Alarm clocks, a cold, and a nursing child… 

My alarm on my Fitbit is set for 7:30 am. Rare is the day that it actually wakes me up because I’m usually awake well before that.

Today, it did wake me up! I do have a cold after all, and my 11 month old, yes, she’s 11 months today, where has the time gone??? She’s been taking a few more steps the last couple days too! Back to my 11 month old… She’s still waking up to nurse two to three times a night. She refuses a pacifier if I try to give it to her, but will gladly take it from our nanny during nap times… ? I refuse to let my kids cry it out, that may be your thing and glad it worked for you, but this mama can’t/won’t it. Don’t get me wrong, we actually tried it for a couple days with Victoria, we were tired, really I was exhausted, Ryan just gets tired since he is the son of the energizer bunny (his mom) after all. But in the end I couldn’t let her cry at such a young age. She fake cries now to try to get her way, I tell her she can cry, she just has to go to her room to do it.

We still let our kids sleep in our bed if they want to. Ryan does transport them to their room after they fall asleep, but if they come back again, they usually just stay until morning. Another topic that many parents refuse to even consider, but it works for our family. We have super affectionate kids, and they probably won’t want mommy and daddy to walk them to class every day when they get older, but we’ll take what we can get as long as we can get it.

And yes, Bobby is almost 3 and still loves his pacifier. We let him sleep with it, but during the day we do make him put it away even though he isn’t happy about it. Victoria gave hers up at 2.5, and didn’t start speaking clearly until after that because she would try to talk with it in her mouth. Bobby is a little hard to understand with his pacifier in his mouth, but that little boy has been speaking in full clear sentences since he was 1.5. I’ll keep asking if he’s done with his pacifier and one day his answer will be yes and we’ll pack one away in his keepsake box like we did for Victoria.

Anyway, even with a cold, a nursing baby, and kids in my bed, I have such great sleep that when my alarm goes off before I’m awake, it’s easy to wake up, turn it off without snoozing and start my day feeling refreshed and ready to go!