Marley & Scrubs

You know that scene in Marley & Me where Jennifer Anniston has just gotten all her kids to sleep and she falls onto her bed, arm draped over her dog, in pure exhaustion, only to have the garbage truck roll by sending Marley into a barking fit and causing both babies to wake up crying?

Today, that happened to me.

I decided to try something new today. I draped a sheet over the comforter of the guest bed and let Scrubs take a nap on there with me. I'd do it on our bed, but I don't want him to get into the habit of thinking he can sleep with me. And, our bed is really high. I'm not Scrubs could jump up there without a real running leap.

You could tell Scrubs was in heaven when I said, "Up!" and he realized I was going to let him join me. Me? Get on the furniture? With you? He immediately jumped up and draped his chin over my leg ... pure doggy heaven.

In fact, we were all in heaven. Elijah fell asleep on my chest. I'm big on not having my kids sleep with me, but I have taken Joia's advice. She once told me that when Keenan was a baby she used to try to take at least one daily nap with him. I thought this was a great idea, and I tried to do it with Isaac and now Elijah as often as I can while they are still a little baby. Some days he doesn't want to go to sleep, other days we are interrupted by Isaac waking up or me having to go to the bathroom. But today, it worked perfectly! Elijah was asleep on my chest, Isaac was asleep in his crib, I was asleep on the bed, Scrubby was asleep on my leg . . .

And then . . .

The Fed Ex man came by. He didn't need a signature or anything. He just rang the bell to let me know he was there!

For those of you who don't know Scrubs personally, you may not know that he is not a big barking dog. I've heard this is a little true of the breed, and it is definitely true of him. He'll give a little bark now and then, but never usually more than one unless he is really unnerved. But this ring woke him out of a dead sleep, and he was in a new place, on a new bed, in the back of the house where he couldn't see what was going on and couldn't protect us from the big bad Fed Ex guys. He jumped off the bed, went running down the hallway barking, causing both Elijah on my chest to start crying and Isaac in his crib to wake up crying!

And I think I started crying too. :( I felt bad after that because I got so mad at Scrubs. I really yelled at him, and I could tell that he had no idea why. He just sat there looking at me as if to say: I thought I was supposed to protect you! That's my job!

Poor Scrubby. Poor me. Poor boys. Nap time over.

I've decided to put a note on the door asking people to knock instead of ring the bell. I hope that doesn't appear rude. I'm also going to ask that the package guys just drop their package off if they don't need a signature. We'll find it eventually.

My little Marley . . .