Symphony of toddlerese

Alternate title: What did parents do before baby monitors?

I love my baby monitor. It gives me freedom to move around the house, watch TV - even sit out on the deck - and know that if Bean wakes up, I will be able to hear her.

Most of the time it's just her cute little snore broadcasting over the air waves. Of course there's the occasional late-night cry, but thankfully those are few and far between these days. When she wakes up in the morning, Hubby and I sit down with our coffees and laugh as she performs her A.M. monologue. It usually goes something like this:


Mum-ma! Mum-ma! And when that doesn't bring anyone to the door: Dah-dee! Dah-dee! Didda-didda-dididididida! Mum-ma!

Next she likes to throw her pacifier, which for some reason she has named "Mimi," out of her crib and thus out of her reach.


Uh-oooooh! Mimi! Mimi! Mimimimimmiiiiiii! Mum-ma-mum-ma-mum-ma-Dah-deeeeee! Uh-oh! Uuuuh-ooooooh?

She's not distressed - just chatting along to herself, cracking up laughing every now and then. I know I should go to her, but I'd rather sit and listen!

I heart DST

So, I was a bit concerned (i.e., obsessed) about how the Bean would react to her first Daylight Savings Time (DST). Since it was "spring" ahead, I figured she'd go to bed a little later and therefore sleep a little later at first, but I wasn't sure how it would all play out in the long run. As any parent of an infant knows, anything that messes with baby's sleep is, quite literally, a nightmare.

These days, Bean usually sleeps 7 PM - 6:30/7 AM. So, on the first night of DST I kept her up until close to 8, and she slept until about 8 the next morning. I gradually got her bedtime back to 7, but for the past two days she's still slept until 8! And she's had a two-hour nap instead of her usual one-hour nap each morning. (I'm knocking on wood with each keystroke...praying that the very act of putting this phenomenon in writing doesn't jinx me.)

I'm not sure if it's DST or a growth spurt or a passing fluke or...maybe, just maybe, she'll be a 7 PM - 8 AM baby. I know, I know, flying pigs and hell freezing over are not in the forecast for today. But this momma got two hours of work done before the Bean got up yesterday and stayed in bed until 8 today - and I'm holding on to the dream.

If the shirt stinks...

While we're on the subject of spit-up, my mother recently told me that my grandmother and her sisters (all of whom had a gaggle of kids) used to say, "When you turn your head and can't smell spit-up on your shoulder, it's time for another baby."

I thought of that and smiled as I wiped huge chucks of cottage cheese off my back seat after dropping the Bean at daycare this morning. (How DOES she manage to miss herself entirely and fire that stuff all over the seat, which is well beyond her feet?)

But back to my grandmother and her sisters. A few months back I was crying to Nana about how the Bean was not sleeping well at night. "She has her days and nights confused. You have to turn her upside down." Normally, this would seem totally irrational. But I was beyond sleep-deprived and way past desperate. Pen in hand, I said, "OK, Nana, this is very important. Tell me exactly what I have to do."

She chuckled. "Before you put her in for the night, just flip her over so she's upside down, then swing her around upright again, and put her in her crib. It always worked for me and my sisters."

No lie: that night she slept for 10 hours straight. She's been sleeping through ever since. It may have something to do with that fact that that night was also the Bean's third (and final) night of Ferber sleep training, but I'll still tell any desperate parent: turn that baby upside down!