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Ok for real, how long does it take a toddler to get on a normal sleep schedule after a huge event like moving to a new house? Because we are seriously about to lose our minds here.

Cate seems to think that midnight is her new bedtime. And she can’t fall asleep on her own at all, we have to cuddle with her until she’s sound asleep, then quietly transfer her to her crib. Same goes for naptime during the day. I’m so tired that I’m having trouble finishing a train of thought or even a full sentence.

I know I said that I was going to wait on letting her cry it out, but sometime after midnight the other night, I gave up. We had cuddled with her on the couch for over an hour, we had tried lying in bed with her in between us, and nothing was working. So I put her in her crib, turned on her Baby Mozart CD, and left the room. She was standing up in her crib wailing for me, and I walked out and closed the door. Way to feel heartless. Then I lay down next to Dave in our bed and cried. I felt completely helpless, and totally incompetent as a mother. She only cried for maybe 10 or 15 minutes before she fell asleep, but it was awful.

(For the record, I know I’m not incompetent. These are just the thoughts you have when you’re exhausted in the middle of the night.)

Last night ended up working out rather well. Cate had only taken a 20-minute nap yesterday (no fun for mama, I assure you), so she collapsed at the not-quite-but-almost-normal time of 9:45. And she didn’t make a peep until after 8:30 this morning. So that was lovely.

But this had better not mean that she’s weaning herself off of naps altogether. My mom says that my brother and I both stopped napping when we were about 18 months old. (We were sleeping 12 hours a night, so we were getting enough sleep, but we were done with naps totally.) And right now, naptime is the only time of day that I get any productive work done around the house, so I’m not ready to give it up just yet.

Speaking of which, I have seriously got to get back to work. My current job has sort of dried up lately, they haven’t had a new project for me since June, and I am not cut out to be a full-time stay-at-home mom. Also, judging by the way Cate explodes with utter glee anytime the neighbor kids are outside, I think she misses being able to play with other kids on a regular basis too. So I’m going to be looking for some more part-time work-from-home tech writing gigs. I think it’ll be good for everyone.

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I’ve been meaning to write a post about how Cate is adapting to the new house, but the thing is… I don’t really know. It’s hard to tell with 18 month-olds. I can tell you that her sleep patterns are seriously messed up right now, and I think that has a lot to do with most of the tantrums we’ve been getting lately. Generally she’s been pretty happy, but her meltdowns have been much bigger than they were, say, a month ago. I’m not sure if that’s her age (starting the terrible two’s early), if it’s the lack of sleep, or if it’s the move. Probably all three. But when she’s happy, it’s great.

And then last night she stayed up until almost midnight, which was pretty horrendous. She still can’t seem to go down in her crib on her own, but I think that’s fine for right now. I’m not going to push the crying-it-out issue for at least a couple of weeks.

I have made one pretty huge gaffe, though. We’ve been careful to avoid talking about Patsy or the other kids at daycare unless she says their names, because I think there’s no need to bring it up and upset her. We did the same thing when we were staying with my folks in Mississippi - no one was allowed to say the word “Daddy” because it inevitably led to tears.

(Btw, I took a bunch of pictures of the kids at daycare before we left, and I finally got around to copying them off my camera today. You can go see them in this set, if you’re interested.)

(Another btw: before we moved, I gave Patsy and her daughter the URL for this site, so if you’re reading this, hi!)

So last night, I was getting Cate out of the bathtub and drying her off, and she started saying “doggy” over and over. She does this sometimes, talks about an animal that’s nowhere in sight, and usually I just roll with it. “Oh really, a doggy? Does the doggy say, ‘woof woof’? What color is the doggy?” etc.

And this is where I goofed up: I said, “Is the doggy’s name Shiloh?” Shiloh is one of Patsy’s dogs, and Cate loooved him. She called him Shi-boh. I should’ve known better than to say his name, I don’t know what I was thinking. Poor Cate’s eyes went huge and she stared at me for a few seconds, like she was trying to place exactly what Shiloh meant, then she remembered, and she frantically started signing and saying “shoes! shoes!” over and over. Like we were going to go get in the car and drive over to Patsy’s house to see Shiloh. So I said, “No, sweetheart, no shoes. It’s time to put on our PJ’s and get ready to go night-night.” And oh, the tears. There were many, many tears.

