Unpredictability

These are the constants in our lives these days:

• I do laundry everyday - between potty-training Lauren, spitting up from Marissa and me being too small for maternity clothes but too big for my regular ones which leaves me with only a couple of things that fit - the washer and dryer run constantly

• The dishwasher runs daily as well - bottles, bottles, bottles - I am continuously loading or unloading it
  

• Rob goes to work and Lauren goes to school daily

That is the extent of what I know is true and can count on from day to day. Beyond that, I'm at the mercy of the lack of routine or schedule that comes with having a newborn. The days fly by and are pretty easy, it's the evenings and nighttime that I now fear and dread. Marissa is waking up from her initial slumber, and she has decided that she really enjoys being held and rocked and cuddled - smart girl! She falls asleep readily on either of us, day or night - it is a sweet and incredibly peaceful experience. However, this also means that the act of actually putting her down into the crib so that we can get on with the business of sleeping becomes a problem which starts about the time one is crawling happily back into bed - the protests and urgent cries pull us out and we stumble back to work on getting her into a deeper sleep so we can sneak out without her waking up. It is a game Rob and I don't often win. Luckily for us (please don't let me jinx this!) Lauren has yet to wake up from all the commotion. At least we know that this too shall pass, and will do so all too quickly, although it is easy to say that in daylight after a nice strong cup of coffee.

This past weekend, my Dad and Sandy came in to meet Marissa and spend some time with Lauren, and they were a huge help, especially since Friday night was our first very sleepless night. They took Lauren to the park and played outside and made all the meals so Rob and I were able to nap and take it a little easier. Thank you again, Dad and Sandy, for everything this weekend!

Sunday was Mother's Day and we had a nice, low key one. Here is a picture of my family hanging out together.

This is a picture of Marissa while she was sleeping in her Moses basket on Sunday - she reached her foot out and found the super-soft bear that Dad and Sandy brought her and I swear she dug her toes in and she might have even sighed.


I think Lauren is doing really well adjusting to having the baby around: she is very helpful and always finds Marissa to say hello after school and insists on saying good-bye to her before school every day too. She hasn't seemed jealous yet and we haven't seen any regression in the potty-training, in fact just the opposite, she is doing very well and I would say she is very close to being fully trained. I was thinking last night around 3:00 am how I have always under-estimated Lauren and her capacity to adjust to whatever has come her way practically since birth. She is one amazing little girl, though, and we are reminded daily of that.

Since Marissa and I are still immobile, we are very over daytime TV and have settled on the country music channel to entertain us all day - I only hope it doesn't give her a twang when she starts talking! I watch Fox News in the morning with my coffee and we catch up on what's going on the world - luckily I am not suffering from post-partum depression or the politics in this country right now would put me right over the edge. We always check the channel guide in case something on 550 channels looks appealing, but so far, nothing has. Yesterday I hit a new personal low and watched "Guilding Light" in its entirety. We go way back, GL and I do: my grandmother used to listen to it when it was solely broadcast on the radio and my mother watched it religiously daily so in a way, GL is an old family friend. I did not divulge this little tidbit to Rob, I can hear him groan and run his hand down his face - he does this little move when one of us says or does something that he isn't sure how to respond to without blatantly asking, "What on earth were you thinking??". I did add bon-bons to my grocery list for the week, that should pretty much cover the fact that I am now hooked on a daytime soap opera.