Confident Kid

I know my son loves me.  I know it every time he smiles when he sees me.  I know it when he takes my hand to lead me some place.  I know it when he reaches out for a gentle hug and when he runs at me full force giggling and crashing into me.

But I am also learning he is a confident, secure, independent little boy.  He made this abundantly clear two nights ago.  I laid him down and told him good-night.  He got up pretty quickly.  I decided to give him about five minutes to see if he would put himself back to bed.  (He was REALLY tired when I put him down.)  I checked on him and he was still sitting contently playing with a box.  When I opened the door, he went to his bed, rubbing his eyes.  I gently told him it was time to go night-night.  I thought if I sat down on the floor of the hall with the door open, he would stay in bed and close his eyes.

No sooner did my tush hit the floor than his feet did too.  He walked over towards me.  I thought he wanted to snuggle.  Nope.  He closed the door on me!!!!  I couldn't help but laugh to myself.  So I thought I'd see when / if he would go to sleep.  I checked on him twenty minutes later.  He had pulled 85% of his books off of the shelf and was playing happily by himself!  I changed his diaper again.  He could barely keep his eyes open on the changing table.  I rocked him for a few minutes.  He seemed ok with the idea of going to sleep so I put him in his bed.  I sat beside him, patting his back.  He closed his sweet little eyes.  As soon as I paused the patting, he opened that top eye to see if I was still there.  Sneaky little booger!  I continued patting, he continued checking.  Eventually, I outlasted him and he found he could no longer open that eye.

He slept through the night just fine.  But I kept shaking my head at my two-year-old closing the door on me. I love how much he loves me.  And I love that he feels safe and secure enough to want to be alone as well.