It’s a grumbly kind of night
As I sit here in the living room with the monitor turned up, as the rest of the gang is asleep in the bedroom, it occurs to me why Kate can sleep a 2-hour stretch during the day and not at night: the dogs are friggin noisy. They get up, scratch, drink, walk around, slam their bodies to the ground with a huff (what the hell, are they practicing for the WWE?)… how the heck do we manage to sleep through that? Well we do. Kate… not so much. I’ve already had to go back in to nurse her back to sleep, and expect I’ll have to do it again before I’m ready to call it a night. Grrr. (And in case you’re wondering, the dogs sleep on the floor, Kate’s in her crib, and Den’s in the bed. ;) )
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Because air conditioner season is growing to a close and we will soon be saying goodbye to the white noise is provides, I bought a $20 CD player. I have some great lullabye CDs, but my current favorite for sleeping is actually a CD I purchased while doing IVF, it’s a relaxation cd for meditation and such. It’s lovely soft music to fall asleep to. Unfortunately it’s not quite so good at being white noise and blocking out other things, so to accomplish that I’m using her Sleep Sheep, the rainfall setting. I try not to test my luck with banging around, but it works pretty well for filtering out, say, the dogs barking downstairs.
Unfortunately the Sleep Sheep’s sounds are on a 45 minute timer, which means it cuts out before she’s had a decent nap, and most certainly doesn’t work all night long. The music I set on repeat all, so it plays constantly. But how irritating… I want the white noise to be constant, and the music to stop after so long. What to do, what to do. (The Sleep Sheep has underwhelmed me. I paid how much for a small plastic white noise maker with limited settings that is stuffed inside a stuffed animal?)
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Kate’s eyes are turning decidedly brown. We figured they would, as they have been a steely grey-blue since she was born – she never had strikingly blue eyes. But I held out hope for blue. Mine are blue, as is my entire family’s. Den’s are brown. Brown is dominant but there was a small chance I would prevail. I’ve been studying her eyes practically every day since she was born trying to see any hint of what was to come, but all I’ve ever seen is grey-blue. Yesterday morning as I changed her diaper I looked deep into those eyes and noticed they were a little lighter, and a little more beige-tinted instead of grey. Today it is even more obvious, there is much less blue in them. Soon it will all be gone.
It’s such a silly thing, I mean she has many of my other traits. I don’t know why I held on to those eyes so hard – maybe because my eyes are one of my own favorite traits. But I am sad. Just a little.
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What is with this warm weather all of a sudden?? Kate and I both slept like crap last night and I can tell it’s going to be another lovely night for us both. It is too warm for snuggles, and if I plug the AC back in I have to unplug the music. Grrrrr.
Graco sound machine. I just bought mine, and it plays either white noise(multiple options), or lullabies. Has a one hour timer, or plays until you turn it off. It’s awesome.
For now I’m just going to burn some white noise cds to use.
Get a fan. Just a cheap floor fan. And turn it where it’s not blowing on you if it’s too chilly.
Exactly what Kari said. We have a floor fan and it’s great. It doesn’t even cool the room down that much, especially when pointed at a wall.
White noise machine by homedics it works great and my son sleeps a lot longer with it on
Set your radio off station so you just get static. It’s constant and you don’t get the annoying pause when the cd gets to the end before it repeats. Works like a charm!
My inlaws bought us an alarmclock with white noise and rainfall noise etc on it, maybe you can find one and dual purpose it. I’m pretty sure you can set the alarm to something other than the white noise etc.
We have a box fan both of my kids have used since day one. It works great and drowns out all kinds of noise. I usually set it on the high setting and turn it away from the kids. The only drawback from that is once they get used to it, thats it, they always have to have it! When the power goes out at night, they are both up thinking that its time to wake up! And when we travel, that box fan comes right along with us!
Oh you people are crazy, LOL! I can’t stand any kind of fan on at night, I get a chill so easily. Even in winter I hate having the overhead fan on low! (Hubby thinks I’m nuts.)