I think the moral of that story is that I’m an idiot who unnecessarily traumatized my child. The end.

Overall, though, things have been really good so far. We really like North Carolina, Dave likes his office, and the weather has been mercifully mild for the past couple of days, so we’ve been putting Cate in the stroller and going for little family walks in the evening. (Lovely except for the damn mosquitoes.) This is a really beautiful neighborhood and the people are unbelievably friendly. I’ve already met four other moms, and countless kids. Two boys came over yesterday to show us where a mama turtle buried her eggs in our front yard. So at least I’ll know what they’re doing when random kids show up to investigate a mound of dirt near our driveway.

Oh, and living in the suburbs where there are like 5 different grocery stores plus a Wal-Mart, a Target, and several restaurants (both fast food and sit-down) within a couple of miles of me? And having city water and sewer? And cable instead of satellite? LOVE. IT.

Sorry there haven’t been any pictures of the new house yet. It’s kind of embarassing to take pictures of the place when it’s covered in boxes. So for now, you’ll have to settle for pictures of our cute, tiny backyard.

We could mow that sucker in like 15 minutes. It’s awesome.

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Today, we had several people come over to help us unpack: Cat, Tony, e-baby (ok, she was mostly there to play with her cousin Cate) and their friends Dan and Jess. We got SO MUCH done, it’s amazing. It’s starting to feel like “a proper house,” as Dave says, rather than just a mess of boxes. Granted, it’s still a very messy house, but it’s starting to feel more and more manageable.

The living room is basically done, we just need to put books on the shelves and hang some pictures. And the kitchen was an unbelievably big job that’s now probably 90% done. (It would be more, but the shelves are broken in the cabinet where I want to put my pots and pans. The landlord will be repairing that soon.) Cate’s room is finished too, except for putting away all of the clothes from her suitcase that I took on our trip.

That leaves us with the dining room, my office, Dave’s office, and our bedroom. Oh, and the garage, where the movers dumped a whole mess o’ crap that really has no business being in the garage. It’s a lot, but not quite as overwhelming as when I first walked in the door on Thursday afternoon.

The downside of doing so much is that I am now in unbelievable pain. My shoulders ache from carrying so much, and my calves are killing me from running up and down the stairs a thousand times. It sucks, but I’ll live.

And you know, Cat and Tony are family, so it kind of makes sense that they’d come over to help, since I’d totally do the same thing for them. But we’d only met Dan and Jess once before, so the fact that they volunteered to help us out just amazes me. They both seem like really great, fun people, and I look forward to getting to spend more time with them.

P.S. One thing I need to vent about: we had our cable installed yesterday, and Dave and I went through it last night to set up all of our DVR timers. That’s when I found out that Time Warner in Raleigh doesn’t carry Bravo. That means no more Project Runway for me. I am pissed, y’all. I’ll be calling them first thing Monday morning to complain. I’ll be ok next season after they move the show to Lifetime, but I wanted to see how this season turned out. My mom has promised to record the shows for me and burn them to DVD, which she’ll then mail to me. It’s very sweet of her, but it’s not the same. Hmph.

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We made it to North Carolina. The flight was relatively easy and uneventful, which is always a good thing. Cate was so happy to see Dave at the airport that when he picked her up, she buried her face in his neck and didn’t move for several minutes. Poor kiddo, I think she had decided that Daddy guy was gone for good. We’ve never seen her like that, it was sort of heartbreaking.

The house is super-cute and I love the neighborhood, so I’m really happy with our choice. But of course, it’s a rental so there are a few maintenance issues: the A/C works downstairs but not upstairs (a real problem, since it’s hot and upstairs is where we sleep), the garbage disposal is broken, the dryer took over three hours to dry one load of clothes, etc. So there are lots of little things. And the house doesn’t feel very clean to me, which I suppose is because the previous tenants had teenage boys. It’s not horrible by any stretch of the imagination, just maybe not quite as perfect as you’d expect a house to be that you’re moving into for the first time. I’m looking forward to getting unpacked and doing a really thorough scrub-down of the whole house. It’s sort of impossible to do right now with boxes everywhere.

