Our new nickname for Zoe is princess furious. She is ridiculously mad sometimes, and is just the most whiny little thing the rest of the time. When will she talk? I’m so ready to understand what makes her so mad.

For the past week she’s been fighting bedtime. We’ll do our little ‘routine’ of reading three books after a change and toothbrushing, but as soon as the lights go out she just screams. AND I lay down with her. Finally, once she finds my hair to pull she’s OK, but she will then pull it for an hour or two until she’s completely asleep. It’s nuts. I really wish my hair wasn’t her favorite cuddle toy; it really hurts and completely rats up my hair. Last night I FINALLY got her asleep at midnight. Then, she woke up again at 4, so I had to walk her back, deal with another 5-10 minutes of screaming, and another 2 hours of hair pulling until she finally fell asleep enough for me to get back to my own bed. I’m SOOOOOO sleepy. Poor Bryan tries to help, but she just doesn’t like him. She’ll point to him and say daddy, but she screams like she has been hurt if he tries to pick her up or put her to bed. Now, yesterday they actually took a bath together, but then as soon as they were done she was screaming for me. I do not mean fussing or crying…I DO mean screaming.

Sometimes she’s just so sweet, too. Like now that it’s morning she is content taking all her clothes out of her drawers and wants to cuddle. She’ll turn into princess furious, though if I try to redirect her to a different game. I think I’ve figured out that she gets a short fuse on days we’re inside alot. As long as I get her outside playing for 3-4 hours (not strollering, or running errands, being in the car), then she’s OK. The trouble is that it’s super-cold now, we can’t just go to our backyard like in Tucson, and there’s only so much playground-hopping I can handle. It’s mostly that she is so mad when we’re here and I can’t be right by her side. I like to play with her – and do most of the day – but sometimes I really need to get things done. Things like take a shower, or sew some gifts, or cleanup, or just go pee. I can’t remember the last time I took a shower without her, or went to the bathroom without her being on my lap. How crazy is that?

I hope her name comes up soon at the korean daycare. I really think she will do great with LOTS of stimulation, structure, and other kids to play with. Stuff that I just can’t or don’t know how to offer her. I really would like to start to work again, and something part-time would be ideal. Then we could get a little break from each other, she could play with other kids, and I would feel like I was back to doing something productive.

OK. I’ve vented…I feel better…and a little worse for not always understanding.