Life with Fidget

Fidget will probably hate her parents for this when she's old enough to read, but
then she's got plenty of years ahead of her to get even...

So, we've had 10 months with Fidget so far and every day she develops a little more personality. As you may have guessed from the previous post, or I'm sure we've told most of you, Fidget does not do naps. A long nap for Fidget on her own in her crib is maybe 30 minutes. To get a longer nap in, we have to hold her and try to get a nap in ourselves at the same time - this only works if you're first willing to hold a squirming, twisting, hitting, pinching, scratching, kicking 30+ inch long child who does not like to take naps long enough to work out the anxiety of actually closing her eyes and relaxing for a few minutes. Sometimes we get an hour long nap Now, there is a point here - an explanation of the pictures, in fact - we're getting there.

One of the places we like to cuddle up for these naps is on the spare bed, which has all sorts of pillows on it. We sometimes use the pillows to help keep Fidget contained on the bed as we're having a staring contest combined with small body slams on Mom or Dad's chest and stomach to decide whether this episode becomes a nap or more playtime where Fidget rubs her eyes and pulls her ears every five minutes instead. Normally, Fidget is content to simply nuzzle up against the pillows and Mom or Dad in a little nest after the ritual contest is won due to pity for the more weary party. We take our nap, then get up and play with our toys on the floor. It should be noted that if for some reason Fidget wakes up first, or Mom & Dad do not get moving fast enough, then she very clearly lets Mom or Dad know to get up and going by repeatedly whacking the parental unit with her hand, usually on the cheek or arm. Discouraging this practice is difficult because Fidget has such great success with it.

Yesterday, Fidget won the nap or no-nap contest, but happily remained on the bed after watching Dad give up in disgust. Fidget then began her first home redocoration as she rearranged all the pillows into a little fort on the bed. She very carefully made sure there was some sort of overlap between all the pillows so that she was completely surrounded. The one picture more or less shows Fidget with the fort 90% done and the all important "nananana" in her mouth. Finally, after moving all the pillows just where she wanted them, she flopped over on her side and gave her best, "Gee, I am just exhausted!" look. Needless to say, we still didn't get a nap in...