Speaking of the boxes: my general rule for moving is to get the beds and bathrooms unpacked first, then you can take a shower, go to bed, and deal with everything else the next day. Makes sense, right? Well, I consider it a huge victory that among the hundreds of boxes in our house, I was able to find the boxes with our bedding in them (crib bedding too! different box!) and get everything fixed up with a very agitated 18 month-old running around demanding our constant attention. Score one for teamwork: Dave kept Cate distracted while I got the beds made.

The cats were delivered this afternoon, and the poor kitties are totally freaked out, but very happy to see us. Cate missed her little buddy so much, she and Beaumont have basically been making out for hours (lots of full-on face nuzzles). Teenie is so happy to see us that she’s even been letting Cate pet her, which is kind of a huge deal for her. And Teenie is usually the skittish one who hides under our bed all the time, but she’s been exploring both upstairs and downstairs of the house, so that’s great. She hisses at Beaumont when he gets too close to her personal space, but otherwise they’re both fine.

Cate didn’t go into her crib easily tonight, which I was kind of expecting, since it’s her same crib but in a totally foreign room. She freaked when I put her down, and I didn’t have the heart to make her cry it out on her first night, so I brought her into our bed until she fell asleep (which took about three minutes tops - baby girl was worn slap out), then I moved her to her crib. I’m wondering if I’m going to get a 3 a.m. wake-up call or not. Fingers crossed that we all sleep well this first night.

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It feels like we’ve been in Mississippi forever. I think Cate has decided that this is her new home. She’s finally starting to relax and sleep somewhat normally here, and now we’re about to leave for yet another totally new and unfamiliar environment. Sigh.

My sister was supposed to fly back to New York yesterday, but appears to have come down with some sort of devil stomach virus, so she had to reschedule her flight yesterday. And again today. Now she’s thinking that maybe she’ll fly back on Friday or Saturday. Poor thing, she’s been absolutely miserable, and Cate has been so sad without her beloved “Dacy” to entertain her.

Luckily, none of the rest of us have come down with whatever it is that’s making her sick, so that’s good. Watch, I just jinxed us all by saying that.

My mom’s been having a lot of post-chemo tests run while we’ve been here. Yesterday she had a bone scan to find out whether or not her cancer had metasticized (sp?). We found out today that she is cancer-free, so that’s great news.

According to Dave, our stuff arrived at our house in North Carolina today, and it’s looking good so far. The movers did manage to dent my car, but it’s just cosmetic and the movers are going to have to compensate us for the damage. Still… ugh. Sucks.

Cate and I fly up to Raleigh tomorrow. I can’t wait to see Dave - Cate and I have both really missed him for the past ten (10!) days. Cate really misses the cats too; my parents’ cat is kind of mean and hisses anytime Cate goes near her, so I know she’ll be so happy when she can go back to abusing Beaumont all the live-long day.

More updates when I have Internet access again. Friday, I think? I’m not sure. Hopefully soon.

Edited to add: More pictures have been added to the Flickr set of our trip. You can even go see pictures of my mama’s cute little bald head in there.

Good times.

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We’re having a good time in Jackson, other than the fact that Cate’s sleeping schedule has gone completely haywire and she’s acting a little bit bipolar because of it. She’s been super-clingy too, but I think that’s normal with all the changes going on right now. Different house, different bed, no Daddy, no kitties, all these “new” people around (she’s met her grandparents and aunt before, obviously, but long enough ago that she didn’t remember them). It’s been really stressful for her, but she’s starting to relax now, and overall she’s doing really well.

As for me, I’m just trying to stay inside as much as possible, because oh my lord, it is HOT. I’m trying to keep Cate inside too, because she developed a really nasty heat rash all over her chest and arms after only 2 days here. It’s crazy. I miss Seattle weather already.

But we have been having a lot of fun too.

You can see the whole set here, if you’re interested. I’ll be adding more as the week goes on, I’m sure.

Oh, and Cate’s already learned that her grandparents are Mimi and Pop-Pop (she’s called them both by their names), and she absolutely adores “Dacy” (Tracy). Seriously, I don’t know what she’s going to do after we move and she doesn’t have an audience applauding her every move anymore. She will be one sad little girl with just boring ol’ Mommy and Daddy around.

