and i thought we were over the sleep issues...

Today while in the pediatrician's office waiting for Sam and Naomi to have their annual well-child visits, I browsed through a tired and dog-eared issue of Good Housekeeping from last year. Though I was hoping for some truly miraculous good housekeeping secret, I found an article by a mother who was talking about how she let her eight year old daughter sleep with her.

"She's only little once," she was quoted as saying and my first reaction was that this was very sweet. I looked up at my brood waiting not-so-patiently in the waiting room, fighting over the toys, and rolling around on the floor like small possessed animals. But it was a nice idea and I thought at that moment that the next time they tried to climb in bed with us in the middle of the night, I'd totally let them stay, instead of escorting them back to their beds, exhausted and muttering the mantra, "We all sleep in our own beds."

And then I read on to see that she only had one child and a king-sized bed.

And so I changed my mind.

Because even though I love cuddling with my kids more than most other activities, I'm rotten company in the middle of the night. And now that these kids are continuing to grow bigger and bigger and bigger, there just isn't enough room in our queen-sized bed for five people, and that's what usually happens when one kid ends up joining us in bed. And a Brangelina-sized bed isn't in our cards.

But hours later after reading that article, I'm wondering if I'll regret not letting them sleep with us once they're too old to want to. I mean, we have the occasional slumber party where we know nobody is going to get any sleep. And we cuddle in the morning, though that usually ends up in a wrestling match between Tali and Sam.

But I know that the time is coming quickly when they'll be embarrassed by our public affection toward them. And soon they'll be sleeping in longer than us (one can really hope, right?), and we'll have all the room in our bed that we want.

So maybe if one of them sneaks into bed tonight, I'll just pretend I don't notice. I think I may be the one with the biggest sleep issue.

putting a lid on the crib

Naomi did something the other night that her older siblings have never done.

After waking up at 3am and refusing to go back to sleep, making futile demands for more lullabyes (her fave is Dayenu still), and generally waking up the entire family with her screams, she climbed out of her crib, padded over to our room and shouted "I fell outta my crib!"

Because she is my third, I know there is little exciting about the transition to big kid bed, especially since I haven't really slept well for at least eight years. And because the little girl is just two, I know keeping her to a bed would be close to impossible.

But seriously, knowing that she can climb out of bed is really infringing on my sleep. I can't relax knowing that she might try again and then fall and hurt herself getting out.

A friend recommended a crib tent, but I checked out a few stores and people looked at me like I was insane. You'd think I'd asked for a toddler-sized cage.

But I know if I put her in a bed, she'll be out of it about a trillion times a night.

So here's where I ask for your help... What would you do?

(And if you have a crib tent you're not using, please send it my way!)