Sundresses in January
Yesterday was Bug’s second day of preschool. She only goes on Mondays. Over the past week we talked about how much she did not like preschool and I pretty much gathered that she actually really liked preschool. She just didn’t like going there without me. All week she sang little songs and talked about how we should do exercises “like this” and then she would wave her hands around in the air. I figured it can’t be that bad if they are teaching her fun songs and exercises. It’s not like she’s stuck in a corner, ignored.
So when Monday rolled around again we decided to give it another shot. Bug even seemed excited about going. She was definitely excited about going back to the playground. She wanted me to take her to the playground only and skip the “inside preschool” but I explained preschool doesn’t work like that. She seemed okay with it. She only screams and pitches a fit when she thinks I’m on the fence. If she can tell I’ve made up my mind about something she usually just sucks up her quivering bottom lip and makes the best of it.
And that was that. She was fine all the way up until the very last moment when I handed her over to her teacher. Her teacher told me she likes to be held and part of me wondered if it was Bug wanting to be held or if it was the teacher liking to hold Bug. Either way, I’m fine with it.
Bug willingly went to the teacher but I could see her big eyes welling up with tears and her bottom lip quivering. She didn’t cry. She just gave me that look that makes me want to give up everything and hold her like a baby for the rest of her life. Except she gives me that same look when I won’t let her eat cookies for breakfast, so I’m not completely disarmed by it. It was still hard though.
When I went to pick her up, I left super early so I could spy on the class and maybe get a chance to talk to the teacher about her. But of course I got a phone call before I got there and I ended up stuck outside the building until pick-up time. When I finally I got inside, it was a crazy mess of parents and backpacks shuffling through so I didn’t get a chance to talk to the teacher at all.
Thankfully a friend of mine also has her little boy in the class and she asked the teacher about Bug. Apparently Bug only cried a little bit but she did want to be held and ended up taking a little nap on the teacher’s shoulder.
I’m really confused by this. We do wake up at the crack of dawn (5:45am is not unusual) and I do know that Bug gets tired around ten or eleven. But we usually have no trouble pushing through until lunch and then taking a nap at one or two. In fact, I can’t get Bug to take a nap at eleven if I want to. If we take a drive anywhere at that time she’s out like a light but at home she’s squirrelly and won’t lie down and be quiet at all.
The only way I can guarantee that Bug will sleep is if I deprive her of anything interesting. She has to be completely bored before she will drop off. A darkened room with no access to her toys is the best way to get her to sleep. So why does she feel like sleeping when she is at school? I would think with all those other kids around, sleeping would be the last thing she’d want to do.
I can see her pretending to sleep. She does that all the time. She loves making up her perfect bed with her perfect pillow and snuggling down with a teddy bear and telling us all to be quiet because she’s “sleeping.” But actually sleeping?!! That’s for the birds. Why would she sleep on the teacher’s shoulder? I’m totally baffled. If she did sleep, I suspect it wouldn’t be for very long. They are doing activities and there are other kids being loud. It’s not like she could pass out for hours is it?
So tell me this: when we got home and it WAS nap time, why then would she NOT sleep at all? Isn’t she supposed to be tired and worn out from all the fun she is having at school? No dice. I was so frustrated yesterday. We lay down together for an hour and she wasn’t having any of it. She was bouncing around like a hyper kid doing everything but falling asleep. She’d rather contort her body in fifty directions than actually settle down and rest. Finally I just gave up.
Could it be that she’s giving up naps altogether? We were just in the sticks this last weekend and I didn’t make her take a nap there because her cousins were at my mom’s house and that’s just cruel to make her take a nap while she can hear them laughing and having fun down the hall. Of course she was a crankmeister by the time five o’ clock rolled around but them’s the breaks of skipping naptime. We hardly ever skip naptime at home but we always do when we are out visiting friends and relatives.
I guess I’ll know the answer today when naptime rolls around again and there aren’t any preschool snoozes to mess with our schedule.
Since naptime was in the can I decided to let Bug have her day. It’s not like I can complain about not getting my “me” time since I spent three and a half hours at Starbucks that morning getting some freelance work done. I might have been slightly annoyed because I had more things I wanted to do without the help of a toddler, but I am a mom after all. I did sign up for this job willingly. So we decided to go to the beach!
The weather has been beautiful. Freakishly beautiful. The Santa Ana winds have kicked up and the air has been dry as a bone. It’s been so hot I had to break out my summer sundresses again. Part of me really wants it to be winter for a change but I guess I can’t complain. Tough life when you have to go down to the beach and run around in the icy water because your apartment is too hot IN JANUARY.
While we were there I was sort of mumbling disgustedly to myself about how much I hate this freaky summer weather (and the fact that I seem to have some kind of sinus problem) but then I saw a couple out in the waves that reminded me of something.