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The moving and house closing went off as well as could reasonably be expected. I was surprisingly ok about most of it; I cried when I left our house and again when we left Patsy’s for the last time, but otherwise I kept it together. We had a great time with my sister, had dinner with Kris, took Cate to the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle on Wednesday, and then flew to Mississippi on Thursday morning.

As it turns out, I was expecting the Tuesday (the Move Day) to be the worst, but no, it was Thursday that was our hell day.

First, just as we were pulling up to the rental car return place, Cate projectile-barfed all over the car seat, herself, and the entire back seat. It was milk. Which - in reverse - smells like death and is all curdled like cottage cheese. Seriously, seriously gross. I held her out in front of me like she was a bomb and ran to the ladies’ room, where I cleaned her up with wet naps and changed her clothes while she screamed bloody murder.

Meanwhile, if rental car companies maintain any sort of blacklist, I’m sure that Tracy will be forever banned from Dollar Rent-A-Car, because she just handed over the keys to the puke-soaked car with a “um, sorry!” and took off. She was mortified, but what could we do? It’s not like we had the time or resources to clean it ourselves. As it was, the whole incident made us so late that we almost missed our flight.

But! We made our flight and Cate was fine all the way to Atlanta - she even slept for 2.5 hours of it. Yay! Then we get to Atlanta and find out that our connecting flight to Jackson was cancelled. Boo! So we spent over 6 hours hanging out in the Atlanta airport waiting for another one. Luckily Tracy is one of the Delta “Gold Crown” status people, so we got to hang out in the fancy club room with free cocktails (they also had both milk & apple juice for Cate, yippee!), which was better than your usual “stranded in an airport” scenario. So that was good, but it still sucks to be stuck in limbo like that.

Tracy was able to get on standby on the 7:20 flight since she has her fancy-shmancy status with Delta, but Cate & I were numbers 10 and 11 on the standby list because we aren’t Delta frequent flyers. I managed to get one seat booked on the 11 p.m. flight, and decided that I could just go with it and ride with Cate in my lap. She’s under 2, it’s legal.

After we talked about it, Tracy said she’d take Cate in her lap on the earlier flight, since it was better to go ahead & get the poor kiddo to her destination, rather than keeping her up past midnight. I agreed, then had a full-on panic attack when I saw my baby leaving to get on a plane that I wasn’t on. That was an irrational Mommy Phobia that I didn’t even know I had. What if something happened and I wasn’t there? I mean, if the plane crashed and we were both on it, yes that’s tragic and awful. But if something happened to her and I was left behind… I don’t know how I’d live with myself.

Luckily, when they started going through the names on the standby list, I was the LAST ONE called. I hugged the Delta ticket agent so hard that I dropped my water bottle, ran onto the plane, got the lady sitting next to Tracy (with a now-screeeaming Cate in her lap) to swap seats with me so I could sit with them. Once we were seated and everything was ok, I started to cry. I just couldn’t take it anymore, the panic effect wore off, I was so exhausted (we had all been up since 4:30 a.m.) and I broke down. I’m pretty sure it’s not the last time I’ll cry during all of this, too.

The 7:20 flight didn’t actually leave until almost 9:30, so we finally got to Jackson somewhere around 10 p.m. Cate didn’t fall asleep until almost 1, but at least she slept until 9 a.m. (apparently she’s still on west coast time, thank the stars).

Today’s been ok. It’s just been really hard because Cate doesn’t understand what’s going on so she’s been super-clingy and crying a lot more than usual. She pretty much freaks anytime I’m out of her line of vision. Going to the bathroom is a challenge. It’s upsetting for me because I know this isn’t her normal personality and I don’t really have any way to reassure her and make her feel secure that it’s all ok.

But it’s great to see my parents - especially my mom, who looks very cute with her little bald head. And I’m so excited about the people we’re going to visit with while we’re in town. (Danielle, email me if you’re around this week!)

I’m not sure if this makes sense, but it hasn’t quite sunk in that we’re not going back to Seattle when this trip is over. Weird.

Meanwhile, Dave is having all kinds of fun driving cross-country and sightseeing along the way. He’s extended his trip by a couple of days just so he has time to see more stuff. I think he’s in Minneapolis tonight. I’m just glad someone is having fun.

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