sleeping woes

today is monday and i am thankful. really i am. we are extravagantly loved by our heavenly Father. last weekend we traveled for a quick family reunion to meet my cousin's beautiful new wife and to see other cousins, aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters etc. it was fun, but resulted in serious sleep deprivation for the munchkins. since our return, graham has completely weaned himself and now sleeps all night. this is wonderful, truly. however, marit has really been struggling with her sleep. she has always been a great sleeper and does really well with bedtime ritual going to sleep on her own for TWELVE hours a night and usually a 2-3 hr nap. until last weekend. she has suddenly begun to scream hysterically before going to sleep. we thought she was afraid of the dark, so we put up globe chain lights. we frequently return to her (every 20ish minutes) to remind her of how much she is loved by us and by Jesus and to lay her back down. she is so tired. she frequently falls asleep if we drive for any length of time and her voice is hoarse. we struggle to know if she is manipulating us (we have been through those phases too) or if she is really afraid of something. the other night, she was finally quiet and we found her sound asleep like this:


isn't that so sad? pray for us to have wisdom to extend the love of Jesus to our dear daughter and to help her get the sleep she needs...