And this has been my life recently.

Today I had to have a mole removed. Which is so much simpler than it sounds. And relatively painless. I've had a mole on my inner thigh for as long as I can remember, but during my pregnancy with Anya I had decided it needed to go as it could often cause discomfort with my clothing and definitely during all of those pregnancy related exams as well as labor and delivery itself. I was in and out of the exam room in less than ten minutes. It's kind of weird to know it's not there anymore after being used to its existence since my childhood. But I'll get used to it being gone, and I'll probably be a little more comfortable without it.

Right now I'm getting a little me time in...though I still have Anya to look after...while Ryan is out doing Christmas shopping. He hasn't had a chance to do any of it before because we were at home visiting family during his first block of leave and he has been working the past two weeks. What off time he's had he's spent with Anya and me. So he took this afternoon to do it as Christmas is already sneaking up on us at the end of the week. Crazy that it's already that time of year. I'm looking forward to him coming home, though, because now that his second block of leave has started we have until after the New Year to just be together and relax a little bit...or as much as we can with Fussy McFusserson who has discovered that she can get little things like our attention or her pacifier if she just screams at us even when there is absolutely nothing wrong with her.

Needless to say we're looking into the future and deciding to deal with the screaming now rather than when she's a toddler. So when we know she's fed, dry, and comfortable we just let her deal with whatever it is she thinks is so pressing until we're finished with our dinner or shower or whatever it is we're doing at the time she decides to freak out. The crying grates on the nerves a little bit, but she'll learn that whining every five minutes over trivial stuff isn't going to get her very far. We have reached the point where she can be spoiled so we have to nix instantly giving her whatever she wants or thinks she needs the second she lets out a whimper just because we don't want to hear her cry. Like just now, for instance, she was freaking out about her pacifier falling out in her bouncy seat. I put it back in a couple of times only to have her spit it out. So what she's really wanting is attention. She spent between five and ten minutes crying. And now? Quiet. Staring at the toys on the bouncy seat and cuddling her blanket.

We have learned in the past week that 9 times out of 10 she just wants our attention and doesn't really need anything right then and there. We know when she's hungry or has a soiled diaper. We've learned her schedule and the signs for those things well enough to know the difference between those needs and a temper tantrum. And I'd really rather not have a child screaming at me in five years so I think I'll deal with a little extra crying right now instead to help her learn what behaviors will and won't get her what she wants when all of her needs have already been met.

And while we're on that subject, my not quite 3 month old baby girl is sleeping through the night for up to 12 hours straight. It doesn't seem to matter when we put her to bed, she has been waking up between 7:45 and 8:30 every morning for the past week. And we usually put her to bed right after her 7:30 bath each evening. So that's pretty awesome. We're still in shock that we don't have to open our eyes or step foot out of bed until after the sun has been up for an hour or two. For the past month she's only been having one night time feeding so I knew she'd be outgoing that relatively quickly just as she outgrew needing a bottle every few hours within a month of life. And sometimes she slept 5 or 6 hours through the night even in the weeks following her birth. I feel very blessed to have a baby that sleeps so well at night. Even though it means she takes next to no naps making it very difficult for me to accomplish much besides making bottles, changing diapers, and playing with a laughing baby who now makes so many more noises at us in response to stimuli. It's pretty amazing. But she gets a little bouncy seat time, too. We don't want to spoil her...too much.