The Best of Times, The Worst of Times

I absolutely love the age/stage that Kylee is in right now. She’s so much fun!!! She’s learning new things every day and is becoming her own spunky little person. It’s so amazing watching her learn and grow. Everyday I am amazed at how funny and smart she is. She already has an awesome personality with a great sense of humor, and she is definitely smart beyond her genes. Everyday she makes me smile. Everyday she makes me laugh. Everyday I love her more even though it doesn’t seem possible. She can be ornery as all get out, but I love it. She’s adorable, and she knows it. She is such a friendly, social butterfly, and I hope she stays that way. She has the biggest smile I’ve ever seen and the best laugh ever. She gives the best hugs on the planet. In the mornings, she greats me with a huge smile and a “boo!”. She is always so happy in the morning, and I love that. I always hated mornings, but she has a way of making it one of the best parts of the day.
Things are so much easier now that she can tell me things such as: she’s hungry, wants water or milk, wants more of something, is finished, etc. I always felt like such a bad mom when she was younger. It always seemed like the last thing I thought to try was the thing she wanted. It’s such a relief to know when she’s hungry or thirsty and when she’s not. I love that she can express what she wants ( like she wants to take a bubble bath or wants to know where her baby is) and that she share things that she likes and sees (like the fact that she sees a cat or that she noticed the wind is blowing.)
As awesome as the past couple months have been, they’ve also, in some ways, been the hardest. Getting rid of the daytime bottles was surprisingly easy, but nixing the bedtime bottle has been awful. The first 2 nights I tried skipping it, she did great. After that…. well… it was quite a different story. Tonight she screamed (and I mean SCREAMED) for a solid 2 hours before finally falling asleep. I am physically and emotionally exhausted and feel absolutely, 100% evil. The only thing harder than seeing my sweet baby cry and not being able to do anything about it, is watching her cry knowing that there is something I can do. Maybe I should just let her have her bottle.
The older she gets, the more worried I get about that fact that she has yet to sleep through the night. Some nights she only wakes up once or twice. Others it seems like she’s up every 30 minutes. On that note, I better go make an attempt at some sleep as I’m sure she’ll be waking up soon.