The closest one can come to Mommy Dearest without a hanger

And so it is that I've finally lost my mind. WHAT WAS I THINKING to get bunk beds???!!! A bit PREMATURE you might ask? That would be CORRECT. Last night was quite the nightmare. Somehow the idea of sleeping on the top bunk elicited fears on a scale of well... a major earthquake in Southern California. Happening... NOW. No middle ground. Just PANIC off the chart. And how did I handle it? Poorly at best. In fact, I handled it so poorly that it might have been my worst night yet as a mother. I know...don't say that - I could be jinxing myself into many, many bad nights of pain. But, it's true. Last night I was awarded The Closest One Can Come to Mommy Dearest without a hanger. I screeched. I yelled. I was the poster child for Bad Mommy.

BOY shrieked. He quivered. He practically levitated off the bed. And I, well... I was incredibly tired and incredibly impatient. After things finally settled down and there was no more screeching from either of us, we figured it out. The mattress on top, must come down. And so, I moved the mattress to the bottom bunk and this simple gesture, resulted in a much calmer BOY. Of course, it would have been brilliant if I had thought of doing this, well... 45 minutes earlier. What followed were additional requests for water, resorting of various stuffed animals, pat pats on the back and getting the "special blanket" just right. Where was GIRL during all this? Lying contentedly in her little toddler bed, so glad that she didn't have to make the difficult choice of an upper or lower roost to perch on. What was I thinking! And so it seems that we'll have a clutter of furniture for a while in their room. One toddler bed that prevents the closet door from opening, and a bunk bed that is a fun adventure/place to stash the goods (various toys, blocks, dolls and bits of crumbled food) by day and a bit of a howler by night. Not unlike a werewolf. Can an almost 4 year old be a werewolf? I think it might be possible.

And did I mention the 4am call? The usual pad, pad, pad down the hall and BOY in the doorway of our room.

Mommy, I'm scaaared. Can I get in your bed?

Then after five minutes of sheet rustling and a general feeling of a washer on the spin cycle, the request changes:

Mommy, I want you to come back with me to my bunk bed.

And so I followed a little BOY back to his bunk bed and fell asleep to the rise and fall of his small shoulders and the nearby snores of GIRL, oblivious to it all. Hey, the bunk bed seemed pretty groovy to me at the time!

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