Solo. Again.

So, I'll be flying solo this week. Again. Thankfully, Chris hasn't been traveling since the end of November. But that stretch was a long one. And, thankfully again, he had today off and isn't leaving until tomorrow afternoon. So, hopefully, the week will not seem too long.

We usually keep pretty busy during the days with school work, playing, cleaning up the debris after the constant tornado of active children, and meals. But I am dreading the nights to come this week.

For about 3 weeks now, Elizabeth has not been sleeping well on a regular basis. I think that initially she was bothered by teething and then a minor cold. So naturally we wanted to cuddle her at night and help her feel better. I know we have no one to blame but ourselves that now she does not want to sleep alone.

Lizzie falls asleep quite easily (most of the time) once big brother and sister are in bed and it's quiet and dark. It used to be simple to lay her down once she was out. Even if she would arouse a bit or roll over, she would stay asleep fine. And then if she would awake at night, often she would fall back asleep on her own with only a little fussing.

That has all changed. Once she falls asleep, we carry her to her room, and she wakes up and starts crying immediately upon going through the door. Usually we still lay her down, but she just works herself into a full-blown screaming tantrum within five minutes. So we just get her back up and we have been taking turns sleeping with her in bed or on the couch.

This is what is worrying me about Chris being gone this week. If I'm here alone, the evening time after the kids are asleep is my time. I can take an hour and get a lot of real house work done, and then have an hour (or more) to just relax and catch up on some recorded tv or browse the internet. Or even just go to sleep early.

Chris is still here tonight. In fact he's upstairs holding Elizabeth right now. But I am already stressing out about how rough our nights this week could be.