Remember when I thought that I was going to have to swaddle E forever, and she would never be able to sleep without being bound up like a crazy in a straight jacket? Well, that finally passed, and we happily made a new bedtime routine of rocking her until she was sound asleep, then ohsocarefully carrying her upstairs to her room, and ohsogently laying her in her crib, and ohsoquietly creeping out of her room so as not to wake her, because if you did... it was back downstairs to start the process allllll over again. But whatever, we didn't have to swaddle her! Right?!
Wellllll... that got old. And hearing stories of friends who just lay their baby in bed while still awake, and they put themselves to sleep seemed like a dream. A dream which we would never be bestowed upon this household. Because if there was one thing that E was not good at, it was self-soothing. However, about a month ago, our night time routine became a little stressful, as E would no longer relax in our arms and drift peacefully off to sleep. She began kicking her legs, thrashing her arms, sitting up, wanting to get down and run around, and basically making bedtime a nightmare. So one night, when tension was high, moods were foul, and babies were being a pain in the A$$ about going to bed, we said, "Ok E, we know you're tired, so we're going to try just putting you in your bed and see if you can soothe yourself to sleep" (Not really. It was more along the lines of, Go the F*#% to Sleep). We carried her upstairs, tucked her in bed with Bear, Monkey, and Horsey, and walked out. And.... NOT A FRICKEN PEEP. We sat there, dumbfounded by the silence. I almost wanted to run back in there and make sure she was okay. And she slept the entire night.
The next night, when bedtime came around, we asked ourselves if we dared to try laying her down again, convinced that the night before was just a fluke; maybe all of the planets and stars had been aligned in cosmic synchronicity or something. But she fought the rocking, so we carried her upstairs again and put her in bed, and once again she was quiet all night long. Then I started trying it for nap time, with the same amazing results. I know this may sound like such a simple accomplishment, but for me (at least), it feels like the best thing in the world. We started saying, "Night-night?" when she showed signs of getting tired, and when we would put her to bed, and now she has started saying "nigh-nigh" when she wants to go to bed. Then she will walk to the stairs and stand there, waiting to be taken up to bed. It's so cute :)
Speaking of words, another word she has recently mastered is "No". She picked this one up suddenly, as one day I was feeding her, and as I brought a spoonful of applesauce to her mouth, she pushed the spoon away and said, "No-No". I was shocked that she said it, and that she used it in the right context. I said "No more?" and she said "No-No". Then she started saying "No-No More" when she was done eating. And that was cute, and fun. And then, she started saying "No-No" for EVERYTHING. "E, come here so I can change your diaper." "No-No." "E, be nice to kitty." "No-No." "E, do you want to play with your dolls?" "No-No." Okaaaaay. Fun's over. Time to learn "YES".