Portable Gwen!

I am so incredibly proud of my Gwen.

Yesterday was Day 6 of sleep training. I took her to Victoria for the day and overnight. Talk about throwing a wrench in the works, right?

She handled it beautifully.

I timed the drive down so that we were leaving right around her morning nap time. We even went through the naptime routine before we left, with me reading her a story as she sat in her carseat by the front door. She fell asleep in the car and got a decent nap during the drive. Then when we arrived at my friend Mike's house, we went downstairs to the room where Gwen and I would be sleeping, and spent some time hanging out there, so that when I went to put her down for her nap, she wouldn't be in an unfamiliar room.

I brought *so* much stuff from home to help her feel comfortable, I felt a little ridiculous. But it all paid off!

A couple hours after we arrived, she was looking really tired, so I went through the naptime routine again, lay her in the playpen, and waited. She cried for only a few minutes, and then slept for two hours.

That evening, Gwen and I had a great visit with Janice at her new (beautiful!) home, then we stopped by medieval dance practice on our way back to [Uncle] Mike's place. When we got back to our temporary home, it was about an hour past Gwen's usual bedtime, but I felt it was important to do the whole bedtime routine. So I put her in her bumbo chair and fed her some cereal, then we went upstairs and had a bath. Then pajamas, bottle, storytime, prayers and lullaby, and into the playpen with her lovey (a gorgeous soft stuffed cow named "Mooey" that Mike gave me for my birthday last year). She babbled and cooed to herself for a few minutes, during which time I snuck out of the room. After a while, she began to cry, but that only lasted about 10 minutes. And then she slept for 6 hours.

When she woke in the night, I fed her for a few minutes and then put her back down. She barely even cried before going to sleep.

OH! And the other amazing thing is that as of Monday, GWEN NO LONGER SLEEPS SWADDLED.

Every night after Gwen goes to sleep, Chris says to me "Good job, honey." But really, it's all her. She has learned so much in the past few weeks, and I'm just so damn proud of her. I'm especially excited about the fact that she handled the trip to Victoria so well, as now I can travel with her without worrying about messing up her schedule. Quite a contrast from a few months ago when I could *only* get her to nap in the swing, and so felt afraid to take her anywhere.