clingy

in addition to being cranky on account of her burgeoning milk teeth, aubrey has been very clingy over the past few days. for example: she will be happily playing on her own, and when i walk into the room or try to interact with her, she drops her toy and holds out her arms for me. she does this with pete, too, but the behavior is more particularly associated with me. mama.

last night we had a dreadful time getting aubrey off to bed. i should preface this by mentioning that for the past week or so, i've noticed that after i nurse aubrey and put her in her crib with her favorite "wormy" (rainbow colored caterpillar that she love love loves) tucked under her arm, she looks up at me as if to say, "really? it's bed time and you're leaving me now?" but she usually doesn't put up a fuss. if she does, it's nothing more than a whimper.

not last night. after i put her down, she instantly broke out in tears. which turned into sobs. i then did what i probably shouldn't have done...i picked her up. she calmed down after a minute of rocking, and then i put her back in her crib. more crying.

"MaaaAAaAaaaA...MaaaAaaAAAaAa!!!!!!!"

she was pissed! i rubbed her tummy for a minute, said "nite nite," and then quietly backed away from the crib.

fifteen or so minutes later, she was still crying, so pete went up and tried to comfort her. of course, this made her really mad, but eventually, she gave up and fell asleep.

i really, really hate it when this happens. i feel bad for aubrey, but i know that she needs to sleep and she needs to figure out how to get to sleep on her own. actually, she knows how to fall asleep on her own...i suspect that last night's fussing was due newly developed separation anxiety. i fear that tonite will be a repeat performance. i'm hoping that this is just a phase and she will get over it quickly. in the meantime, i will be pouring over me books about sleep habits in children to see what the "experts" have to say.