Am I doing this right?.......

I guess that we all wonder, "Am I doing this right?" when we are in the process of raising our first child. I wonder that ALL the time, even though I research and study up and of course receive a ton of "want it or not" advice from others.

The challenge is that whenever you find a good medical study or research paper or Q&A site that they always say at the bottom, "But remember, every child develops differently and these methods may not work for your child."
That is NOT what I want to hear, I want to hear, "this will work for you and maybe even be the magic to solving all of your sleepless nights and napless days- our guarantee!"

BUT, the silver lining is that ONE piece of advice works with EVERY baby, "It gets a little better everyday." I may not have found a magic trick for putting my baby to bed or for getting her to eat her carrots instead of spitting them out, BUT everyday is a little better because I learn more about baby and about myself, oh- and I guess that the fact that baby matures more and more helps as well.

To each her own in raising her own baby, but as a community we can all kling to the hope that tomorrow can be better than today- especially if today baby screamed all afternoon :)

GOTTA keep moving!

OK, so my husband has been home sick all weekend and stayed home Monday and Tuesday from work. That basically meant that he had commandeered our computer and that I was unable to complete my video project. I have also been struggling to get up the courage, or "the will" you could say, to work out again. Sometimes I will have a great workout and afterwards find myself thinking- "OK, I did really well, so that should last me the next 2 months a least, right?". WRONG. LOL!

At least ONE thing has been going well. Baby is finally getting her bedtime routine together. Bath time at 8:30pm, bedtime at 9pm- AND she is actually doing it! Sometimes it takes a little longer for her to go to sleep and actually STAY asleep, but a lot of the crying is over. The only thing now is that she sleeps for about an hour and then wakes up again. She'll go back to sleep if I fed her, I just have to be careful that I don't fall asleep with her, otherwise she ends up sleeping with me all night! OK, so I'll admit it, there seem to be a few loose ends yet to be worked out- but we're getting there. :)

One great thing I have been accomplishing more and more, little by little lately is the practice of my harp. I am not an accomplished player, but I want to be better and I can play simple things and beginning piano pieces on my harp. I want to brush up on my guitar though, too, so that Baby and I can sing song together one day- Baby plus siblings yet to come :)

At the same time I have to remember to PRIORITIZE and make sure that GERMAN study is number one (after Baby, of course)...even though I would much rather do other things. At times, I feel like a person with split personalities. One side is the little girl that would rather play all day and pretend that German didn't exist (because, you know of course that if you ignore a problem that it goes away...NOT...if only it were THAT easy), and the other part is a concerned mother that goads and scolds the child into doing what is in it's best interest (I hate that responsible side sometimes- LOL!). So, alas- I must bend to responsibility and press on as the ever motivated, or RE-motivated mother. I can't lose my DRIVE. :)