Sleep time

For about the last 6 months both kids have been asking for extra special treatment at bedtime. Xav, at about 7.30pm, always comes and asks me to take him to bed. He spends the whole day idolising his father, but come nighttime, it's his Mummy that he wants.

He then heads to the toilet, then bathroom to brush his teeth and we meet back in his room. He's usually picked out a few books, so we snuggle into his bed and start reading. After 5 or so books, I'm usually over reading and by then he's asking for me to tell him a story. I have 2 stories that I've made up and they have evolved over time, just for Xav. Ones about a little boy that wants to fly and one day grows wings, the other is about a little boy (see a theme?) who finds a magic fairy door in the garden. He loves both of them, and never tires of hearing either story every night.

~~Grubby hands and blankies~~

After I've finished the story, he rolls over and grabs his blankie for a cuddle. Then I get a request to either pat his back, run my fingers through his hair or lightly touch his back with my finger tips. Ok, I may be setting him up here for future fetishes here! But he loves all of them, and asks that I keep going until his asleep - I oblige. The lightly touching his back thing is a bit odd though. I just can't believe that it doesn't tickle him, instead sending him into a relaxed, docile trance. He often wanders up to Duane or I during the day asking for the back strokes too.

I love doing any of the above and watching him drift off to sleep. It's one of my all time favourite things - watching a child nodding off to dreamland. It's the beautiful moment as their body relaxes and they drift off - Bliss.....

Whilst all the above is happening, Grace has her Daddy performing much the same. They read some books and then Duane lays on her bed and they cuddle until she's asleep too.

We do sometimes mix it up, but for mostly I stick to Xav and Duane goes with Grace. It's become our quiet one-on-one with each child, and it's precious. Duane and I both do it eagerly and there is never any resentment for bedtime taking so long, sometimes we can be in there up to an hour. Mostly if it's taken this long though, it means the adult has fallen asleep too!

Now with all these lovely, relaxing night time rituals you'd think that they'd stay in their own beds all night? Nope, usually around the early hours of the morning (3-5am) we have 2 little bed buddies creep in. We barely even wake when they come in now, either they have improved their stealth qualities or we are learning to sleep through the disruption!

Xav cuddles into me and Grace snuggles in with her Daddy. Xav holds my hand as we sleep, which I just adore. Also, every day he picks a moment to tell me that we had lovely cuddles last night. Just today he thanked me for our last night snuggles as I buckled him into his seat - Just Adorable.

Duane and I both know it's not something we'll be doing forever, so we take the moments when we can.

**I probably should note here that the above photos weren't quite the tranquil picture they paint. Xav had a wonderful meltdown the other day, as he was tired and wanted to just lay on the couch watching a Dvd. I said no, which resulted in said meltdown. He was going crazy and throwing himself around, so I bear hugged him and reminded him to take deep breaths until his body softened. He then stomped off to his bedroom (still yelling about the injustice of it all) and layed down on his floor and went to sleep. It's just what Xav does when he has a rare meltdown, takes himself off for a rest.