Pigs in a Blanket!

Monkey (that's Nate for the uninitiated) has been really difficult to work with the last week. He insists on being held and rarely sleeps for longer than 15 minutes at a time until we put him down for the evening.

When Audrey was a baby she often had difficulty falling asleep. We tried rocking her, pacing with her, a whole gamboozle (yes, gamboozle) of things. Nothing seemed to really work. Eventually we found that dancing with her would at least quiet her down.

It shouldn't come as any surprise when I say that I am not musically gifted. I could not maintain a good rhythm without putting some music on the stereo. With Audrey, I made a CD of Coldplay, Depeche Mode, Dave Matthews Band, and some other (typically) mellow groups. Without fail, Audrey would fall asleep as soon as track 3 rolled around (Depeche Mode's Precious). She became so conditioned to the song that we would play it in the car when she started crying and without fail it would put her right to sleep.

So tonight I played a few songs for Monkey to try to get him to sleep - Coldplay's Life in Technicolor ii and Viva la Vida, Jason Mraz's The Remedy, etc. He was out halfway through the third song and slept a good 40 minutes (until I turned the CD off - bad move on my part).

As I was bouncing the Monkster around Audrey grabbed her doll, wrapped it in a blanket, and proceeded to dance alongside me. After a song or two, she put her doll in the baby swing and told us all to be quiet because her baby was asleep. It makes me realize just how careful I have to be around the little mimic. The last thing I want is for her to grow up to be just like her daddy...