Saturday, April 18, 2009

Babysitting

Last night I babysat a little boy from our church. We'll call him Action. He is almost one, and therefore exceedingly cute.

MiniMe was beside herself. And she was all over him. Giving him toys, patting his head, trying to pick him up, and generally being a nuisance (albeit a sweet one). Rosie helped hold him when I had to go to the bathroom, and played with him as well.

It was quite the stroll down memory lane. You really do forget what it is like, managing a little person who is completely dependent upon you. Feeding, changing, playing, just staying in his visual range so he won't cry. I'm a pretty old hand it all that, so it's not too hard for me. It's fun to play peek-a-boo once in a while.

The highlights? Getting Action to smile by overreacting to his "kicks". Noticing that he was mostly interested in watching ARG and Hubby (those deep voices, I guess). Watching him go head over teakettle as he crawled up his unstable car seat. Oops. Having him fall asleep on my lap. Awwwwww.

But the part about babies that I don't miss? The tiptoeing around after they are asleep. "Shhhhh! Don't wake the baby!" Maybe most people don't share this neurosis, but I had (and have, apparently) an unusual fear of waking a sleeping baby. It has to do with the fact that I was always going to be the one that had to get up, feed and soothe, at ungodly hours. But it was strange that I felt the same way last night.

And have you noticed how, when you are trying to be quiet, you inevitably bump into every chair, drop or bonk things noisily, trip over toys...etc?

It was good to realize the freedom we have now to be ourselves at night, after the kids are upstairs. If they get up? We just send 'em back. Easy. We can go to sleep when we want, because we wake up when we want (by we, I mean me, as Hubby has to get up early 5 days/week). Plenty of sleep. No worries of sleep deprivation.

But all that may be changing soon. No, I'm not pregnant. It looks like we'll be getting a puppy. Either in the next few weeks or over the summer, we'll have a new member of the family. One who will require someone to get up with her in the night for potty breaks the first six months. Wha? Oh no.

Sleep deprivation here I come.

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