Can You Explain

See how precious she is when she sleeps?!?! I haven't seen too much of that sleeping face lately and mommy needs her sleep! These pictures were taken almost two years ago, look how little she was!

Why it is 11 o'clock in the evening and my child is still not asleep?!?! We have always had sleeping issues, from day one. Just when I think we have conquered a particular stage of some sort of sleep disturbane, we move onto another stage that is equally exasperating. A couple of months ago it was staying in bed. I fixed that by shutting the door each time I caught her up and out of bed. She was not allowed to re-open the door. She HATED having the door closed. I only allowed it to be open an inch or two, but having it shut that couple of inches was something worth staying in bed for, apparently. It sounds mean, but it's better than catching her painting her toenails, climbing the headboard, playing mommy to our Great Dane, having a secret dance party in the closet and many other things (all of which I busted her doing when she was supposed to be in bed). I station myself outside of the door and I learned that the dogs are a dead giveaway. If they start stirring and coming out of the bedroom then that means she is up and moving around. The exception is when they are forced to lie under a blanket and get their backs patted as their "mommy" instructs them that they have to go to sleep because she is tiwerd (tired). So assuming my station and closing the door worked for a couple of months. Now....not so much.

Her new thing is that she will stay in bed and she starts singing musicals at the top of her voice, or having full conversations with herself, and chit chatting to her invisible friend. So, I pulled out my handy dandy door trick and.........it doesn't work!!! She is now perfectly content to sit in the complete dark and converse with herself. So, I can make her stay in bed, I can make her lay down, how do you make her fall asleep?!?! I was ready to go to bed an hour ago, but I can't because if I fall asleep before she does than the mischief she could get into is just too scary to even think about! It also doesn't help that she is worse than a teenager to try to pry out of bed in the morning. You'd think she'd get it that it's better to go to bed at a decent hour than it is to go through all of that morning drama. I'll be glad when this phase is over, but I'm a little scared to think of what the next one could be!!