Down in the Delta: snow! and tears :(

how about that snow?! how exciting!! i love snow. and since we never ever ever get snow, it makes it that more special when it finally does! we got about 4 inches, which, to me, is just about the equivalent to the result of an avalanche. the only sad thing about the snow this year.... lucy isn't big enough to play in it or even experience it :( booooo. she's only 13 weeks, so ju and i felt that it wasn't a good idea to take her out in it. we contemplated just a quick visit outside so we could take her picture, but then decided that it was too cold for that. (maybe if we had a scarf and some gloves for her but we only had a hat.) so ju came up with the idea of putting her in her bumbo in the window and raising the blinds to take a picture--perfect idea :) but she was napping at the time and by the time she woke up and was fed and happy, i had completely forgotten about it. go me. but there is still a good bit of snow on the ground so perhaps i can get my act together today.

our house :)

sammy wasn't sure what to think

ellie kept hopping around in it

sammy and ellie "attacking" bear (the shop dog)

sleep. it's an essential ingredient to a happy day for an infant. and for happy parents. unless, of course, your baby likes to nap in your arms.... it's sweet for a while, but then it becomes a "job" and ends up wearing you out. lucy is the type where she likes to be held while she sleeps-aren't they all until a certain point? and i've been obliging her until this past sunday. see, i hold her for an hour to hour and a half to make sure she's good and asleep then go put her in her crib. the problem with this is that 1)she's spoiled; and 2) i need her nap time almost as much as she does (to take a nap myself or to do things around the house or to just be me-baby free-for just a few minutes). so what's happening is that i get her to sleep then hold her to make sure she's good and asleep and then go put her in her crib. she'll sleep for maybe 30 minutes then wake up crying. now it's filtering into her bedtime routine as well.... she's been doing great at night... once i put her down, she's been sleeping all night. occasionally she'll have a bad night and wake up once, but for the majority of the nights-since she was about 9 weeks old-she's been doing great. until lately. since i'm so tired by her bedtime, i would get her to sleep by rocking her then would go to my bed and hold her until she was good and asleep and i would fall asleep too. then wake up in a couple hours and go put her in her crib. seems like a reasonable thing to do for an exhausted parent, right?! wrong. very bad idea on my part. at first i would just hold her for like an hour.. then it was an hour and half.. then 2 hours. then she realized that she would much rather stay in my arms then sleep in her crib. so i made the decision that it was time to let her cry it out. there are many thoughts and opinions on letting an infant cry it out... lots of people are against it. but as long as i know nothing is wrong with or hurting her, i think it's ok. no, it's not easy for me; but if i don't nip this problem now, it will only continue getting worse, which only makes it harder in the long run. i do, however, have a few mixed feelings on the whole method.... my main problem is thinking that she'll think we've abandoned her by not responding to her when she's crying. but i have to put my big girl panties on and realize that if she's not hurt and not needing anything, then she'll be ok.

sunday, day 1... she cried off and on (and never a real cry.. more like just loud whines) for 40ish minutes before she went to sleep. then only slept for 10. then resumed crying. the only good thing to her taking a very short nap--she was exhausted by bedtime and slept all night w/out waking up after she was put in her crib.

monday, day 2... awful. she cried what sounded like a terrible cry almost the entire time. i was really upset. ((side note: we have a video monitor so i'm able to look at her the entire time to make sure she's not hurt or what not.)) i could see that she was crying a combo cry-mad/spoiled cry and sleep fighter cry. so i let her continue to cry. it took about 40 minutes again until she finally stopped and went to sleep. she slept for 30ish minutes then resumed crying. it was the bad cry again. i let her continue as i finished my snack then went to get her and she was up for the afternoon. last night, i held her for about 35 minutes then put her in a crib. she woke up about 2 hours after i put her down and was crying. cried for like7 minutes then went to sleep. and slept all night.

it's supposed to get easier every day... supposed to being the key word. i'm optimistic though (otherwise, i might cry!). so we'll see how today goes.

in development news, luce has discovered how to roll from her belly to back! but she can't quite grasp how to get back to her belly! soon enough though. also, she's sitting up so well in her bumbo! she's getting bigger every day, which is really fun and really sad at the same time!