frustration

Naps are becoming a very frustrating part of our day. It seems like all I do is fight with the girls to take their nap. They are DEFINITELY not ready to give up the nap, but I don't understand why they fight it so much. 

On a typical day, our nap routine ends up like this...

• After eating lunch we sit around and read almost all of the books we own or have checked out from the library...ok, maybe not all of them since that would take all day, but we read a lot of books.

• After awhile, Little Pie gets tired and starts sucking her thumb and positioning her bunny into the perfect position and lays her face on her bunny...starting to get comfortable. I take this as a sign that it's nap time. 

• I announce that it's time to put the books away and go upstairs to take a nap. Both girls sing the "books away" song and help me put them away. They grab their bunny/frog and run to the stairs excitedly. I take this as a sign that they are ready for a nap. 

• After a couple of diaper changes, the girls get snuggled in their "cozies", I give them each kisses and they both say bye bye. I take this as a sign that they are ready to fall asleep.

• I head back downstairs to clean the huge lunch mess and no less than five minutes later I hear the girls squealing and singing and counting and talking and laughing and being the silliest they can be. I take this a sign that they don't want to nap. :(

Unfortunately this can go on for over an hour. They eventually fall asleep, but sometimes it's so late that by the time they get up it's almost time for supper and we don't really have time to go anywhere for an afternoon excursion. sigh. I've tried putting them down a little bit later, but we still end up going through the same process and lose even more afternoon time. I don't know what the best thing to do here so I'm just going to keep trying! The girls will nap. The girls will nap. The girls will nap. The girls will nap.

I am really dreading the day that the nap goes away. Right now it's such a relief to have a break from chasing them around and keeping them safe. I know that as they get older, I can trust them more, but right now it's so exhausting just to keep them alive with no broken bones, that nap time is a necessity for me to get some energy back. I need to stop thinking about that time though and enjoy the nap time that I do have now... however much longer it lasts!