You Are Getting Very Sleepy...

Today I put Sahana in her crib awake for her afternoon nap, and after a little whimpering, she went to sleep on her own! This is the second time -- I put her down awake last night also and she went to sleep without a peep and slept till her 10:30 feeding. I hope this sticks. I think this is a result of Andy and me letting her "cry it out" two nights ago, when she began to do her starting-to-become a habit of waking up at 7:30 after going to sleep at 7. We felt like we should nip that in the bud, and she cried for about 20 minutes, was quiet for 10 minutes, cried for another 5, and went to sleep. Getting her to fall sleep on her own is Step 2 of my master plan, after getting her to sleep through the night. Step 3 will be to gradually remove her swaddle for her various naps and ultimately, all night, though I probably won't begin that operation until we get back from our trip to Dallas in a couple of weeks.

Sahana is very alert these days. She's a serious kid, though: she does smile and laugh, but usually she's got this very concerned look on her face like she's trying to figure out what the heck is going on. She's very calm, though. Even after she wakes up in the morning, she's not screaming for food, and will (mostly) wait patiently until Andy or I are done brushing our teeth, fixing her bottle, and getting our own tea/coffee to feed her (interestingly, her name means "patience" in Sanskrit). Our au pair taught herself some basic shantala massage (baby massage), which perhaps helps to keep Sahana in her relaxed state. Here is a photo of Sahana getting her daily massage:



Meanwhile, we have new tensions on the Paras front. He is deathly afraid of our cat, Chakli. He used to be fine with Chakli, until an incident that happened about a week ago. I was in the living room feeding Sahana, and Paras was with our au pair in the kitchen, getting breakfast. Suddenly I heard this piercing, terrified scream. It was so loud that I thought that Paras got burned with hot water or something. When I got into the kitchen, I saw that Chakli had brought in a bird. A LIVE bird. So the bird was crashing against the window trying to get out, Chakli was jumping all over the place trying to kill the bird, Paras was screaming his head off, and the au pair was using a broom to get Chakli away from the bird and figuring out how to get the window open (Sahana was still in the living room, happily playing with the monkey on her play gym). I was able to separate all parties and get the window open, and the bird was clearly not too injured as he flew away. I then had to clean up the resulting mess, which was a disgusting mix of feathers and bird poop.

Anyway, that was Paras' first encounter with killing/death, and all he could talk about all day was how Chakli had a bird in his mouth and spit it out. He was very upset about it. And now he is terrified of Chakli and screams whenever the cat is in the house. I really think he's scarred for life, and is going to be a cat-hater.

Poor Chakli is starved for attention, and I think the bird was his way of telling us that he feels like he is still a valuable contributor to the household. He has since brought in another live bird (fortunately we heard him come in and Andy booted both Chakli and the bird outside before they came into the kitchen), and today he left a decapitated mouse on the porch steps. Geez, my house is like National Geographic.