It never ends

Whenever I think that we have Arabella's sleep issues licked, they come back in a new form. For awhile, she was sleeping straight through the night and only waking at about 7:30 or 8 am.

But this past week she has been geting up before the alarm (6:30) and coming into our room. She will crawl into bed beside me, snuggle for about 90 seconds, and then announce that she wants to go downstairs, she wants to go outside, she is hungry and wants breakfast, or some other thing that requires me getting out of bed. Since she can forage things off the top of the refrigerator, I am a little fearful about what she might get into if I allow her to head downstairs on her own.

This morning I think the thing that woke Arabella was the cat howling outside my bedroom door (it's open, but this is the way the cat signals she wants something that is outside the bedroom) at 6:20 in the morning. I can and often have ignored the cat. She will never grow up and go on Oprah or be responsible for my health care in my old age, so she can wait until I get up of my own choice. The cat is so round as to have been labeled obese by the vet, so I have no fear of her starving to death in the hour before I choose to get up. But she howls piteously that she is a starving cat, and the howling is so loud it wakes Arabella, who decides the sun is shining, it must be time to wake up and bring her favorite person into the light with her.

And then, after getting me what could pass for dressed and downstairs, and while I am drowsily eating my cheerios, Arabella asks me, "mommy, why are you awake?"

Where are some friendly child-buying gypsies when you need them?