Musical Mornings

Murray went to bed last night like an angel. This is the first peaceful bedtime we've experienced since we took his pacifier away - almost 2 weeks ago. Serenity finally reigned again. . . or so I thought. Murray woke up at 3:30am, and instead of going back to sleep, decided it was morning. First, we let him cry it out. He has learned how to jump up and down in his crib, and in the process of his tantrum, hit his chin on the railing. Thirty excruciating minutes and a bloody lip later, I went into his room and attempted to settle him down by sitting on the floor next to him( Craig needed to be up at 4:30am for work, so I wanted him to get every extra minute of sleep he could). My attempts at getting the stubborn child back to sleep failed miserably. Nothing worked; singing, holding his hand, rubbing his back, ignoring him, or even reprimanding him. I finally gave up at 5:00am and trudged to the living room, where Murray merrily played with toys and watched "Diego" while I fought with every ounce of my being to stay awake. At one point, I dozed off. I can't tell you how long I was out, but I can tell you that I woke thinking I was at a concert. "Amarillo By Morning" by George Strait was blasting out of the stereo. I bolted upright - startled - and the sight I saw almost brought me to tears (at the time they were tears of frustration, but looking back, the whole incident is hysterical). Murray was dancing like a crazy fool all over the living room. Arms flailing, jumping around, turning in circles - the whole bit. The dogs were staring at him as if he were an alien, and the cat was hiding in the china hutch. Murray was oblivious to everything except the joy of dancing to the musical magic that is George. So even though I'm sleep deprived again, I have another happy memory stored in my heart. However, we won't be converting his crib to a toddler bed anytime soon. I like the fact that he can't get out of bed on his own. . . yet.