You can barely see them in this picture:
The girl was obviously pregnant. Her partner was taking pictures of her belly and the ocean behind her. It was very sweet. You could tell they were so in love with each other and their soon-to-be-born child. And it got me thinking…the tide was way out, the weather was freakishly hot, it was the middle of winter and I was sweating…haven’t I been here before?
I have! This photo was taken on December 7th, 2005 just weeks before Bug’s birthday. So here we are now in January, 2009 just days before Bug’s third birthday…maybe this weather isn’t so freaky after all. Maybe I’m just not very good at remembering it.
27 Comments
Kristen
For a second there, I thought you were pregnant…
Aunt B
It’s 6 degrees here in Iowa. I KNOW, I live in the wrong park of the country. I’m really enjoying your beach photos, wishful thinking.
Glenda
Ohhh such a beautiful picture!! I am a softy when it comes to pregnant bellies!
Hoooray to you and Bug for surviving and enjoying another day at preschool!
little miss mel
Sometimes kids and/or babies will sleep to avoid too much stimulation. She may have just been overwhelmed with all of the “fun” and needed an escape.
OR
she was just so busy playing she did, in fact, get tired.
And, of course no matter how long her earlier “nap” was, he can, in fact, kill any following sleep.
When my son turned 3 last spring, he did start to give up naps. They were definitely few and far between. I still had him stay in his room for some “down time” so the both of us could have a break.
Sounds like she’ll hit her stride soon enough!
keli
Well, this was a lesson in read everything before you look at the pictures. ;)
I am utterly jealous. Of everything. It’s not even that cold here, but it’s too cold for me. And I miss being pregnant. So being pregnant on a warm beach would be just about the best thing ever.
I think I’ll go make some hot chocolate and listen to the ocean sounds on DD’s sound machine.
Beth
thank you so much for sharing your winter/summer with me/us! Bug is so cute and looks so happy at the beach. Enjoy the warmth
yesterday, my hubs calls, and asked about the impending BLIZZARD headed our way!.Wisconsin gets alot of snow, but the Alberta Clippers that come through are incredablly alarming! Major drops in temperatures, adding wind chills, ends up below 0 to – 30’s sometimes! Check list includes: checking the gas in the car,enough food,outisde water faucets are off, to making sure the pipes inside the house don’t freeze! Alot to prepare for! blah blah blah
Ok
i am sitting inside my house trying to think about all the stuff i can accomplish, and not go “thesefourwallsRdrivingmecrazybonkers”. Your creativity has inspired me totally…i wanna go crafting the day away! Your birthday favors are way cool, you do great mom things! Bug will have wonderful memories of her childhood, bless you all.
i also thought maybe…..you would be sharing some news with us…wink-wink, cute prego pic.
cat
Sometimes when I get emotional or feel overwhelmed, I can feel exhausted. Maybe Bug is just napping at preschool because it is still a lot to take in emotionally. Should get easier as she goes on.
Then of course she goes home and doesn’t want to nap because she wants to enjoy all the things that are just as they should be in her little world.
Jenni
When children get over stimulated in their environment it is very common for them to fall asleep. The new environment in preschool has a lot of things for her to take in in all areas of the sense: new noises (often louder than children are used to like other children and music); new visuals (pictures on the wall, lots of children to watch); even new smells. It’s almost a sensory overload and a short nap is a way to “check out” and “reboot” their system.
It sounds like she is adjusting well…and sounds like it’s not quite time to drop the nap. Most children fight that nap, but once their out…
jana
I’m so glad you posted about round 2 – I have been eagerly wondering how pre-school will play out. Your bug is just such a doll – truly – she’s absolutely beautiful.
So anyway, I was going to comment about how I’ve heard that children sometimes go to sleep as a coping mechanism – think about when you’re really overwhelmed by all you have to do, and even though you’re not tired, all you want to do is go to sleep… but I see that a few people have already commented along the same lines.
good luck! I’m sure it will all work out… and I’m not sure if you like country music, but the pre-school stories remind me of Darius Rucker’s new song, “It won’t be like this for long.”
bethany actually
I can totally believe that Bug would either feign sleep or actually go to sleep just to get a little break from the roomful of people-who-are-not-Mommy. Maybe if you just change your mindset to knowing you won’t get a nap out of her on Mondays, you’ll be okay?
I have the same feelings of “Wow this weather is gorgeous/but it’s supposed to be winter/but I can’t complain when I could be living in blizzard country/but it’s too hot!”
Sometimes living in SoCal is very weird.
Kathy K.
