2nd birthday

Two years old already... where did time go? Well I guess the first nine months went in playing all day long and not sleeping all night long and meeting little girlfriends while eating cakes and drinking tea and laughing and loving wholeheartedly. Then I went back to work, and there was a whole lot less cake n tea parties and not a lot more sleep, but a lot more fun yet with first steps and first words and other kinds of first times. Anyway, we got there soon enough - 2 years old.

Since we have the most beautiful place in the world - I decided to throw a proper party, complete with gift bags for little guests, finger food, beer and wine for grown-ups and juice for the pregnant moms. Of course, I over estimated everything and invited more people than I could possibly cope with - but somehow wonderously managed to!

We had her three little friends from birth, Matilda, Emma and Libby, with their moms and dads as well as friends from nursery, Amelia, Billy, James, Marleigh and Oliver with their moms and dads. Unfortunately, Byelle felt a bit overwhelmed with the crowd though and clingged on to mom or dad throughout the afternoon, until it was just her three bestfriends left, upon which she had a great time dancing and singing and playing!

Gabrielle was quite spoiled with lots of toys and books and jigsaws but I guess her favourite moment was dancing along 'ring a ring of roses' with Emma, Libby and Matilda or jumping on the bed with James and Amelia!

Tough Love: my baby won't sleep

Running up to 2 years
2 years = 730 nights
730 nights with no more than 4 consecutive hours of sleep
730 nights getting out of bed once or twice or three or four times a night
730 nights listening to a little girl cry herself to sleep

I had enough - I read 5 books - heard countless 'have you tried...?' - tried countless things and methods - bookmarked hundreds of webpages talking about toddler's sleep (or lack of) - watched too many episodes of Super Nanny.

Control crying did sort out the 'going to bed' dilemma in the evening but it did not solve the 'waking up in the middle of the night.
Letting her cry it out, only resulted in completely sleepless nights.... until now

So forgive me - I'm not a bad mother - but I decided to give the latter another go. She can cry all she wants - cry all night long for all I care - she needs to learn that I will not be there until the morning - I decide when she wakes up not her.

And you know what?
It worked
It finally worked

In the many things I read, a doctor said there are two misconceptions from - the first one is that for a child to sleep from 12 midnight to 5am is sleeping through the night - but that did not even apply to my kid. The second is that in spite of your best efforts and applying the book rules to the letter - if your child is not ready - he is just NOT READY. I am suddenly finding out that this is very true.

On Monday night, Gabrielle cried - what felt like - most of the night
On Tuesday night, Gabrielle cried for very short periods (twice 15-20 minutes)
On Wednesday night, Gabrielle only cried once for 15 minutes
On Thursday night, Gabrielle only cried once but did not call for mommy or daddy
Tonight might just be the night where the cry is just a whimper and/or that she sleeps through.

The irony of it all is that I feel more tired than ever. I guess I have 730 nights' worth of sleep to catch up on.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
For the benefit of desperate parents who might stumble upon this page, these are the books I read, but none of them helped except combined with each other -

• Sleep by Beatrice Hollyer and Lucy Smith (in theory - should have been very good, it teaches you good habits and sleep routine before baby arrives - but that did not help with Byelle)
• the no-cry sleep solution by Elizabeth Pantley (nothing good came out of it)
• The Sleepeasy solution by Jennifer Waldburger and Jill Spivack (fixed the going to bed dilemma - with control crying - very reassuring for parents who don't want to hear their baby cry)
• The Baby Whisperer by Tracy Hogg (I personally don't like her)
• The Sleep Guide by Gina Ford (another partisan of the crying method - but now I have to admit it works)

What you need to remember is:
1) control crying or letting your kid cry will work but maybe not this time
2) Your kid does not hold against you so stay strong and stick to the rules of the method
3) but if your kid is not ready - he's just not ready the first time we did control crying - she was 8 months old and cried all night for 2 weeks with no improvement whatsoever - the second time we tried letting her cry, she was 17 months for 3 nights and except for exhausting me and her dad had not made a dent in her bad habit
4) Books that claim you don't have to let your baby cry are lying - they will ask you to let your baby cry - but refer back to #2
feel free to email me if you have question or need support - I've been there and it's been exhausting.

