Today was not so picture perfect.The lack of an afternoon nap has the ability to turn my sweet prince into a terrorizing Tsar. He was nutty with sleep deprivation and demonstrated this by alternating hysterical laughter and high pitched screaming with finger sucking and flopping dramatically onto the soft surfaces I provided in the attempts to tempt him to sleep. He played peek a boo through the crib rails then hurled his crib mates (stuffed dog and glow worm) out of his crib. I played Jewel Lullaby’s and attempted baby massage. He responded with giggles and grunts. I read a book, he laughed at me then threw the book at Jack, who was setting a very good example by sleeping at the foot of the crib. I gave him a little warm milk and a diaper change, he squirmed on the change table like the diaper was on fire.
After forty five minutes and dinner time was reached I gave up and went back downstairs.
Low on dinner options I resorted to frozen pizza. I was planning to cook and catch up on the rest of my Heather Homemaker tasks during the nap that never happened. If it makes it any better it was thin crust and veggie. Putting the pizza in the oven proved harder then one would expect due to my child being attached to my legs screaming to be picked up every moment. Again, this is not usual, I blame the lack of nap for releasing his inner Wendy whiner.
Our delightful nine year old neighbour knocked on the door and within a few minutes was dressed in Roman’s Baby Chick Halloween costume and lounging on my couch watching Will and Grace. It was a pivotal episode where Grace marries Leo (who is hottie Harry Connick Jr) but is conflicted about what it will mean to the love of her life, gay bff Will. I am going by memory because I missed it due to being busy with my usually lovely little eater throwing his food onto the floor, smearing it on his tray and sucking his fingers.
When my little neighbour offered to take Jack to the park because she sensed that he needed to pee I was thrilled. However, when she returned twenty minutes later in a panic without my dog I was not. I threw on my flower power rain boots (it was the first thing in view) scooped Roman onto my hip, threw a treat in my pocket and ran to the park. I see a white blur of fur running across the road narrowly missing a passing car and attracting the attention on the neighbourhood. He comes running to me when he sees me looking very guilty and a little scared. I didn’t bring the leash so I had to scoop him up with my other arm. Toddler on one hip, terrier on the other, we return to the nest.
Roman finished the evening by trashing our home like a diva in a hotel room. Every toy knocked over, every toy basket emptied onto the floor. Not even the tray with magazine’s on the ottoman was spared, which unfortunately also had a large glass of water on it. I was counting down the moments until I could legitimately put him in the bath which I decided was 7pm. I came up with that time as a compromise between the instant gratification of stopping the insanity by putting him to bed early and the pain of a very early morning wake up tomorrow.
After some splish splashing, singing in the tub, stories, Jewel lullaby’s, head massage, back rub and a couple of pleading “shhhhh, time for sleep, shhhhh, pretty please my love, give it up and go to the sleep” I got the sweet sound of sucking fingers and deep baby breaths.
Now here I sit a few hours later after dealing with the aftermath aided by a new concoction of POM juice and rum, Jack the runaway, peacefully asleep at my feet and Oprah’s life lessons awaiting me on PVR.
Goodnight