It was a harsh cry that broke the silence at 5:00 am this
morning. The monitor on my nightstand
vibrated from the sound. Immediately, I
jumped from sleep-mode in to mommy-mode.
I grabbed my video monitor and watched as poor Kendall stood in her
crib, clutching her blankie. That was
the signal that something had upset her and she was not about to go back to
sleep on her own. Not a problem at
all. My girl needed me and I was there.
After nursing, snuggling, and trying to settle her down for
an hour, she was asleep. Hallelujah! There was just one major obstacle that stood
between me and my bed: her closed bedroom door.
As I sat in her glider and watched her fall in to a blissful sleep, I
wondered, “How in the heck am I going to
get out of here?!” There were so
many things that could and WOULD wake her up.
First, let’s just state the obvious: my creaky bones. I am
twenty-eight years old and have the creaky bones of an eighty-year old
woman. The second I try to slither out
of the chair my knees are going to crack, followed by my feet and ankles, then
finished off by a lovely medley of all the vertebra in my back. Even without anything else standing in my
way, my own body was its own noisemaker.
Second, the floor. It
is carpeted, but there are some vents under the floor that make a pretty loud,
hollow sound. Since it is under the
floor, I clearly can’t fix it. Although
even if it wasn’t hidden under the floor, I probably couldn’t fix it
anyway. Whatever. There are noises and I can’t fix them.
Lastly, the dreaded door.
It creaks. It is a brand new door that we had installed
when we did the nursery, so it isn’t old, just squeaky. I was going to have to crawl my rickety body
over the minefield that was her floor, over to the door, gently peel it open
without making ANY noise, and escape through it to safety (and sleep).
Naturally, that didn’t happen. My body failed me as I set off mine after
mine in the floor. Luckily, I made it
over to the door, hidden behind her dresser.
I couldn’t see her, but she wasn’t crying. I gingerly lifted my arm to turn the handle,
pulled the door towards me and CREAK! And she was up, crying and demanding I stay
in the room until she was good and asleep.
Hidden I stayed for fifteen more minutes until she was truly asleep and
I was able to slide through the six inch gap I left myself.
Moms-to-be, learn from
these mistakes! As you finalize
preparing your child’s nursery for their homecoming do not overlook one of the
most important areas of their room – the door!
You may have all of the diapers, wipes, onesies, and receiving blankets
you could ever possibly need. Yet what
you really need is some WD-40. Grease down those hinges. Make sure that door is totally quiet when you
go to open or close it. Better yet,
grease down the hinges of every door in your entire home. You never know.
Then, get yourself some glucosamine
and chondroitin. I can’t be the
only one who is noticing their bodies are falling in to disrepair. (And I do Zumba, so we all know that I should
be in peak physical condition.) It
should help lubricate your joints so that it isn’t your tip-toeing out of the
room that is going to cause your sleeping baby to awaken.
Take it from me, these are a few, overlooked fixes that
could be the difference between this:
and this:
Good luck!
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