obsession

if you're getting as little as i am it's no wonder an obsession develops. i'm talking about sleep of course!

little percy has gone backwards in the sleep stakes over the past week, consequently so have i. she was sleeping 4 hours, occasionaly 4 and a half to five. yes, i know, nothing like the 'thru-the-nite-12 hours-at-a-go' babes i have heard about. never mind. i was doing 4 hours alright.
she's regressed to 3 hours and even 2 a couple of times. this is unsustainable. what is causing it? well, if i knew that i might have a chance to fix it! i'm going with the old stand by of growth spurt. there's nothing i can do about that.
she's napped well today so hopefully that means a better nite sleeping. there does seem to be a correlation between decent day time naps to better nite sleeping.

on the topic of daytime naps. we've had a first today. a small and significant one. i wonder if it will continue..?
to put this in context percy has two very definate cues for going to sleep- being wrapped/swaddled and using a dummy/pacifier. at seven months it's probably not wise to wrap her any longer but we don't have much option- if she is not wrapped she knocks or takes the dummy out of her mouth and this will result in her crying for one of us to put it back in. she hasn't learnt to put it back consistently for herself. she'll manage one go in ten. so even if she is deeply asleep and the dummy comes out when she reaches a lighter sleep stage she realises its not there, wakes up properly and starts crying. that's my explaination anyways.
the first... i put her down for a nap at 3:50pm; wrapped and dummied. she is adept at wriggling out of wraps (adding to our problem) and was out of this one in no time. i rewrapped her and put her back in her cot once. after half an hour i could see this was going nowhere. i took her out of the cot, took the wrap off- it was only draped across her tummy by this time, took the dummy out the cot where she'd spat/knocked it, put her in a sleeping bag, tucked her back into the cot tightly, told her gently to go to sleep and left the room. i stood watching at the doorway (door open just an inch) while she wriggled, swung raffles her sleep comforter around her head striptease style and pulled her blankets off for 20 minutes. she then started to ease off; raffles was no longer in danger of decapitation. ten minutes later she was asleep- no wrap and no dummy!!! yeeha! so in total 50-55 minutes of settling which is quite some time. i take heart that she didn't actually work herself into a lather and scream or yell at any time and that maybe in the coming days the time taken will be less and less.

this new development is important as we've resolved to take the dummy away for good this weekend. we've warned the neighbours, we've got frozen meals in the freezer, we've told everyone we're booked this weekend and no-one is to visit. in other words; we're bunkered in and ready to fight!

(piccie taken a few days ago of percy being adorably asleep.)