Three's a Crowd

Last night I did something I don't normally do -- I let a kid climb in bed with us. In this case it happened to be this kid:

I know some parents have no problem with their kids sleeping in bed with them. However, we have tried to avoid this as much as possible over the years. First of all, it seems that once you let them in your bed they come to expect it every time they wake up and it gets harder and harder to get them back in their own bed. Plus, I don't think anybody sleeps that great -- well, maybe the kid can konk back out, but I know Mom and Dad sure don't sleep soundly worried about rolling over on top of a little person or getting the covers over their head or just having little feet kicking your back all night.

So back to last night... Hayley woke up around 4:00am or so and came in our room. She looked to be kind of dancing around a little, so I hurried and took her potty and then took her back to her bed. She started crying that she was scared of how dark it was. I noticed that she was literally shaking -- I don't know if it was from being scared or not, but she was definitely shaking. I put extra blankets on and tried to tuck her in, but every time I'd try to leave the room she'd just start crying again.

She started with crying about how her room was too dark, then it went to her room wasn't pink and she wanted it pink, and then it went to she wanted a bigger bed. (She has told me the part about the bigger bed before, so maybe it is time to start thinking about moving her out of the toddler bed.) Anyway, I finally was able to leave the room after about a half hour and get back in bed. I thought she had gone back to sleep, but 10 minutes or so later, she came back in our room again and said she wanted to get in our bed. (The morning before, she came in right as I was getting up so I let her lay in my spot while I showered.)

I'll admit that at this point I was just too tired to protest and try to get her back in her bed, so I just let her climb up over me and lay down in the middle of our bed. I think if it had been earlier, I would have tried to get her back in her room -- but I knew my alarm was going off much sooner than I wanted (6:00 in my case) and it could well be another half hour to an hour before she would settle down in her room and then it would be about time to get up!

I kept thinking that I would regret this decision -- that she would start wanting to sleep with us more and make it even that much harder to get her back to sleep -- but I was still too tired for that argument to win. So in she climbed and after a while she slept (right up against my back pretty much) and there she stayed until after I was up and showered for the day.

We'll see how tonight goes -- she didn't take a nap today (again -- no naps this week so far!) -- so I'm hoping she's tired enough to just stay out all night long! I know that's what I'd sure like to do!