Midnight Crawl

It is three o'clock in the morning, and I hear a voice whispering softly to me in my dream. I continue to sleep. Then the voice gets louder more urgent, and this time succeeds in waking me up. Mommy, I can't sleep says the blanket hording boy lying next to me. My husband is missing, evidently he decided to go to Andrew's room when he climbed into our bed, lucky guy. Again, Andrew says "I can't sleep" and I say shhh, shhhh, he goes," don't say shhhh".

Alright count sheep, I say trying not wake up, and to my amazement he agrees. I know it is because he loves animals and that this appeals to him even at this early hour. To make it interesting and perhaps quicken his process back to dreamland, I say, breathe in deeply, and change the color of the sheep, breathe out slowly and change it back to white. He loves this early morning game. A few moments later he says sleepily, "the sheep are really tired now, and I think most of them are asleep."

Then silence.... beautiful silence! But now I'm wide awake and my mind begins to actively plan my day. So, I count sheep, changing their colors, back and forth ...

One day, Andrew will stop coming into our bed in the middle of the night (at least I hope so), but I will always have warm willy memories of sheep counting in the wee hours of the morning...