A little helper with a giant heart

We've had so many storms here lately, and most of them have been happening either at night time or, worse, in the middle of the night.


When you have little ones, storms that come in the middle of the night generally translate into toddlers who end up in your bed in the middle of the night. At least, that has been our experience during our Illinois thunderstorm seasons, anyway.


As previously stated on Facebook earlier in the week, you can be certain that our queen bed will fit five people--however, it will not do so comfortably. So, Shane and I have sort of been playing musical beds lately. When we are wrenched out of our deep, wonderful, peaceful sleep awakened at night by one or more boys creeping into our bedroom, we get up and 'make the switch'. One of us will sleep with two of the kids in our bed, and the other will go into the boys' bedroom and sleep in Colin's bed (the most comfortable and roomy of all of their beds) with the remaining child.


And, of course.....they return to sleep, and have a wonderful night of peaceful dreams.


We wake up (if we ever slept at all) with backaches from being in contorted positions and bruises from where they've kicked or smacked us sometime in the night.


*sigh*


A couple of nights ago, while putting Ethan to bed, he began to cry. Colin, ever the helper and wonderful big brother, grabbed his blanket and "Neena", his stuffed animal, hopped out of his bed and said, "I'll lay with E, Momma!"


And, he did.


And, Ethan loved it.

And, more importantly, he fell right asleep, and stayed asleep all night long.

This has been the habit now for a couple of nights in a row.....Shane puts Colin back in his bed once they are both asleep, and none is the wiser. I'm not sure how long it will continue, but I just love that little protective instinct that Colin is showing. He has such a heart for his brothers!