Sunday Morning Derailed.

Ella's sleep patterns can be so incredibly awesome or so unbelievably bad. There doesn't seem to be much middle ground for our girl. And although I make mental notes about what triggers her, it can be something completely different two weeks later.

Saturday night was some of her best work. Because of it, we had to play hookie from Ah-men yesterday morning. It was necessary - for all parties involved. We think He understood, in fact, we know He did.

Because there was massive amounts of whining about being cold (it was 80 degrees at 9am), we plopped her in the sun to eat her breakfast. We turned on relaxing music to fill the backyard in hopes to soothe the savage beast. It worked, for a short time...

...and Panda helped. But it spiraled downward shortly thereafter and she ended up going down for a nap at 11:30 (!) and slept it off for a few hours. I then took her to Aunt Mimi and Uncle Glenn's house to swim and swing and bounce on the trampoline. Over two hours of non-stop action.

I am happy to report that she slept 11 hours last night. Uninterrupted. Which means I slept incredibly well. And Daddy-O slept incredibly well. And we are very grateful to our friends for having a three-year old's dream of a backyard that saved the day.

Here's hoping the holiday week is filled with smiles, fewer off-the-chart fits and good sleep.