Cuteness incarnate

A short list of all the reasons I love it and Gabrielle is sooooo cute when...

• She stretches for 20 minutes in the morning waking up both her daddy and me with all the grunts and groans associated
• She looks at me with a corner smile when she sees me lift my top to breastfeed her, she knows what's coming
• She caresses my side with her little hand while feeding
• She grabs my tee shirt with the other hand while feeding
• She daydreams
• She loses the breast she talks to it and when she latches on again, she continues talking her mouth full
• She does the crab/tiger on her changing table
• She cries in her sleep
• She laughs in her sleep!
• She clicks her tongue when she's happy
• She pouts when she is sleepy
• She frowns when we play and I do something a bit unusual
• She lifts her head up high when lying on her tummy and that she's done sleeping
• She kicks her legs when she is frustrated, i.e. I tried to make her sleep when she's hungry or vice versa
• She licks anyone's tee-shirt (mine included) when she's hungry
• Like a gopher, she looks for the breast in her sleep
• She looks so miserable like an exagerated sad smiley before she starts to cry, it's hilarious, I hope one day I can capture it on photo
• She coos at her little bunny/spider/butterfly pram toys
• She falls asleep at the breast and continues pretending to suck

And best of all...

• She talks, coos, smiles and laughs with her Daddy and me

En francais maintenant... Toutes les petites choses qu'elle fait qui sont trop choux et que j'adore...

• Elle s'etire pdt 20 minutes tous les matins en faisant le plus grand baroumf possible jusqu a ce que Mama et Daddy se reveillent
• Elle me regarde avec un sourire aux coins de levres qd elle voit que je m'aprete a lui donner le sein
• Elle me caresse (et chatouille) les cotes avec sa petite main pdt qu'elle tete
• Elle s'accroche a mon tee-shirt avec l'autre main pdt qu'elle tete
• Quand elle a la tete dans les nuages
• Elle parle qd elle perd le sein et continue a parler la bouche pleine qd elle le retrouve
• Elle fait le crabe/tigre sur sa table a langer
• Elle pleure dans son sommeil
• Elle rigole dans son sommeil!
• Elle claque sa langue quand elle est contente
• Elle boude quand elle est fatiguee
• Elle fronce si je fais quelque chose d'inhabituel, meme si c'est habituel
• Elle dresse la tete haute allongee sur son ventre quand elle est reveillee et a decide de ne plus dormir
• Elle me donne des coups de pieds qd elle est agacee, souvent pcq je lui donne le sein qd elle veut dormir ou la berce qd elle veut manger
• Comme une taupe, elle cherche le sein ds son sommeil
• Elle leche mon tee-shirt ou le tee shirt de celui qui la porte quand elle a faim
• Elle fait sa pauvre malheureuse comme un emoticon triste exagere :( C'est a mourir de rire j'espere le capturer en photo avant qu'elle arrete de le faire
• Elle parle et fait des mamours a son petit toucan/lapin/araignee ou papillon qui pendent a sa poussette ou tapis de jeu
• Elle s'endort au sein et continue a faire semblant de teter

Et le meilleur...

• Quand elle fait des areus, mamours, sourires et rigole avec Daddy et Mama

Cuteness incarnate

A lot of work... but darn fun... and definitely worth it all (the wait, the pains, the extra kilos, the sleepless nights). I d love to write more about how much fun and lovely she is but we are in the middle of a conversation of aheus, coos, laughs and smiles.

Ma Petite Cherie, My Little Darling, The Love of My Life (with Daddy)

It's a girl!

Well we're 99% certain of it, it seems that on one occasion, the midwife told us that what looked like it was a girl turned out to be a healthy baby boy, but there is no wrong choice, either one is wonderful. I just wanted to know whether to talk to my baby as a She or a He, Her or Him. So it is She, my lovely, ma petite cherie...

