Rock til you drop

Aida is next to me, cooing and making all sorts of pleasant noises as she observes the world from her bouncy chair.

This would be delightful if I hadn’t spent the last two hours rocking her to sleep.

It worked. She fell asleep. Several times.

And each time, just as I thought she was crib-ready, her eyes just popped open.

This last time, she looked up at me and laughed. We both did. For different reasons, I am sure.

For the past few weeks, the baby Steve and I have taken to describing as “happy,” “good” and “easy” has been dissolving into tears much more often than any of us like.

It typically happens at the end of her one-hour “I’m awake!” window. And as I rush her to her room to swaddle her, her irritation grows and she fights the swaddle, resists the rocking until she finally falls asleep in exhaustion.

It isn’t a fun way to put a baby to sleep.

In the event the problem is me, I’ve begun working on trying to read her signs earlier and get her to bed as soon as I see a trace of tiredness coming on.

I did this yesterday afternoon and the results made me feel triumphant: we had a more content baby who went to sleep more easily and even appeared to enjoy the winding down process with mom. I was so pleased, I even called Steve at work to tell him of our victory.

So, today, determined to do the same, I rushed in to swaddle and rock her as soon as I saw her first yawn.

I rocked. And rocked. And rocked. Two hours.

Seriously. This baby has a hard time staying awake more than an hour at a time, yet, here she is, contentedly playing in her beloved bouncy chair – occasionally rubbing her eyes (a sign of sleepiness, mind you!),  yawning and talking to the yellow duck dangling before her eyes.

I have theories (informed, in part, by all my parent book reading). One, her vision is better, allowing her to see all the incredible things around her. “OMG! There are birds hanging from the ceiling fan! . . . And, look, that curtain rod is AMAZING . . . Could those really be flashing lights on the baby monitor? Holy cow! Who can sleep with all this going on?”

Two, she’s reaching a stage in her development where she actually CAN stay awake longer than an hour in the afternoon, but she’s not generally happy about it, and I, of course, am slow to understand this.

Three, she just really enjoys being rocked.

Whatever. I’m giving her five more minutes in that chair.

If I know her, she’ll be sobbing any second.