He may be the death of me, but he sure is cute

Nate doesn't feel the need to sleep. He is like his oldest brother in that respect and because the three children between them were really great sleepers, I had forgotten what it feels like to have a little one who thinks sleep is for everyone else.

Now don't get me wrong, when I say he doesn't sleep, I actually should say he doesn't nap. At least like most almost-fifteen-month olds I know. He sleeps well at night, going down around seven and waking sometime after six in the morning. But he went from three to two to one nap extremely early. He has been down to one nap for several months now and that nap is getting shorter and shorter as the days pass. If he sleeps for just over an hour, that is a pretty normal day. If he sleeps for two hours, I think I have died and gone to heaven.

But the biggest issue of the whole thing is that most of the time he is fine with that little sleep--which makes it so pushing him to sleep more just makes both of us unhappy. He is just one of those kids that doesn't require a lot of rest. I guess Jacob is that way, but it is much more adorable on a grown man who can take care of himself when he wakes up early or goes to bed late.

The other night, our darling friend Lorri tended the three youngest boys while Jacob and I went to the opening night of Annie's play and our Cam had the opportunity to go to a Celtic's game. (Thanks so much Lorri!) And as I do during the few times that someone else is tending the kids, I tell them to do what works for them. I let them know what the normal routine we usually go through is, but if it makes life hard on the tender, go ahead and let those kids of ours stay up a bit late. If the little one is happy and not pestering the kind person being willing to stay with our kids, no big deal for a night.

And so, Lorri let Nate stay up as long as he was happy. Which was more than two hours past his regular bedtime (see sentence above about him being just fine without sleep). And Nate was not only happy, he was in heaven. I could just imagine his little brain thinking, "Finally, someone realizes that putting me in that dumb crib at seven is cramping my style. I have things to do, people to play with, a house to destroy."

And when we arrived home around 9:30 that night, this is what greeted us:

Apparently I've been going about parenting our fifth child all wrong.
It appears Nate would like to request the party-til-you-drop approach.


(And for the record, the little munchkin woke up just before 6:30 the next morning.
And slept an astounding hour and fifteen minutes for his nap. Did I mention he was cute?)