Mexico

The Mexico trip went very well, much better than we had expected after the difficult trip to Boston a few weeks earlier. When we arrived, we discovered that the hotel room we had reserved for Mini-Me was not air-conditioned, so we got a cheap-o Moses basket at the local Walmart and the baby slept in our room. After two hotel stays, I think the big difference was having a space near the room where we could hang out while she fell asleep. We brought the baby monitor and hung out in the little courtyard outside the room, where there was wireless and a bar. Not a bad set-up.

The most significant thing I will remember about this trip is that my husband and I had a HUGE fight about Mini-Me. It started when we were at a restaurant way past her bedtime and she was melting down. I wanted to go back to the hotel ahead of him so I could put her to bed, and he wanted to push her to stay up later so we could both stay. I got really mad about this - I am so used to working around Mini-Me's sleep schedule, and I didn't think it was fair to take advantage of her adaptability. Papa felt that if we were going to take the trouble to go all the way to Mexico for a wedding, we should participate in everything and let Mini-Me straighten out her sleep schedule when we got back (which is how the airplane flight home from Boston went so horribly awry).

It was ugly. Things were said that should have stayed unspoken. But once we cooled down, I did agree that I needed to loosen up and also that I needed to let Papa be in charge more often. I talked this over with a friend who has three kids and an awesome parenting relationship with his wife, and he likened parenting to loading the dishwasher. I knew exactly what he meant, because my husband and I have gone around on that one too - we each have our own way of loading the dishwasher, but the wine glasses get clean and stay intact both ways, so both ways must be ok.

Partly to give Papa some time with Mini-Me and partly to foster the non-mother side of my personality, I am taking a class this weekend that will go all day Saturday and Sunday. We'll see....