This is my little darling at 21-weeks! (that was a month ago) She is such a little cheeky monkey so soon. There is another scan picture which shows her playing with her ombilical cord, pulling on it. She's perfect in every way, mind you, call me naive or arrogant, but I was surprised when the nurse said that, of course she is perfect in every way! I would not have expected any less.

This picture was taken on the 22nd of August at just 21-weeks, (the day after the scan) I could still fit in most of my clothes at that point (except for my skirts and trousers, so I had a pair of maternity trousers for work). Just a month later (picture taken by the Daddy on 22nd of September), I had to put away all my shirts, tops, bras, nothing fits anymore. I went on a shopping spree to quickly find something to wear the weekend before.

I wish I had a picture of this week because I swear that I am widening at sight! The little sweetheart had another growth spurt this week, I can tell because I'm bigger but also because I was utterly exhausted in spite of daily naps and solid 9-hour sleep. But the last two weeks I 've had insomnias, I am up every couple of hours or so because the little sweetheart figured that it was a whole playground mama's tummy, jumping and bouncing and twirling or whatever it is that she does. But that's a darn cute thing to wake up to.

I'm delighted, I'm the luckiest mama in the world, I'm sure of it. My main obsession nowadays is the nursery. I had found the perfect set from a shop in France but when I called, it would take months for the set to be available, and I can't see myself renting a van, driving accross to France being 8 months pregnant! Sounds a bit mad. Unfortunately, I can't find a similar perfect set here, so I am obsessing trying to find something that will do just fine... But now Kitem is here and so it will be hardcore shopping around for the white nursery. Although, after studying every page of every catalogue, I have a good idea of what I'm going to get. But I have not spent any money on the baby yet, (unlike Kitem and my grandma!), so I am looking forward to the shopping...

The Last Wonder of the World

I know... it's been two months I did not update my blog. Been extremely stressed and busy at work and too tired to do anything at all in the evenings, besides following the new Heroes season, watching the Euro 2008 and Wimbledon, could not even find the strength to cook dinner or clean up, but Alex was a great help.

Alex got us away on our wedding anniversary to Venice, stories to follow... The thing is, Tweetey's very last comment on my very last post knew more than I did... Indeed just over a month ago, something did not happen... I waited, not too long but impatiently and anxiously, and it persisted at not happening, until I was forced to check out what's the hold up, and we are having a BABY!!!!

Finally, after all these months of practice, the much awaited little darling is here, growing at the speed of light, comfortably tucked away in his mother's womb. So it was almost two months before I realised I was pregnant, and you'd think it's a curse because just days after finding out, I was stricken like any good mother with morning sickness, nausea and quasi-total exhaustion. But this is now gone...

Since the day I found out a lot happened: work and problems kept on piling up my desk faster than I could cope, which left me so frustrated because that's no way to treat my little baby, I had to change doctors as my doctor was a real charlatan who could not care less about me (or my foot) and felt aggravated with guilt at the thought of all the alcohol I had consumed in my first month (in Iceland and entertaining customers) not knowing I was pregnant.

But this was made up with my grand mother's 80th Birthday back home surrounded with future Pepi and Memie, my cousins and the little cutie Antoine. It was a wonderful family reunion and perfect opportunity to announce my wonderful news to my loved ones. And this was followed shortly with Alex taking me to celebrate our 4th wedding anniversary in gorgeous Venice.

Last weekend, we had the greatest pleasure of seeing our little love during my third-month scan; we were awestruck, we still are. Although thanks to Internet information, I followed closely the evolution of the little one, I still did not expect to see what we saw, in fact I was even surprised when the midwife confirmed that 'yup, that's a baby alright'. We were very moved to see our baby moving his little body and touching his/her face and twisting around, much to our delight. And although we knew it would be complete, we were still impressed with the little feet, toes, face, hands, everything, it is a complete minature human being, and it is mine!

Next time up is end of August and we'll find out the sex of our baby!!! yay!!! will keep you posted.