Nana is here!

My mom is visiting. For the first week Kate’s attitude was, “YAY someone to pay attention to me all the time! Let me show Nana all my things!” The second week she started insisting, “NO, Mama do it!” This is the third week. She is a full on hot mess. Every time Nana tries to do something for her she melts down crying and screeching. So I end up doing everything like normal, while silently apologizing to my mom and hoping that she understands that it’s nothing personal. Kate is also waking up at 6am most days (2 hours earlier than usual) because she rouses a little bit, notices some sunlight, and then announces “Mama! The sun is up! It is time to get up!” The 2 hours less sleep is not improving her mood whatsoever.

Joining in on the chaos is Ember, who not only decided to take her first steps (yay developmental milestones!) but also to finally cut her first two teeth. She is unhappy and cries every time I put her down. Thankfully she can be distracted with toys and TV – at least until she sees me, then she melts down crawling after me crying “mamamama!”

Needless to say, my hopes of getting lots of things accomplished and spending time by myself has not worked out according to plan. We did go out on a dinner date without the children, but Ember was miserable while I was gone. She’s just hurting and wants her Mama. :(

We went to Ikea today, which is a long drive but worth it if I need some furniture. Kate is 1″ too short for the child drop off room – gah. Sometimes it sucks having a short child! (Why do they have a height requirement and not age? I am assuming because you can quickly assess height.) She wanted to ride in the cart, no she wanted to walk, no she wanted to hold the cart, no she wanted to PUSH the cart (into a display or two). She found some toys to play with and then suddenly became deaf when I said it was time to go. And when I crouch down and get her to look at me so she understands what I’m saying she pulls against my arm and does that crazy lunatic laugh that tells me it’s going to be a very long day.

We got all the way through the store without too much issue (other than the above), got what I needed, put it all in the truck and went to get food. And what’s when I noticed that Ember was missing a shoe. Brand new shoes, of course.

Ordered the chicken strips and fries for Kate and I. I should not have ordered her the kids meal – she ate all her fries and only half the chicken.

I think right now I’m parenting “good enough” – as in, “Kate ate some of the chicken, that’s good enough,” or, “Mom distracted Ember with the TV so I could clean out my bedroom, that’s good enough.”

On the good side of things Ember is at least sleeping better! The first week my mom was here Ember was not sleeping at all – waking ever hour all night, sleeping fitfully, crying and fighting me. I took her to the doctor and sure enough she had a ear infection. She just finished the antibiotics and the change was within days of starting it. It’s amazing how you can end up down that rabbit hole and not realize how far out of whack things are until they are back to normal!