Nap Time

When it comes to nap time around our house this is usually what happens: I tell the girls that I have to go lay down with Samuel at which point I usually set up a show for them to watch but every now and then I tell them to just go in their room and play quietly (this is more likely to happen if they are already happily playing in their room). Then as I'm getting Samuel to sleep I will often drift off too and get a little nap of my own in. I'm a firm believer in naps and really love it when I'm able to get one. Well one day this little scenario played out where I had them playing in there rooms - only this time I completely crashed and instead of maintaining my barely-aware consciousness that I usually employ for nap times I slept hard. When I woke up an hour maybe and hour and half later the house was very quiet and still.  A little too quiet and still...Samuel was still asleep so I got up and started looking around for the girls. Because it was so quiet I assumed that they were outside in the backyard playing but when I looked out there they were nowhere to be found. This is when I started to have a little jump of panic in my heart. The thing is I have safety handles on all the doors leading to the front yard but Emmuska and Liberty are pretty clever and I'm never sure what they are going to figure out next. I pushed the panic aside and started looking through the house. It wasn't long before I found them sprawled out on Liberty's bed:

Okay maybe sprawled isn't the right word  for these particular sleep positions. Still there they were right where I asked them to stay. After enjoying the complete relief that this sight brought I enjoyed a couple hours of complete quiet, a pretty rare occurrence around here.

Sleep Mode

I don't know about your computer but mine is set up to automatically go into a sort of shut down mode if I don't do something (mouse movement or keystroke) after a lengthy period of time, say twenty or thirty minutes. Apparently Emmuska is also equipped with this feature. After roughly thirty minutes of being left to her own devises in a quiet house (usually when I'm laying down with Liberty for nap time and 'accidentally' fall asleep...) she can often be found slumped over whatever she was last working on before going into her own version of sleep mode. She usually falls asleep over her coloring books but I've seen her do this over many different endeavors including stories she's been reading, her computer game, various toys and movies. The real joy in it is the positions she ends up in. It's as if it would take too much extra effort or she is so devoted to her task that she can't be bothered with stretching out and laying down in a comfortable position/place. And then you have Liberty who has recently decided that she would rather fight me on the afternoon nap front and this is the end result. By the time six o'clock comes around she is so tired that she simply drop in her tracks. In this picture I was working on something while we were talking to each other (she had been actively responding...) after a fairly brief pause I look up to see that the poor girl had finally given in and just dropped. It's baffling to me that anyone would fight the idea of a naptime - especially when the result is not being able to complete a conversation because you've fallen asleep mid sentence. I guess appreciation of some of life's finer things comes with age...

Cuddlies

I found it interesting one night as I went in to make sure the girls were all tucked in their beds that the stuffed animals had ended up on the floor while the massive books are what each girl chose to cuddled up with/under. Emmuska has always loved taking her book to bed with her (though I admittedly tried to keep the book size a little smaller...) and it looks like Liberty is following after her. As I tried to pick the books up (in an effort to make their rest more comfortable) I encountered definite resistance. Emmuska relinquished fairly easily (once she's asleep there isn't a whole lot that bothers her...) but Liberty got quite upset as I tried to sneak the book out - grabbing at it and holding on for dear life (she has an impressive grip for a sleeping 20 months). I decided not to push the issue but obviously had to grab my camera. It is gratifying to see the value they place on the written word.