Not quite the wild weekend of my past, but I'm not complaining....

The Pretend Husband and FunnyKid left town on Friday for the weekend and my wedding rings were off within the hour as I hit the town. Ok, not as bad as it sounds-- I went for a manicure and pedicure to take my mind off how much I missed them which, of course, meant taking my rings off.

While I was kind of lost for the first hour (which included about 10 minutes of sitting in my car trying to stop crying), the rest of the weekend went by fast. And it was fun to be single and carefree again. While there was some cleaning that had to be done and I still had to work, I found some time for sleeping late and getting a massage. But even the cleaning was kind of fun because I was able to do it when I wanted, for as long as I wanted without someone grabbing onto my legs or demanding I put the "choo choo" show on the television.

It was the first time I've ever been away from FunnyKid overnight, but I figure it's good practice for when I'm in the hospital to have his brother or sister. And he had a blast with his cousins and his dad. The PH sent me tons of photos and videos so it felt like I got to be a part of the fun without any of the responsibility.

I told the PH how much I enjoyed the hour to sit and be pampered in the nail salon and he encouraged me to take a break every once in awhile and go for a pedicure or whatever. In talking to the other moms in our playgroup, I realized I am not alone in not asking for time for myself. It's a tough situation because I don't get to see the PH as often as I'd like as it is and when he is home with us, I want us to be together as a family. But I also learned the value of taking a breather from being a mom and having some time to do something for me.

I made sure I enjoyed the heck out of the weekend, not knowing when I'll get one to myself again (while the PH is a superstar dad, I don't see him taking a toddler and an infant away by himself-- and I'm not sure I would either!) But I'm going to make sure I take advantage of the PH's offer in the meantime and get some time out of the house that doesn't involve grocery shopping, playgrounds or the word "no" on repeat. Now that I've tasted it, there's no going back.

It's a library... there must be a newspaper around here somewhere for you to start checking the classfied ads

A playgroup we are a part of decided to meet at a local library this week. We rotate around to different libraries on rainy days and, although I had been to this one a handful of times before, I had never met this particular children's librarian. This particular *grouchy* children's librarian.
The library, like many others, boasts a nice play area complete with a train table, a kitchen and some other fun activities.And the kitchen includes a couple of kid-sized shopping carts which, of course, the kids are eager to push around.

One of the kids in the playgroup was pushing the cart quietly around the rest of the very large (mostly empty) children's room when the librarian looked up and said, "she needs to take that back to the play area." Then, when we stepped out into the hall outside the children's room to say hello to a friend, the librarian chased us out, told us we needed to return the same shopping cart to the play area and said, "And you need to help clean up the play area."

Trying to give her the benefit of the doubt, maybe she thought we were leaving (without our coats or bags?) and maybe she thought we were the types of parents who walk out on a mess (we're not), but I didn't appreciate the tone.

And personally, if you're not a fan of kids and how they do things (they wander, they move toys around, they are prone to leaving designated areas over and over again), perhaps you might want to find another line of work. Or just, you know, chill out a bit.

Note: I feel like I repeated the word "librarian" a lot in this post and I don't mean to mock anyone but this particular woman and her lack of flexibility, especially when working with kids. The library we went to is a great one and happens to be the same place that employs my favorite librarian (and one of my most faithful readers). We'll visit again, my friend, but maybe on that lady's day off!

Me and my first-world problems...

Let me tell you, pregnancy brain is a real thing and I am suffering from it. Mostly it includes things like walking across the house, getting there and not remembering what I was looking for. But tonight it affected the Pretend Husband.

We have a double oven in our kitchen (if you ever have the option, choose them! I thought it would be a waste, but they have come in so handy on many occasions). Anyway, the PH was on his way home from another long day at work and asked me to heat up some food for him. So, I turned on the oven, put the food in and figured it would be perfect by the time he pulled in.

The PH went to get his dinner, noticed the bottom oven was on, opened the door... and found nothing. Then he opened the top oven (the one that was off) and found his cold dinner just sitting waiting to be heated. With four months to go in this pregnancy, I fear things will only get worse...

Since it went so well the first time...

If you ask me, the quick success we had with moving FunnyKid to a big bed is just another indication of what awesome parents the Pretend Husband and I are. Well, either that or we were just lucky enough to end up with one heck of a kiddo (probably the second reason, huh?)

Well, riding that high that is our confidence in our parenting abilities, the PH and I decided to give it another whirl. All this to say that I am pregnant again! I am due on Christmas Day, expect to give birth earlier for a multitude of mostly medical reasons and we are not finding out the gender until it can be done in person.

This pregnancy has been easy in a lot of ways (no morning sickness, no swollen extremities yet, etc.) but tougher in others (mainly the fact that I have to chase after a toddler all day regardless of how sore or tired I am). But, of course, we are oh-so-grateful that I'm pregnant at all and looking forward to meeting the new kid (fingers crossed he or she is as funny as their brother!)

That "Super Nanny" technique where you put the kid back into bed again and again again? It's exhausting.

Last week, for various reasons, we decided it was time to move FunnyKid out of crib and into his new, twin bed. Not only that, but he was moving out of the nursery into a bigger bedroom (where, although he was only slightly impressed, he found a train table waiting to be played with).

After a few nights of me sitting in his room for two hours putting him back into bed again and again and again and again (and again) until he wore himself out and fell asleep, I was ready to throw in the towel. I called up a bunch of my mom friends and cried, "What are we doing wrong?" And the answers were plentiful... and not at all hopeful.

Basically, they all described the transition from crib to bed as one of the worst times of their lives and all said it would take weeks of tears (mine) and sleeplessness (mine and FunnyKid's) to get it to stick. So, we pulled ourselves up by our boot straps... and decided to take a break.

We moved the crib into the new room to give FunnyKid a chance to acclimate to the new room and decided we would try the bed again next week. The best nephews in the world (and an awesome niece) are in town this week, FunnyKid turns two later this week and we just thought it was a little too much excitement to throw a bed transition into the mix.

So, FunnyKid went to bed in his crib the first night... and the second night. And the third night, he climbed into bed, yelled for about two minutes and then went right to sleep! Worried it was a fluke, I didn't have much hope for nap time yesterday, but he did it. He actually played quietly for an hour in his room then climbed into bed, pulled a blanket up over him and conked out. And last night took a minute of yelling at the gate across his doorway before he got back into bed and promptly fell asleep.

What?!? The Pretend Husband and I keep looking at each other saying, "How did we get so lucky?" We're guessing he was just ready after having some time to acclimate to his new surroundings and the idea he can get out of bed if he wants to. It's tough to declare anything truly, finally "done" with a toddler, but I'm going to venture onto a limb here and say we (and he) did it.

I'm not just writing this all out to brag (although, if I may, my kid is pretty stinking awesome!) but to give other parents hope. While every one of your friends and family members will tell you how terrible the transition is-- and it usually is-- there are always the exceptions. And you might join us in being lucky enough to be one of them (fingers crossed).