Lucy - October 2018

Looking back at these photos of Lucy from October, it registered that these were some of the last photos of her taken at our old house! It's so nice to look back and see her outside on the patio, which she loved.

And sitting on the trail (we got in as many walks as we could before moving!)

 

On one of our neighborhood walks, she discovered the geese, who were coming back to the pond as it got colder. You can just make them out in the photo above, but trust me - Lucy definitely saw them!

Of course all of that walking and playing makes for a tired puppy.

But then it's time to run around like a lunatic some more, in a fun new game that Henry made up. This had all of us cracking up so much. She really did not like him hiding next to the crate!

Lucy - September 2018

As I trained for my half marathon, Lucy went on lots of walks with me in September! I go a bit slower when she's with me (cause you know, we have to sniff EVERYTHING, MOM!). But still, she's a lot of fun to walk with.

Plus, it tires her out! She does love cuddling up in soft spots, particularly when the kids are there.

Or, her favorite position on the floor (and we won't say any more about that! Keep it clean!).

Lucy started doing a couple of new things in September, as the school year began. First, she likes to sometimes lie outside of my office, on the landing, and occasionally sits there looking all cute. I swear we don't put her behind bars!

The other new thing Lucy started doing is learning what happens around 2:50pm every day...it's when the kids get off the bus! Around 2:30, she typically wakes up (because, you know, afternoon nap time), and starts pacing near the front of the house. When she sees the bus come down the street (the bus passes in front of our house on its way to the bus stop), she gets all excited and watches out the window for the kids. It's too cute!

And of course, some playtime videos! One of the new things Lucy got to do in September was meet our friend (and realtor) Gwen's new puppy, a beautiful Great Dane who was littler than her at the time, but isn't any longer!

And, we discovered that Lucy learned how to catch, all on her own! Look at that use of feet. It makes me think of when my dad taught us to use both hands with the glove to catch a softball.

Lucy - August 2018

August was a long, hot month, full of the usual for Lucy! She continued to love her toys from her Super Chewer Bark Box (I think this was month #2)...Lucy takes them as a personal challenge. "Oh, you say I can't destroy this toy? Challenge accepted!"

She still loved laying on the bed in my office while I'm working...I think not only to sleep (although she does that quite well), but also to give me passive aggressive looks of "Fine, Mom, keep working and don't play with me. I'll just lay here..."

Lucy is not always the cuddliest of dogs (she doesn't lay in any one place for very long!), but I had one evening where she was very cuddly! Turns out after swimming for a while (a post on that shortly) she's tired out enough to want to cuddle. I loved every second of it.

But then, next day, right back to the playful puppy we know and love!

She and Henry play so well together...ring tugs like this are a favorite. We no longer have this one (she managed to chew through the rubber!), but the one we replaced it with is a keeper.

 Although she gets warm easily, Lucy loves to lie out on our back patio and bask in the sun.

She did discover one thing in August: our bed. Evan and I continue, even now, to have an ongoing...discussion about her being allowed up there. Our rough compromise is that she can lay up there during the day, when we are in the room, on top of the covers. I'll have to settle for that.
On this day, I was spending some time doing my nails in my room, and she certainly enjoyed a nice nap up there while I was busy! I enjoyed the company.

 And why shouldn't the whole family then take over our bed? :D

Lucy has learned to respect the closed bedroom door, although she doesn't like being separated from me. This is basically what she does.

You'll note I tagged this post with "sleep" - she's an active girl, but she does love curling up and having a nice nap. On our bed, on the couch, in Evan's chair...she's darn cute no matter what.

Sleep FAIL again

I posted two weeks ago that we had a really bad night's sleep because Natalie woke up crying repeatedly all night. As we've had good sleep since then, I think we could mostly attribute it to her schedule getting really off from traveling.

However, last night was bad too, and I can't find anything to link it too. The only possibility is that I went out to run an errand and then went to Zumba, so I wasn't home for the last hour before she went to bed, which is not her/our usual schedule. But Evan said she was very good for him, and I did go in and kiss her goodnight when I got home (which she always loves). Everything was fine, til she woke up screaming at about 10pm. Now, before Henry was born, we would've just let her cry for a LOT longer. But I'm scared her VERY loud crying will wake him, so we're going in a bit more quickly now. I probably shouldn't worry; that kid can sleep through anything, but I'd rather deal with Natalie, who I can reason with (at least in theory) than with a 2 month old who got woken unnecessarily.

So, in theory, I can reason with Natalie. But she wouldn't calm down for me, and I got really frustrated: I'm giving her what she wants (i.e. ME, as she was crying "I want mommy!" over and over), and yet she still won't stop screaming in my ear. I told her I would leave if she didn't stop crying; she didn't, so I kissed her, told her I loved her, and left. Evan ended up going in, and got her to calm down after picking her up and walking with her a bit (in a throwback to what we would do a year ago at night!).

Then, not even an hour later, we'd both just about gotten to sleep when she woke up and started again. We both ended up going in, and she did eventually calm down. It's now almost midnight, and I know Henry will want to eat sometime between 1-2am, and then I'm up at 5:15. Ugh. At some point within the next 30 minutes, she did let out a couple of quick cries, but that was it. As I expected, Henry woke up just before 2am, ate pretty quickly, and was back to sleep. So, I got about 5 hours all told (maybe slightly more), and none of it in a long enough stretch.

Here's hoping tonight goes better.

where'd my sleep go?

I failed to mention in my previous post that we had kind of a rough ride home. Natalie was pretty good in the morning, and when we stopped to get lunch. She took a short nap in the car, and after that, the last 3 hours were pretty bad. She alternated between watching a few minutes of her new favorite movie (Cinderella, on the portable DVD player), and then whining for everything under the sun. We were also hitting every single light on Rte 15, so between the constant stopping and starting and the whining, I was both nauseous and had a headache. NOT a good time. I don't think I've really yelled at Natalie before; I still don't think I did, but I came darn close. Its just hard for me to be ok with that behavior from a 2 year old who should know better, when her 7 week old brother (who would be within his rights to cry a lot more!) is sitting sweetly in his car seat.

Natalie got better once we got home, and both kids were good about letting us get unpacked. We were all really hot, so we decided to head over to the pool for a bit, as it just opened this past weekend. That was a lot of fun: Henry slept in his car seat next to the pool while we hung out. Natalie was really good; listened to us both, and left after about 45 minutes without fussing at all. We got home, took a shower to clean up, and had some pizza while watching her bedtime TV (which she hadn't gotten to do in over a week). Natalie even went to bed with no real fussing! Henry was in his bed asleep by a little after 9pm, so we thought we'd lucked out for the evening.

No such luck. Natalie woke up around 11:15 and alternately whined & cried for about an hour. Evan and I each went in twice, were very firm with her, and she still kept it up. After I went in the last time, we didn't hear from her, so I thought we were good. Again, no. She was back up briefly at 1:15am. She asked for water (as she had every other time), and I got her a little, which she drained, so maybe she was just really thirsty?? But when we had given her water before, she was just asking for it to get us to stay in the room, so we didn't believe she really wanted it. Luckily she didn't make any noise after that 1am time until after 7am. However, Henry woke up for his feeding at about 3:45am, so neither of us got a stretch of sleep longer than about 2.5 hours. Ugh.

I'm hopeful this was just a fluke, and we had a one-time bad night. We'll see how tonight goes.