I have too many random things to talk about so how am I supposed to pick a title for this post?
First off, we saw Prince Caspian yesterday!! Woohoo, a real movie in a real theater! Our church bought all the tickets to the 4:45 showing and then sold them to the congregation in hopes that people would bring friends and neighbors. I was bummed - the 2 families I would have invited had members out of town.
I was, of course, very anxious to see this second movie in the Chronicles of Narnia series (Can I call it a series? I don't know how many they plan to make and wonder if they'll make all seven?)
Anyways, Prince Caspian did not disappoint! If you've read the book, you know that Narnia is a much different place than the first time the Pevensies visit. The movie did a wonderful job portraying that and made me long for the old Narnia, just as I'm sure the characters did. Two things that were interesting to me - (1) Prince Caspian himself was much older than I had imagined from reading the book, and (2) Aslan's first appearance was not clap-worthy. You know, when He appears the whole audience bursts out in cheers and clapping. That did not happen, and it wouldn't have been appropriate. I don't remember the first time Aslan appears in the book, except for when Lucy sees him. Something in me just really wanted to shout and clap when Aslan showed up, but it was a much "softer" moment. Maybe that in itself is some sort of allegory to the way Christ shows up sometimes - not always with shouts and thunder, ya know, but in the quiet.
Next - not nearly as exciting to you, but pretty exciting to me, Laina is transitioning to one nap a day. I have been trying to figure her out and figure out how best to make this transition, when it occurred to me that I need to re-read my favorite baby sleep book, "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" (well, at least the section on naps). Sorry, you can't really search inside this image, I just pulled the image off Amazon.com, but you can click on it to go to the listing.
Once again, I was not disappointed! I love this book! It totally described what Laina is doing (either laying in her crib playing, and/or not wanting to go down for her afternoon nap, which is the one you want them to keep as they get older!) and had solutions to help "fix" the naps. I have been doing what Dr Weissbluth recommends for 3 days now and IT WORKS! Amazing! For her AM nap, I lay her down and don't leave her for longer than one hour. If she plays that's fine. If she sleeps that's fine. But don't let her sleep for more than an hour. We want her to be able to take a good afternoon nap. Yesterday she took a 2 hour afternoon nap, which is 1/2 hour longer than normal. Eventually she should be taking a 2-3 hr PM nap and no AM nap. I am really looking forward to her being on only one nap a day as I think it will help me feel less "tied to the house". I would love to get this sorted out before our NC trip, but it may take a couple months of transition, so we'll see.
And that leads to the next exciting thing - our trip to Holden Beach, NC is quickly approaching! In June we are renting a beach house with two sets of friends. It's going to be a long awaited, much needed real vacation. I know it will be much different than the vacations we used to take before becoming parents, but hopefully it will still be great, just in a different way. Maybe even a better way. This is the house we're renting, called "Simply Breathtaking". Yes, they name their houses out there. Weird, I know. I guess it's like naming a boat or something.
So there you have it - a few different things all in one post - how would I begin to come up with a title?
