For your information, I live a rich and varied social life.

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Thanks so much for the comments on my socializing post ... it's such an ironic kind of post - laying myself bare for the world, yet claiming to be an introvert. But I see that's the way it is for a lot of you. I wonder how many bloggers are actually introverts, parlaying the relative anonymity of the interwebz into an ability to open up and be, for all appearances, extroverted.

I keep 'meaning' to do more social things - attend some single-parent or local singes get togethers, maybe try speed dating ... I just don't really care enough to take the step from 'meaning to' to actually going. Can I blame it on all the other balls I have in the air? Job hunting, trying to network, trying to maintain my sanity ... ???

Bean, talking to the TV: "Yeah, I'm having an easter egg hunt too."

And she is. She'll be hanging with the grandparents today to do the easter egg hunt in their 'hood. It will be her first, and I'm sure she'll have a great time. Since Dave had the girls on Thursday, my folks missed their usual Bean day - and I'm just generous enough to give them a make-up day.

Yesterday both girls were up at 4:30. Fortunately, I chose that night to just make their bedtime my bedtime, and I was asleep before 7 p.m. Still didn't really make 4:30 'okay', merely acceptable, but at least I wasn't seeing the butt-crack of dawn on only a few hours' sleep. It certainly makes for a looonnnggg day, regardless.

It's actually taken me two days to get this far ... I started this Saturday around 4:30, and and just now getting back to it around 6 a.m. Sunday.

Yesterday wasn't awful, even with the butt-crack of dawn wake-up. Everyone was asleep by 7 after some short daytime naps, and, of course, up at 5:00. No matter what time we go to bed, 5:00 seems to be our magic number here ... I checked the "No Cry Sleep Solution for Toddlers" out at the library, so we'll see if that's any more motivating that the one for babies. I know the baby one she wants you to keep logs for awhile and then take forever to implement, which is so discouraging to me. I want a no-cry solution that transpires over a week at most, not a couple months. Of course, if I'd started the solution when I first started my sleep griping, it'd be done and over with by now.

I'm just not a believer in letting *my* kids cry. Like I said in my comments from the other day - I don't fault anyone else for going that route with their kids (unless they are doing it with young babies - that burns my biscuits) - it's just not something I want to do. Usually.

Miss O is also not a great candidate for it, as she does not ever stop screaming. I've found that out the hard way in the car and on the few occasions I have just had it at night and left her in a crib to cry because the alternative is not pretty. (I'm a big believer in the advice the pros give new parents - if you're at your end point, it's okay to let a baby cry in a safe place for however long you need to regroup your poop.)

But my 'lessons learned' from these experiences is that O does not stop crying until she is picked up. She just doesn't. It's never been longer than maybe 20 minutes or so (in the car - in person when I *can* fix it, I've never needed more than 10 minutes before I can face the music again.), but there's no winding down at any point - it's a continued effort that says to me "however long you can take it, I can go longer". Would I ever "win" and would she ever cry herself to sleep? Possibly. But I will likely never find out how long it takes to reach that point.

Jen, 2.5 is a looonnnggg way away. You have my sympathies. And a ton of empathy.