I poke Ben and hiss at him to turn his alarm off.
6:30 a.m. - Ben leaves for work. Anna is usually eating breakfast and I'm trying to wake up and pretend it's 9 a.m. or some other civilized hour.
6:30-7:15 a.m. - Rachel wakes up and comes rushing downstairs with her hair in her face like a wild thing.
7:15-8:45 a.m. - "Crowd control" - The girls play, eat, get dressed, hair brushed, teeth brushed, potty/diaper, etc.
8:45-9:15 a.m. - Get ready for preschool drop-off
9:40-11:50 a.m. - Random errands with Anna or sometimes home for a nap
12 p.m. - Pick up Rachel
12:20-5 p.m. - "Survival mode" - lunch, naps, snacks, sometimes something fun if it works with Anna's nap
5-5:30 p.m. - Dinner
5:30-6:30 p.m. - Bath (They love bath. So do I, because Ben does it!)
6:30-8 p.m. - Bedtime snack, stories, etc. Rachel is usually in bed between 7:30-8 and Anna is usually in bed by 8 p.m.
8:30 p.m. - IT'S QUIET!