Four Hours in a Row!

Yes, I really did get four hours of sleep - all in a row last night! Baby J has not been a good sleeper from day two. Day one, he fooled me, slept all night, never to accomplish this task again. It must have been the trauma of leaving his mom, the strange family (us ;-) or the first night in his comfy new crib. For whatever reason, he slept until morning and I thought I had hit the foster care jackpot.

A baby who sleeps through the night is a thing of beauty.

Day two: J settles in and reveals his true colors. He is a horrible sleeper and proud of it.

Hence, I have been delirious for the past three weeks. Oh, other family members try to be supportive, but how can they? They have never gone through mommy 101, so they do not have the natural inclination to arise from slumber when a baby whimpers.

Brandon will stay up until all hours of the night with me if a baby will not go to sleep, but if a baby wakes up at 2:00 am it is really useless to wake him as he probably just fell asleep himself.

Brianna, bless her heart, is just not a night person. The other children and I have had to come to terms with this. Somehow she did not get the night owl gene. When her clock shuts down for the night it is over. Now, she is the first one to rise in the morning and always has been, so what she lacks at midnight she makes up for at 7:00 a.m morning feedings!

Brooke has a heart of gold and good intentions. She will even plan our middle of the night sessions with the crying baby of the month. Pick a movie or two ahead of time and insist I wake her up when the little tyke starts to cry. Well, good intentions are just that sometimes. She really is a trooper if I have the energy to drag her out of bed, but a quick tap or jarring nudge will usually just cause her to pull the covers up tight as she rolls on over. The first few nights she will jump at the call, but when her sleep meter gets low and she is not functioning on her full beauty rest, it is hard to convince her to get out of bed for another round of Anne of Green Gables or Pride and Prejudice.

So what do I owe this night of a little over four hours of uninterrupted slumber? I would love to tell you, but then I'd have to kill you. . .


~Susan

How long will you lie there, you sluggard?
When will you get up from your sleep?
Proverbs 6:9