sleep, please sleep

We may have had a potty break-through today! Although her count is a little low (I think due to her lack of sleep last night), this afternoon, she got kind of still and stopped playing, looked at the potty, vocalized and waved. Potty? You need to sit on the potty? (I use the sign for potty too.) So, I removed her dry diaper, sat her on the potty, and she immediately peepeed...a LOT. A coincidence? I hope not!

We've been having sleep issues at our house. Not Jarrad, of course; that man will sleep through a hurricane (he really has before). Rachel is having a tough time figuring out she can't be standing up and fall asleep at the same time. at 11:14pm last night, she stirred around, and she woke up enough to sit herself up, which led straight to pulling up and looking around her room. Now what? She's sleepy and can't fall asleep! So she fusses, and I lay her back down. Up she goes. Down I lay her. Up she goes. She finally falls asleep folded in half, but that won't last long. We start all over again, until she finally falls asleep sort of on her side with her legs halfway folded underneath her. Whew! Unfortunately, she also regularly stirs around at 5 or 5:30am. In the past, she has easily fallen back to sleep until 7ish. Not now...now she stands, she sits, she stands, and there is NO more sleeping for her (or for me). That does mean she is exhausted by her 9am naptime, and she easily rocks to sleep (avoiding the standup-sitdown routine) and sleeps at least 1.5 hours. We made a Target run with some friends today, and took a nice stroll around the neighborhood late this afternoon. It was early to bed tonight.

Progress Report

	potty	diaper
peepee	6	5
poop	0	4

cute moment

Rachel always gets hyper right before bed. Tonight, she insisted on playing with her new diaper I had out. She would start to put it in her mouth, and I'd grab and gently shake and say, "Hey, cut that out, cut that out." She absolutely cackled. We enjoyed this game for no less than 15 minutes.

non-toy toy of the day

Rachel loves to handle one baby wipe. It's best while she's on the potty because it occupies her so well. She looks at it with furrowed brow, pulls it out of one hand with the other, shreds it to bits, and ultimately holds tightly to the last big piece for awhile as she plays with other things. I like to give her one when I think she needs to wash her hands.

today's life lesson

Rachel's #1 desire at the moment is the stand up. She'll try to pull up on anything and everything, and if she falls, she tries again. But it's interfering with her sleep, as previously mentioned. The sleep books say, "She's stranded herself standing and doesn't know how to get down." But that's not true; Rachel does know how to get down. I think she doesn't know she needs to. Her #1 desire is to stand, but her #1 need is to sleep. She doesn't understand that she can't do both, and, consequently, her #1 desire is obstructing her #1 need. How often is that true for me? My #1 desire is to be right all the time, but my #1 need is to be close to God. But I can't do both, can I? I can't hold on to my pride and have a good relationship with my God at the same time. And, as usual, my #1 desire (the fleshly) stands in the way of my #1 need (the spiritual). They can't coexist. Furthermore, how often do I think I want something so badly, and I keep saying, "please, please." God will quietly correct me over and over, but I'll keep standing back up, saying, "but I don't understand why not!" But He knows, just like I know Rachel needs to lie down. And, even though I don't understand what God is doing or teaching me, and even though Rachel doesn't understand what I'm doing or trying to teach her, eventually the lesson will be learned and we can move past this hurdle and on to the next one.