ZZZzzz....

I don’t know what happened. I always used listen to the sad and scary tales of mothers with insomniac babies and, while trying to emanate sympathy and nod knowingly, inside there was a just a little glimmer of smug pride. Not for myself (entirely), mind you, but for my baby. Kira, from the time she was about three months, never really gave me any trouble going and staying asleep. She’d go to bed while awake and I’d see her the next morning without a fuss after a long night’s sleep. As long as she had her precious bear and access to some container full of water, she was set. Then multiple naps started to disappear. Maybe it was a bit early, but, hey, it comes with age, right? And besides, she would sleep for at least 2-3 hours during her one nap while still sleeping through the night. It's all good. Then, the unthinkable happened…she would start waking up, screaming, after about 20 minutes of sleep during her daily nap. As hard as I tried, I could not get her to go back to her normal once-a-day nap schedule. And this was just after she turned two! I still NEEDED those few hours especially with a new baby in the house, so after lunch we have what is known as “quiet time”- basically, Kira has to move play time to her room for two hours. Occasionally, in the beginning, she would end up in bed. But for the most part, this brand-new three-year-old is bright-eyed and bushy-tailed all day long. Now, however, though she goes to bed earlier than most kids her age, she’s started waking up to grace us with her presence in the middle of night, several times a night. And then, even with the use of dark curtains (since the cursed sun rises before 5:30 AM around here), she’s usually up by 6 o’clock, waking up all within her wake (haha, pun intended). That includes one of the louder (and smallest) members of the household that shares a room with our little night owl. Anyway, I guess that’s what makes these moments so funny and worth documenting. They’re so rare and sometimes, as I take the shot, I wish I could have been there to see how in the world this girl fell asleep like that…

(Looking at these, I realized all of these but one took place on a Sunday...maybe that's it- she'll only rest on the "day of rest"...hmm. "Kira, guess what today is...")