Back to the Real World

That blissful period of reprieve from work know as "maternity leave" is coming to a close. I'm back on the schedule at work with a full 80 hour pay period ahead of me. Monday is my first day back. My managers and coworkers seem excited to have me back, but I'm torn. It'll be nice to get out of the house and to make money again, but I'm going to miss Anni like crazy. The garden departments are going through the transition from summer to the holidays. Halloween decorations are up and Christmas will be following suit shortly. From what I understand, I will be spending a large chunk of my winter outside, selling Christmas trees, packaged firewood, and ice melt. Kelly has a big down-filled coat I plan on wearing. I'm going to look like a red and black Michellin Man.

Annika is sleeping better. At night, she usually sleeps for 5 or 6 hours at a time. The problem is getting her to go to sleep initially. The past few nights we've both been so tired we don't have the patience to fight with her, so we just put her in the car and take a drive for a half hour. She'll fall asleep and stay asleep. Last night, I was bound and determined to have her go to sleep on her own. That went over rather poorly. We fed her and did her nightly bedtime bath, and she fell right asleep. That lasted for about 15 minutes before she woke up screaming. At about 1:30 in the morning she finally went to sleep and stayed asleep. I think I just let her sleep too much during the day yesterday. She falls asleep quickly and sleeps pretty well when she's on the bed with us in the evening or with us in the living room, but as soon as we put her down in her room, in her bed, she wakes right up and won't go back to sleep.