Day 36: Bedtime Battle

This bedtime battle routine is really starting to wear me out. Last night, I made the mistake of letting Samantha have a late nap. When I went to wake her at 6pm, she was out cold snoring away. Mommy mistake number 1; thinking "well she's had a really busy day at TheMuseum with Daddy so maybe she'll sleep the rest of the night". Boy was I wrong about that. She loudly woke up at 8pm (her regular bedtime) and didn't fall back to sleep until close to 11pm. Mommy mistake number 2; thinking "well at least she'll sleep the whole night now". Yup, I was wrong about that too. She woke up at midnight, 2am, 4am and 5:30am. At least one of us was bright and cheery at 9am this morning...

Thankfully, tonight wasn't quite as hard as last night, but nap time as almost become nonexistent! Morning nap has gone from at least an hour to 20 minutes and afternoon nap has become half an hour of playing in her crib. Maybe it's a growth spurt...maybe it's her teething...or maybe her cold...all I know is I am starting to lose this bedtime battle. It doesn't matter how tired she is or how busy of a day she's had, she just fights the Sandman with all her might.

I must say though, once Mr Sandman wins and she's asleep, she is so beautiful, so innocent and so serene. This afternoon, was one of those moments.

After chasing the cat, exploring the stairs and chewing on an ice cube to try and numb her gums, it was time for some quiet time. I figured she probably wouldn't nap, but still needed some time to relax and be calm, even if it was only for 5 minutes. So, we cuddled on the rocking chair and I slowly and lightly drew circles on her cheeks, over top of her eye lids and across her eye brows, while she snuggled against my chest staring up at me. After about 15 minutes she was sound asleep and snoring away. By far one of my favorite mommy moments, so I just held her and rocked her and lightly kissed her forehead.

The sound of her laughing, is by far my favorite sound in the entire world, but the sight of her asleep and the sound of her snoring in my arms is a pretty close second!