I always said I wasn't going to adjust my life for the baby...
I always said I wasn't going to adapt my life to our baby, she was going to have to adapt to our life..
As you can imagine- I'm FAILING. LOL!
Nadia has finally adapted to the bedtime routine and we have a really nice rhythm going every night. Now here's the problem- I'm staying home every night so that I can keep up our consistent routine...
This is NOT how I pictured my life. I wanted to just keep living, buisness as usual- but do it with my baby in tow. ;-)
I try to take her out A LOT. She's gone to many restaurants and so far so good. The problem is that she's only dinning out when I can get her home before 7:30-8:00 so I can bathe her, give her the last bottle, and put her down...
My husband doesn't understand my desire to STICK to the schedule and I don't blame him. I don't want to be BORING. I want to go out and have fun. So, what would happen if we went to dinner on a Friday night and weren't home until 10? Would I totally kill the routine I worked so hard to achieve???
I imagine I could just do our bedtime routine when we get home at whatever time, but I have this secret fear I am going to mess up her clock again and she's going to get all confused and start staying up and night...
I tend to over think everything- please tell me this is the case!
Re: I always said I wasn't going to adjust my life for the baby...
some kids to great with staying out late and just going home to sleep whenever... some don't. You'll find out which one Nadia is very quickly.
My girls were always better with a schedule. We could vary a little by an hour or so...but if we went later, you knew there was trouble. It's the same thing now. You just get used to it. We can adjust a little...but not by much. It's okay by me...when my kids are happy, I'm happy.
I think as long as it's not every night, going out once a week or every other week is ok. We do. We will take Alexis out to dinner and be home around 9:30 or 10. I usually skip her bath those nights. I will still giver her dinner at the normal time 6 or 6:30 then I'll give her some nibbles of whatever we're eating while we're out to keep her occupied. Depending on how late we're out, I may give her her bottle in the car or if we're getting home closer to her bedtime, like 8:30 or 9, I will wait until we get home for the bottle. Then I change her into her PJs and put her to sleep.
We've been doing this since she was little so she is pretty well adjusted and she's great at restaurants.
The next day make sure to go back to your normal routine.
ditto everything that kim said!
we've also been a bit off schedule on some occassions, it didnt kill the routine completely. but i dont tend to be off hours at a time...which is why we opted to stay in for new years b/c i didnt want to come back after midnight and not only ruin the routine but also have her uncomfortable and not in her atmosphere. you'll get used to it and so will nadia and pretty soon you'll pick and chose when you should be heading back home!
And I will add that when we go to a family event at my mom's or my aunt's, we put Alexis to bed over there. my mom has a crib but if we go to my ILs or my aunt's houses we bring the PNP and the sound machine and the monitor that way we can stay later. Alexis may wake up when we transfer to/from the car but falls right back to sleep.
Maybe we got lucky with a baby who is flexible but we have also gottenher used to it b/c we've been doing it since she was little.
Experiment and see what happens. Like Kimmie said - when the baby is happy, mommy is happy. So if you go out late and she's not happy, you will not have a good time!!
I hear you! I always feel like I am doing Sophie wrong if I don't stick to her schedule - I especially felt that way when she was Nadia's age. Now that she is older its getting a little easier to deviate and keep her out and up later once in a while but we do not do it regularly by any means and honestly doing it regularly would defeat the purpose of a schedule IMHO! LOL. So, a deviation about once a week so that we can do something a little different works for us - and even then we are usually still home by 10pm because (lets face it) we are TIRED!
Although there are nights that we are off, by an hour or so, we dont do that very often at all. On nights that we are out late, we try to keep to a routine, such as bring a pj set, and change he rand get her comfy, even while out, and give her a sippy of milk at the normal time and she may fall asleep in the stroller or car seat, or even in family members beds when we are there. However, more than likely we just have someone watch her at home, ususally my MIL or we take her to my moms and they abide by her schedule, and whenever Rick and I pick her up, she may wake up, like Leanna said, during the transfer to the car, but she falls right back to sleep. The best is whenever someone can watch her at home.
Ususally we just tell them to get there once she is already down, which is usually 7:30 or 8 and then we go out after that. It gives me the peace of mind that her schedule was not messed up, but it also make sit REALLY easy to convince people to take care of her, when she is already asleep, they really can just hang out at my house whike she sleeps lol As she gets older it will become easier. Hang in there!
I think you'll have to give it a shot and see what happens. Mateo is super flexible, so we've gone out to dinner late and have no problems with him, when he was an infant it was super easy b/c he slept thru dinners, now that he's a toddler we just keep him busy w/finger foods and he's usually out like a light by the time we get home.
When we have family get togethers we have the pack n play at my mom's and just put him to bed when he's ready.
I too said I wasn't going to change my way of life just because I had a baby, but guess what..........????????
Don't feel like a failure because your life has changed. That is just what comes with the territory of being a parent, and it will constantly change as Nadia goes through each stage.
Personally, I am a stickler for routine. We very rarely ever go off schedule and that works well for us. My friends who don't have set schedules as far as eating and sleeping find it much harder to plan out their day and even more difficult to have time alone with DH because their baby goes to bed at a different time every night.
So do what works for you and don't worry about being boring. Unfortunately when you have very young children, you are a slave to their schedule. You can try as hard as you want to change that, but after a few public meltdowns, where people roll their eyes and wonder why you brought a baby out for a 9:00 dinner, you won't care so much about eating with the early birds...lol.