MOMday: Forgotten Loveys

Our girlies are addicted to their loveys.  Buggie has a bunny and Doodle has a bear.  I bought them these little blankets with an animal head the day they turned 2 months old.  We had given them separate cribs and I wanted to make sure they had a comfort object.  Before long, the twins were loathe to be apart from these little toys.  At first, they were just a fun crib toy.  Buggie would have long conversations with hers - so cute and totally caught on video.

By their first birthday, sleep depended on the loveys.  Loveys and white noise machine were the magic combo.  As long as we had those, they could sleep anywhere.  It was great.  If we ever forgot to bring them on a daytrip, we were in for a horrible naptime.  

So, last week, when  we did the trial at the dayhome - of course, I sent the noise machine and the loveys.  I wanted things to go as smoothly as possible.  Today, on their first full day, the loveys and the noise machine were sent again.   All seemed like it would be great...

At the end of the day, I had trouble catching a bus north.  I've always arranged my schedule so I would be off by 4:15 and today I had to work until 4:30, spelling disaster for my afternoon commute.  Hubby ended up picking up the girlies and then meeting me halfway to downtown.   When he told me that the dayhome was just going to keep the diaper bag and tell us when it needed refilling (we made a decision over the weekend to just do disposables - a story for another day), I didn't think anything of it...It made sense.

We were almost all the way home to Langdon before I thought to ask if the loveys and noise machine had been remembered.  The car got really quiet for a moment.   We were doomed!  The loveys had been forgotten.   We could substitute an iPod app for the noise machine, but how do you replace the "toy" that is the very centre of their earth?

Well, with a little creativity and the untimely death of a couple of stuffed animals...momma to the rescue.   I hunted for a soft t-shirt that was almost unwearable and cut a couple of squares from the cloth.  Then hubby carefully decapitated a couple of the zillion stuffies the girls have (lucky for us, we had a bear and a bunny) and I set my extremely mediocre sewing skills to attaching the heads to the t-shirt material.

It was like Buggie immediately understood what I was making.  As I crookedly stitched that bunny head, she would come over and pet it and lean over and kiss it.   When I handed her the finished "lovey", her face lit up and she grabbed it into a gigantic hug!  As I started on the bear, Buggie climbed up behind me with her new bunny and gave me a big hug from behind.

Doodle really liked the bunny and was upset and impatient that she didn't have a new toy.   I stitched as fast as I could, but it wasn't fast enough for her.   Fights ensued (I'm amazed the bunny head survived - I'm THAT bad of a seamstress).  I jabbed the hell out of my fingers as I hurried, but Doodle finally had a new bear.

They spent the next half hour joyfully playing with their replacement loveys.  But the real test was still to come.  Bedtime.

Upstairs we went.  Pajamas and the rest of the bedtime routine.  Hubby set up the iPod noise machine and I laid Doodle into her crib.  Immediately, she put her thumb in her mouth and pulled the lovey over her eyes...just like it was her real bear.  I thought we were in the clear.  Buggie laid down, cuddling her new bunny.   Just as we were ready to turn out the lights, Doodle started tearing apart her bed and calling for her bear.

DAMMIT!

We spent a few minutes explaining that she had to use the new bear tonight but she could have her real bear tomorrow.  She wasn't happy with it but seemed to accept it...for tonight.

Guess we'll see how the rest of the night goes (Boy, I hope I get to sleep...fingers crossed), but with Mother's Day looming - I kind of feel like a hero for saving the day.  maybe.   Guess I was feeling like I needed to make up for abandoning them.  Guess I might not be that bad of a mom after all...