Sleep Issues

Here's a sign that Ben is growing up: last night he came into our room complaining of nightmares. Well, at least we THINK that's what it was - he was saying something that sounded like "Hooper", but I think it was really "Hacker", one of the characters from Cyberchase, a PBS show the kids watch. He's voiced by Christopher Lloyd - how cool is that?!

Anyway, this period of sleeplessness drove Ben into our bedroom about 4 times in 20 minutes last night. The first time he climbed right into bed with us and tried to go to sleep between our pillows. Aaron returned him to his bed then and the next time, and then I did round #3, since Aaron said his attempts "didn't stick". Neither did mine, but his next one did, and there were no further disturbances until 6:30am, when I went to the kids' room and found both of them sitting on Ben's room gabbing away like sorority girls. Grr.

Then we had naptime. After a little quality Wii time with Daddy, Ben pitched a fit about taking his nap. (Which, I'm afraid, are on their way out entirely - they are shrinking from 1 1/2 - 2 hrs to closer to only 1 hour. Eeks.) After about 15 minutes, Aaron went upstairs on his own errand and looked in on our boy child - and then announced that Ben was MIA.

I told him to look in the baby's room, across the hall -sometimes when he's resisting or being evasive he'll hide in there. Nope, no luck. Aaron's next report to me was that Ben was sleeping behind the couch. In the room next door to me, downstairs.

People, I am not sure how this child was able to get downstairs and into another room without either Leah or I noticing, but it may be a sign that he's top-notch material for the FBI. We already know he's way sneakier than Leah - a few rounds of Hide N Seek will teach you that. He can actually hide silently for more than 5 minutes - Leah starts to giggle at about 30 seconds.

This helps to illustrate something - when you see goofy photos of kids sleeping in weird places (on their bike, the toilet, at the table) we tend to think, "Wow, that kid must have been REALLY tired!"

But in actuality, it just demonstrates how fiercely kids will fight going to sleep. They will doggedly keep doing whatever it is they are doing until sleep finally overtakes them and they give in. The backstory is that their mom or dad has probably been trying to get them to take a nap or go to bed for about 20 minutes BEFORE that hilarious photo was taken. Good thing it's not video, or there'd be a lot of weeping and wailing to go with that shot!