So my toddler is in her room right now, screaming, "Help! Help, Mommy. Help, Daddy!" It doesn't mean anything besides the fact that she's just been laid down for her nap and doesn't want to stay in there. It's a pro forma thing, done just after climbing out of bed and before sitting down to play for an hour before falling asleep.

She's like me. I have never been able to fall asleep right away. I can remember when I was a kid, lying in bed at night for what seemed like hours, thinking about this and that, my mind turning over ideas with the consistency of a ticking clock. Sometimes I'd get myself so worked up about something that I wouldn't be able to fall asleep at all, but usually it helped to entertain me while I waited for my body to calm down enough to drop off.

So I let my daughter have her time. She'll crawl into bed and fall asleep when she's ready, an hour after I put her down (regardless of what time she goes down it always takes an hour for her to fall asleep.) She's busy and happy, Mommy gets an extra hour to herself, and if the baby stays asleep we're all going to get the chance to nap this afternoon. Hooray!

And to think of all those times I fought with my mother over taking naps ... Wow, I've gotten old!