Peas in a Pod

There has been a long standing battle situation in our house regarding the sleeping arrangements of a certain soon-to-be-kindergartner. He was never a good sleeper as a baby. As in NE.VER. until we found the magic ingredient of wrapping him cocoon like into an oversized blanket and soothing him to sleep with lots of rocking and shushing and patting and bouncing and singing and swaying and...

In the years since, he has mastered sleeping well and it is now quite easy to put him to bed for naps or nighttime, but the discussion invariably ensues over the WHERE he will sleep and HOW LONG he will stay in the WHERE he should be.

You see, he has a bedroom of his own. With a way cool bed and an even cooler bed cover which he adores (we take it along on all trips and vacations--it is THAT important). But, uh, yeah... he doesn't sleep there. Generally he opts instead for my bed (as in my half of the bed which causes me to contort into all kinds of pretzel shapes in an attempt to get some further shut-eye after his post midnight arrival. Because I should also mention that while he wants to be in my bed he is NOT a snuggler and in his sleep will cast aside any brush of arm or leg against his body. So while we are crammed together like sardines in a can, we are NOT ALLOWED TO TOUCH!)

Sometimes, he crawls in next to his brother and occasionally with his sister. Same scenario in each place--as in "I'm crowded, ROLL OVER" and his mandatory bedmate ends up significantly cramped while Drew happily settles into the space available.

The better option we've found for better sleep all around was to put his mattress on the floor at the foot of our bed. Once set up, he quickly dubbed it his "hotel bed" and he happily crawled in at the end of each day to snore the night away.

BUT.

We got the notion that it may not be the BEST idea for him to continually sleep on the floor in the draft so at the end of the school year Don announced to him that he would now be moving back into his own bedroom to sleep (being a BIG BOY now and all) and as Daddy made it sound like such a BIG DEAL and SO MUCH FUN to do so, he went for it. For several weeks (with lots of reminder conversation upon the tuck-in time) he has slept in his own bed, in his own room, all night long! Hoorah!

AND THEN.

Daddy left on vacation with Ian and Emma in tow (they are in the USA on the family/friends/home places tour). So, yeah, there is a wide open space in my bed now where a sleeper used to be. And I ask you, who could resist that?

Our conversation at bedtime last night went something like this:

"Hey Droopers, are you ready for bed?"

"Yah."

"Hmmkay, let's go climb into your bed then, okay?"

"No."

"Yeah, it's time for bed, so let's go get in it."

"Uh, no. Actually I think I'm gonna sleep in your bed."

"Oh, you do, do you?"

"Uh, yeah."

~He held up his five fingers on his left hand and pointed at each in turn as he spoke.

"I think Ian and Emma are on a trip, right?"

"Yep. They are. So they are not here right now. And who else in our family is gone?"

"Ummm... I think it's our dad!"

~He folded down three fingers so only the pointer and thumb remained out-which is the gesture he uses to signify "two". He nodded his head repeatedly and said:

"So, it's just you and me, right mom? Just you and me."

**********

I ask you again, who could resist that?

I tucked him in. To my bed.

this photo taken by 1 Picture A Day