I second or third the notion of Bug sleeping to be able to cope with the situation. My son used to sleep to avoid speech therapy until he was caught raising his head and peeking at her after she walked away-with a sly smile. then when she got home she was just so happy to be back with Mommy that she didn’t want to sacrifice a moment to sleep.
Sitting here in Missouri in a frigid coldsnap (windchill hovering around zero) it was so nice to see Bug in a sundress and barefoot at the beach. and your Bug-Belly picture was just so very sweet.
Sonja
Tell me about it! I had to shave my legs today. (Sorry if that was TMI.)
SleepyNita
I go with what Cat is saying. I am sure Bug is emotionally exhausted going to school and really just gets all snuggly with the teacher and falls asleep. It is sweet; and should get better soon!
I thought you may be pregnant again too – looking at the photo (and holding out on us for 8.5 months….).
Carrie
Nah, it’s not your memory. It’s Global Climate Change. :)
Love that pregnant photo of you! How lovely to live so close to the ocean. (Up here it’s so much colder!)
Sharri
Wow. It’s great that Bug did so well after only one time going to preschool. That’s awesome! And I did notice that my son would get super tired after going to school – I think even just the mental energy of dealing with it all made him tired. So it’s not unexpected that she napped at preschool and then got her second wind with you.
I wish I lived where it was HOT in January. It’s going to be a high of 15 tomorrow. Brrrrr.
Jennifer
Don’t get me started on this weather, GRRRRRR. Not liking it, but it does make for some cute belly shots :)
I completely forgot about the no nap after preschool mess. When Emily started preschool I thought she would be exhausted after a morning of crying for me and being busy with schoolmates. Far from it! She didn’t nap much after starting preschool.
It sounds like Bug is doing great. She’ll be running that class soon :)
BeachMama
Thank you so much for sharing your warm summer/winter. I am sitting here listening to the wind bring in the freakishly freezing weather from the West. It was actually a warm (by winter standards) day today and we are dropping 30 degrees right now, 30. And isn’t counting the wind chill. It is going to be a rough couple of days, send sunshine and warmth whenever you can!
(love that photo of you at the beach)
Kuky
I don’t know about the sleeping. I find with Isabelle it has to be the perfect window to get her to sleep. If she’s not tired then she’s bouncing all over the place. If she’s too tired she has a harder time falling asleep.
And the weather has been crazy. Alan and I were talking about bringing Isabelle up to see snow. With this warm weather, we’ve been joking that maybe we missed our chance this year. ;-D
Saple
J E A L O U S
I am sitting here in Detroit with a high of 3 degrees tomorrow.. and a foot of snow…
I say it again
J E A L O U S
Sonja von Franck
I’m as mystified as you, but I love all the great comments from Moms who have been through this before and hope to hear that Bug adjusts soon! It would break my heart to think that my baby was shutting down to cope with a situation, but I guess that’s life and sleeping’s got to be better than a lot of other things. Hang in there! As usual, love the pics and thorough story telling!
lynne
– 3c in my bathroom with no heating so I’m lapping up your photos of Bug barefoot on the beach. I hope the pre school situation gets better soon, it’s only been 2 days. I remember the photo of you pregnant standing by the sea that was around the time I came across your blog.
mamalang
I know it doesn’t seem like it to you, but that sounds like a great 2nd time. And it will get better. She may not have napped because she sensed how much you wanted her to do so…I’ve found that when I’m sort of stressed about them not sleeping, it’s harder to get them settled. Just a thought.
Yay for Bug and Brenda getting through the 2nd day!
You were a totally cute preggo!
Haitian-American Famiy of Three
My 2 year old has more or less stopped napping but we still have a hour of quiet time every day, aka, mama sanity time. She’ll play or read quietly in her room and sometimes even (!) fall asleep. The beach photos are amazing. Lucky you to have such a yard!!
Gretchen
Our high today in MN was -5 F.
So longing for the beach…
Ash
I am so jealous of your weather!! Today I forgot my gloves at home so i couldn’t feel my hands at all by the time I was done scraping my car after work! Brrr…
About Bug’s teacher saying that she likes to be held, I wouldn’t be too fine with it if I were you. Apparently when I was Bug’s age, a teacher told my mom that I liked to be held and that she didn’t mind holding me. It had been going on quite a bit longer than the ‘transitioning to preschool’ phase by the time my mom caught it happening and put a stop to it. These are the years where kids learn how to interact with other kids and make friends and all those sorts of things. (I’m not saying the teacher holding Bug is a bad thing, especially since she’s transitioning to a new environment and routine, just try and make sure that it’s not too much of the time while she’s there)
Musings of a Housewife
What I wouldn’t do to wear a sundress in January! It’s like friggin’ 0 degrees here today. :-)
Anyway, those photos are gorgeous.
Mrs. Wilson
You make a beautiful pregnant lady!