IN MY ARMS

For the last two days, Ryder has fallen asleep for his naps in my arms....I know, I know, it's not a good habit to start.  I should just put him in his crib awake so that he can learn to "self sooth" I should walk away and let him cry, I should close the door, and not turn on the monitor for at least 10 minutes...blah, blah, blah!!   All of the things I "should" do run briefly through my head but the thoughts flutter away again just as quickly when I begin rocking my "growing up too fast" boy in my arms.  One look at his droopy little eyelids, his chubby cheeks moving in rythm as he sucks his pacifier, his pudgy fingers kneading his blanket, and his chest rising and falling with each relaxed breath and I cannot bring myself to  let go of him.

Normally I read a couple of stories, he happily sucks his soother and clutches his blanket, rubbing the tags.  Normally, he is so relaxed at the end of the stories that I do. I gently lay him in his crib, turn to walk away and...his eyes pop open.  He scrambles to stand up and begins chucking things out of his crib. His soothers, his blankets, the stuffed animals I didn't even know he could reach, they all get tossed onto the floor, while he sometimes babbles and sometimes hollers for me. Normally, I do. I shut the door, walk away and leave the monitor off for ten minutes. More often than not, he falls asleep by the time I turn the monitor on. But, with my back to work date rapidly approaching, I've been feeling all emotional and clingy.
After the stories are read and he is super relaxed, I've taken to rocking the chair and singing. Yep, singing.  Seriously, I know what you are thinking, especially if you've heard me sing, but honestly, Ryder is one of the few people in this world, not counting Scout, or the fourth grade French Students who could never get enough of my rendition of, "Je suis un Pizza," who truly, truly appreciates my singing.  (At least he hasn't complained about it yet..)

He can't sing along and he doesn't really understand all of the words yet ofcorse, which makes it easy to make them up when I run out of the ones I know to the lullabyes. (I have come up with some pretty clever rymes too, if I do say so myself, not always age appropriate and not always PG, but always funny!)

It never ceases to amaze me, that I can put anyone to sleep this way.  The rocking, the snuggling, the singing.  I love it!! I love the way it feels to have my sleeping baby in my arms. I love it more than caring about what I am supposed to do to create good sleep habits, and I love it more than caring if I spelt lullabyes right or wrong....(Yes, Nic, I can tell it looks wrong....) I love it too much to put him in his crib, even when my arm starts to fall asleep and the phone starts ringing and the timer on the muffins I'm baking is going off....

He obviously isn't sleeping in my arms here, but he is sleeping..isn't he perfect???