Well, that could have gone worse

This was quite a weekend for us. Lauren was away all weekend, flying to D.C. with students competing in the History Bowl. Gone all weekend. Since I was involved in the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life that night, we sent our daughter home with her nanny. After four hours of Relay for Life on Friday night, I spent Saturday morning running errands that would have been inconvenient with a crying baby in the back of the car.

When I picked her up, I found out that she hadn't had the best night. No, not at all. Here's the thing: we've never been "cry it out" parents. In fact, at 15 months old, she still sleeps in the same bed with us, which allows her to nurse during the night, usually with little inconvenience to either Lauren or me. Well, I gather she didn't sleep well--she got to sleep well enough but then woke up repeatedly during the night calling for her mama, wanting to nurse. Heck, she was so desperate that she even called for her dada once. Not a good night.

So when I put her to bed last night, I got her to bed in about a half hour, which is fairly normal. Soon thereafter, I went to bed too, figuring that if she was going to wake up crabby in the middle of the night, then I'd better get all the sleep I could before that happened. She was asleep by 9:15 and I joined her by 9:45.

She occasionally needed some reassuring pats in the night, and then a little before 5, she woke up crying. Here it comes, I thought. Seven hours is pretty good--I can live with that. I got her some water, though, and got her back to sleep. I woke up before 8 and she still slept almost another hour. I'm guessing that our nanny got all the unrealistic expectations out of her.