I’m guest posting today at Sleepless Nights. You can check it out here: Exhaustion and the Art of Lazy Parenting.

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I’ve been holding on to the afternoon nap for dear life. Those few hours during the day where I could get things done, or do nothing, or just listen to the beautiful sound of silence. I persisted despite knowing, deep down that it was over.
And then I realised between it taking half an hour to an hour to get her to take the nap and the extra hour it was taking me to get her to bed at night, it wasn’t exactly giving me any extra time. And that …

So far, it’s only happened once. Once was enough. But it could well be an ongoing thing. At the time I had no idea what was going on. It was 3am. Ordinarily when Riley wakes up in the night she just trundles her way into our room, has a little help to get into our bed, snuggles up next to me, insists that I tuck her in nicely under the ‘noo-noo’ (doona) and nestles her way back to sleep. But on this night I could hear her crying and she …

A few months back, the munchkin started wanting company to go to sleep.
If I put her in bed and closed the door she’d just get up again and bang on the door.
Not anymore.
I’ve discovered the secret.
If I leave the door open, she doesn’t get out of bed.
She just chats to herself and then goes to sleep.
I’ve now blogged about it.
I anticipate that the whole situation will unravel rather quickly.

I am extremely soft-hearted when it comes to Riley. I don’t think twice about her sharing our bed when she wants to, lying down with her if she needs company to go to sleep, reading her a story when I’m trying to get work done or cuddling her through a tantrum. It’s not always convenient, somtimes it’s even boring (I challenge you to sit in a dark room for over an hour and not get at least a little bored) and it can be tiring. But I wouldn’t have it …

When Riley was about 14 months old she started reliably sleeping through the night and no needing my presence to get to sleep. Up until that point she was up three or more times a night and at nap time I would need to rock or stroke her to sleep.
Perhaps it was because I was no longer breastfeeding her, so there was less interest in night-time snacking, or perhaps it was that she had always hated the cot and I’d moved her to her toddler bed. Either way, I didn’t …

I now totally get why parents always go on about their kids getting up really early on Christmas morning. It’s not the fact that you’re up before dawn, it’s that you were up past midnight with Christmas preparations. We were up until 12:30am on Christmas Eve (technically Christmas morning) and managed to whisper ‘Merry Christmas’ to one another before falling into a dreamless slumber. That is until 4:20am. When Riley woke up and couldn’t be coaxed back to sleep. 4:20am. It’s not right, people.
Our preparations looked something like this.
The Christmas …

Fair Warning – this is going to be one of those super mooshy posts where I wax lyrical about how much I love my baby. If it’s not your kind of thing you may want to skip over it or get a bucket. But don’t say that I didn’t warn you.

I’ve had a rough week. And I suppose I haven’t been my usual Christmas-enthusiast (rabid fanatical) self. I’d hoped to be pleasantly pregnant during the festive season, but my miscarriage threw me a bit of a curve ball. Physically, I’m …

As a new mother you hear all sorts of things about sleep. There’s something perverse about the one thing that you crave above all else is the one thing your baby seems incapable of doing. And it’s the number 1 question (are they sleeping through the night) you are asked by other parents and non-parents alike, as though it’s some kind of barometer of your skill as a parent.
And it’s easy to become polarised between cry-it-out and non-cry options. If you have a troubled sleeper, you will be tested on …