A Crazy Busy Holiday Weekend

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This past weekend was crazy busy and way too short.  Friday night was the only time for relaxing that we got to have.  I have a lot of mommy guilt over how the weekend went because it was so busy and Nick didn’t get nearly enough time to nap.  Nana, Mommy, and especially Nick are all exhausted.

Saturday started early since Nick didn’t feel like sleeping in.  He was wide awake and in a good mood.  He played happily for a long time and was very excited when Nana arrived just after 10 to make Christmas cookies.  Luckily he did eventually settle down for a nap.  It turned out to only be a short cat nap, so he woke up with time to spare before lunch.

After we had all had lunch and finished the cookies we headed out to get a few groceries and toys for the kids we had adopted for Christmas.  Nick fell asleep on the way, and continued to sleep for much of the shopping trip.  He probably ended up sleeping for about 40 minutes.

His two short naps really weren’t enough to allow Nick to skip his evening nap (which he often does now), but I was certain he’d sleep on the way to my mother-in-law’s Christmas party.  At about five Nick was ready for his next nap, but we needed to leave at 6:15 and he still needed to be fed and have his clothes changed for the party, so there wasn’t time for a nap.  I did everything I could to keep him happy, and it mostly worked.  I was very impressed that we made it out of the door almost exactly on time (especially since Nick was not in a mood to be in his car seat).   Not surprisingly he fell asleep almost as soon as I turned the car on.

Our intent had been to show up a bit early which was good because it gave Nick a chance to wake up before a lot of people arrived.  He was fairly happy for awhile, but as more and more people started coming he started having a hard time.  Now this Christmas party that Laurie has every year is Huge.  Honestly I would have been shocked if it hadn’t been too much for him to handle.  By about 8 Nick had hit the point where he had had enough.  To try and calm him down we took him upstairs.  My hope was that getting away from all of the people would help him, and it did.  There’s a little tree upstairs, so we sat by it and Nick looked at it and played a little with the ornaments.  Not much later we changed him for bed.  He was even happier once we started taking his clothes off, so besides being overstimulated we decided he must have been really hot.

Once we had changed him I gave him his bottle and then we loaded him up in his car seat and headed home.  As on Thanksgiving I carried him in his car seat all of the way upstairs when we got home and then transferred him to the crib.  He was so tired that he didn’t even stir until he was almost all of the way out of his car seat.  It seems I was exhausted too because I slept deeply.  Jason said he heard Nick wake up a few times to play.  So he slept well enough, but as on Thanksgiving, he slept lightly which woke him up.

It probably would have been good to take it easy the next day, but that wasn’t meant to be.  Instead we went out to mom’s for more cookie making, and a mini Turkey Day since we didn’t get to see each other for the real one.  Nick slept in, and we did have an easy going morning.  I knew Nick wouldn’t sleep real well at my mom’s, so we decided to leave for her house after lunch so Nick could have a good morning nap.  That actually worked quite well, and he slept for over an hour.

Nick was awake for almost the whole drive, but he fell asleep at the very end which caused him to be a bit cranky when we got to my mom’s.  The crankiness didn’t last long though and soon Nick was playing in my lap while mom frosted the cookies and worked on dinner.  As the afternoon wore on though it became obvious that Nick really needed a nap, and he was going to fight falling asleep.  We finally had to put him in the car and take a short drive to help him drift off.  When we got back to my mom’s we sat in the car for a little bit to allow Nick more time to sleep.  Then I carefully carried him into the house in his car seat and put him in mom’s room where he slept until I had to wake him up at 5:45 for his dinner.

Dinner was lots of fun because we had some friends come out to join us.  They have a 2.5 year old boy, and Nick loves spending time with him.  We had such a wonderful time that before we knew it it was past bedtime for both boys.  By the time Nick and I left it was 45 minutes past bedtime.  Nick slept on the way home, but it seemed that the drive was almost too long for bed transition because he woke up when we got home.  It turned out to be a rough night because I got to bed really late and Nick woke up crying multiple times.

It was a fun but exhausting weekend.  We had such a wonderful time Sunday night, but the lack of sleep made a bad start to the week.  I really didn’t give Nick a chance to sleep real well, and it was really hard on him.  I’m starting to get scared about Christmas.  With so many long exhausting days I think Nick is going to have a really hard time.  Fingers crossed that that won’t be the case!  Luckily for us we have nothing planned for this weekend, so we get to get some rest before the rest of the holiday kicks into gear.