We bought ours (from Bed Bath & Beyond, with a 20% off coupon) when our son was a baby and, at 3 1/2, he still uses it as the neighbor parks her car just outside his window which is just beyond his headboard (I’m talking 8 ft max away) and is prone to slamming her doors at 5:30 a.m.!
It has multiple nature settings (rain is the setting we’ve always used) as well as a couple of lullabies, a timer OR you can just let it run (as we do). It also has a projector with 3 little discs which he LOVED as a baby. And, the volume control allows for you to make it pretty loud to drown out the offending, intermittent noise.
http://www.amazon.com/Homedics-SS-3000-Soundspa-Lullaby-White/dp/B000QTSW64/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=baby-products&qid=1285856250&sr=1-2
I have a humidifier that I run every night (two actually, one in my son’s room and one in mine). I put water in it if someone is sick, otherwise I just run it empty. But it works like a charm. Blocks alllllll the noise out. I’m a light sleeper and it has been a life saver.
Vicks 1 – gallon cool mist V-311 is perfect. I bought another one and it was way too quiet. I got it at Target.
Isn’t it funny how attached we get to the eye color. I, too, have blue eyes and DH has brown ones. I wanted a brown-eyed baby. My first one has brilliant blue eyes (which I totally love on her). My second (2 months old) is going to have brown ones (yay) and I study them every day to look for changes.
We have air purifiers in each bedroom that we run year-round, b/c we have allergies AND it provides a lot of “white noise” (we have a dog, live in a ranch style home, and none of my kids are super-duper-heavy-sleepers). Here is the link:
http://www.holmesproducts.com/ProductDetails.aspx?pid=1559
Worth the money, trust me. It sounds like a jet engine when set on the highest setting!
And, because I’m ultra paranoid about night wakings, I run a small box fan – pointed at the wall – in our hallway that I bought at Walgreens for $10 one summer. Another priceless investment, b/c we have been able to bring it along with us when traveling (the BEST in hotels!) and put it next to a pack ‘n play when kiddos are napping or in bed.
And…I take the dog’s collar off of her, except to go outside.
Hope you find something that works for you & for Kate!
By the way – she is ADORABLE !!! :)
We have the Marpac SleepMate white noise machine:
http://www.amazon.com/Marpac-SleepMate-980A-Electro-Mechanical-Conditioner/dp/B000KUHFGM/ref=sr_1_1?s=gateway&ie=UTF8&qid=1285896911&sr=8-1
There’s also a white noise website:
http://simplynoise.com/
The eye color thing totally jumped out at me, too. My mother has brown eyes but my father has blue eyes, and I got the blue. My sister got hazel. Apparently my mother took me for a well-baby visit and asked the doctor when my eyes were going to change color, and he looked surprised and said that if they hadn’t yet they wouldn’t ever (I have no idea how old I was). It’s just fascinating to me how eye colors run through families.
Also, I hope you find a white noise machine that works for you — even at my age the overhead fan has to be on (both because I get hot so easily and because of the noise). Hotel rooms without them are a real problem. I may look into getting my own box fan, lol!
http://www.marpac.com/sound_cond.asp
The best white noise machine ever made. It sounds like a fan.
Get a sound machine, for sure. Matthew’s stays on in his room 24/7. We had the same problem with the womb bear “timing out” after 45 minutes. Seriously, 45 minutes? That is one sleep cycle. Couldn’t they have made it one hour at least to get them into the next sleep cycle? Anyway, his sound machine has a “white noise” setting and it is excellent.
I was sad when his eyes went from gray-blue to brown. Was in denial for a long time. Mine are blue and my mother in law’s are blue so we did have a chance, but alas, brown eyes.
I could have written the section on her eyes word for word about me, my husband, and my daughter Taiga (she arrived 2 weeks after Kate). I know I’ll love love love her eyes no matter what color they finally settle on (looking like hazel?) but still, I was holding out hope too. :)