Trying to make it through the day!!!

With Emery's 2nd birthday getting closer, it is very obvious we are at that "terrible two's" stage! Lately he is just completely over-the-top aggressive, disobedient, and screamy. Honestly some days I just wonder how I'm going to make it through! I know it's just a part of toddler-hood but it is really hard to keep my patience with him. The weather has been hot, hot, rainy, rainy, hot. We usually end up outside anyways, but I usually just can't stand it for too long. One day I took Emery to Monkey Joe's. They have the inflatable boucing/sliding toys. Emery loves to jump and run and I was hoping he could go crazy and give me a little time to just sit and relax. But I forgot to mention Emery is also in the stage of needing me by his side almost every waking moment. He draged me with him the whole time and by the time we left I was more exhausted than when we got there. Total Bust!

Oh, and then about 35% of the time he wanted to play on this broken-usually-requiring-a-quarter-to-ride toy. Ug.
One of Emery's obsessions is water. But especially the kitchen sink. He loves to spray the water, scrub in the sink and play. Sounds innocent enough right? Well except he pulls the dirty dishes and silverware out of the other side and puts them in his mouth- Ewe! And sprays the water all over the kitchen. And sticks his foot in the disposal-more ewe, and possibly dangerous! Not to mention that if he all the sudden decided he was done, he'll try to jump off the counter- not safe!
Oh yeah. And then there is our current sleeping situation. Ever since we came home from our load of vacations in June/July he's been out of the crib. We bought him a twin mattress at Ikea and put it in the corner on the floot. But we couldn't get him to stay in there to fall asleep without one of us laying next to him. Sigh... He used to be so good at going to sleep, when he was in his crib. Starting all over sucks!

But then it started getting to the point that even with me in there, he'd try to get up, roll around, scream, etc and basically not try very hard to go to sleep. Plus, he's been getting up in the night (probably because he wakes up and can't get back to sleep with us not there). Last week I decided I couldn't handle it anymore and decided I needed to start getting him used to falling asleep alone. I knew it would be horrible, but I was hoping it would be better in the long run, for both of us.

Night one: he came out of his room 100 times in about 30 minutes (all while screaming and crying) before finally falling asleep. It seemed a lot longer than 30 minutes but I was pretty impressed it worked so fast. Especially considering the few nights before with me in there with him it took over an hour for him to fall asleep! The next day I was not looking forward to doing it for naps too, but lucked out and he fell asleep in the car on the way home from the store. He must have been really pooped because he even stayed asleep as I moved him from the car to his bed. I was bummed when he woke up after only an hour (that's how long he usually sleeps, but I was hoping that his extra late night would make him sleep longer). He was cranky though and clearly still tired. I tured on Winnie-the-Pooh and put him on the couch. I checked back on him 10 minutes later and he'd fallen asleep! Joy! And then the miracle/blessing that I've never had before....he slept for 2 hours on the couch! I was in heaven! So I took some pictures...

He started upright like this

After a yawn (and almost waking up I thought) he fell back asleep before putting his hands back down.

This was right before he woke up, slouched all the way down.

The next night it took more like 40 mintutes but he only came out 50 times in that time. The next few nights averaged about 10-15 minutes. And after about 5-7 minutes he'd stop the crying and just try and sneak out. He hasn't been waking up in the night, which is fabulous! But naps are still hit and miss. Some days he'll fall asleep in the car or while watching Pooh, but then sometimes he does wake up when I move him from the car. And then yesterday he just was so tired, but would not nap at all. Well he did finally about 2 hours after his usual nap time, but I really thought it wasn't going to happen! Last night was a set back though with it taking 40 minutes again. Sigh. I'm just hoping it will get better. Well actually it will probably get worse before better since we are moving on Tuesday Sept. 16th! And the movers will have our stuff moved in at the lastest on Friday! What?! I'm like what are we supposed to do for 2-3 days? But that's another post I suppose.

Here is Em and me out in the rain. It honestly doesn't matter to this kid if it is 95 degrees outside or a tropical storm; he has to be outside!

ps- Sorry for the venting but I think I feel a litte better now :)