Daddy's Little Elf

When I was younger, bedtime was bedtime and there was no arguing with it. It was an inescapable fact that at a certain time we were supposed to be in bed with our heads on the pillow and, at least attempting, to go to sleep. Of course, Jonathon and I were probably the two most difficult children to get to bed that Daddy and Mommy have ever had. Getting us to bed was difficult enough and to actually get us to stay in bed was an entirely different proposition and quite an accomplishment when achieved. So, needless to say, the exceptions to our bed times were few and far between.

Yet Ania, the 9th little one, seems to have figured out and mastered the technique which none of the rest of us ever quite perfected. She has got Daddy's number and when she is put down in bed and, for some reason, does not quite feel like being confined there right at the moment, she calls for Daddy...not Mommy.

On the night that we were decorating the Christmas tree, Daddy was summoned from the festivities by a sobbing voice calling out most pitifully from the wooden cage where she was immured, doomed to hear the sights and sounds of the merry festivities, yet unable to partake, separated by wooden bars and a staircase from the place where she wanted most to be. Her complaint was real enough, after all, Christmas only comes once a year, and she was missing out on the very greatest enjoyments of the holiday, the decoration of the tree. Well, Daddy could not resist the tearful pleading with which she pronounced his name,the eloquence of her very crestfallen face, and the scalding hot tears that raced each other down her plump cheeks.

And so, this is the result...

The tears were replaced by dimpled smiles, the idle hands were busied about the embellishment of the tree, and Daddy was the hero of the hour, her liberator from the unhappy prison in which she had been confined. Altogether, I think that the Christmas tree was improved in appearance by the deft adjustments made by those chubby little hands.

And I don't suppose that the little pixie will soon forget the Christmas that she was able to stay up long after her older brother and sister, Austin and Annie, were put to bed and assist in the decoration of the Christmas tree.