The thing with baby girls

My firstborn was a busy boy. He was active, not a good sleeper, a climber, and I remember using words like maniac to describe him occasionally.

But he had a long attention span. And he still does. He’s quite good at amusing himself with cars or lego or some other toy, or even a dvd or video. It’s nice when he asks me to play with him, and it’s pleasant to play with him.

He’s definitely my easier kid.

My second born is a nut. Really. I don’t remember the first one being as messy as her, or as active. I mean, he crawled at 8 months and walked at 12. This one…she woke up one morning and stood up at 7 months. Then she crawled all over the house. At 8.5 months she is perfectly capable of climbing up the stairs without any practice or assistance. Just did it one day. At the cottage. Where there were lots of stairs. We live in a bungalow with baby gates blocking the basement stairs so how she learned to go up 11 steps at the cottage is beyond me. But she’s did it.

I also don’t remember the boy being as dirty. I mean, you think boys like dirt or don’t care if they get dirty. Well, our girl is not afraid of dirt at all! It’s 10:30 am and I’ve had to change her 3 times already…she:

-got ahold of the blueberry bowl I meant to serve her for breakfast and spread it all over herself
-managed to reach the newspapers when I was in the other room and rip them to shreds, which coloured all her exposed skin black from the ink
-pulled herself up to the dog’s water bowl and splashed gunky water all over her outfit

She’s also a very picky eater. I don’t understand how this happens. I do very little different from how I fed the first one. She is surviving on yoghurt and fruit. If Benjamin didn’t like something in infancy he would swallow it regardless and then turn his face. Sonja however spits it out into a radius covering everyone within her vicinity with spitup, makes choking and gagging noises, and twists her body into such a contortion to illustrate her point, it’s hard not to laugh. Although frankly, I’m too tired and worn out to laugh at such antics all the time.

She is also a terrible sleeper. But looking back, I see that she’s a worse sleeper than Ben was. Benjamin wanted to be with me when he was upset (mostly because of teething). Because the co-sleeping thing was new to me, and I didn’t know many people who supported this concept, I spent too many nights sitting up with him near his crib, trying to get him to sleep. All he wanted to do however was be with me, in my arms. Well, some days I finally took him to bed with me, and he happily slept beside me. Holding my hand…I still remember that feeling, and I miss it in some ways.

He’s now 3 and has no trouble whatsoever sleeping in his room and his bed. He rarely gets up at night, and if he does and comes for a snuggle, he has no trouble going back to his bed and fall asleep on his own. I spent the better part of his toddlerhood with him in bed, and now he’s the perfect sleeper.

The baby? Bah.

I spend more time AWAKE in my bed with her in it than ever before. She. does. not. sleep. Sure, she wants to be with me, but once she is, she twists and turns and arches her back and thows herself around the pillows, I wonder if she’ll ever fall asleep. I finally compromised and put the crib in our bedroom. DH, with pillow tucked under his arm, left us long ago, and I try, I really do, to keep her in her crib. And she does sleep in it. Without too much trouble.

However, she wakes often, and absolutely insists on coming to bed with me. And I’m too tired and worn out (her fault for being so busy and demanding during the day) to resist much. It’s futile anyway because any attempt I’ve made to ferberize her has failed miserably.

DH talked about how busy our daughter is with other fathers and grandfathers at his work. The general consensus there is that for the most part, girls are the more volatile to raise.

She’s almost 9 months old, and days from walking….I guess babyhood is practically done. I’m going to have a toddler in the house shortly.

Thank god for coffee.