R is for Rest

***I’m going to try to post something every day in the month of November. I definitely may not- it’s just a goal and I’m not going to be upset about missing it! Hopefully in my spare time, I can come up with a post per day. My prompts are going to be the letters of the alphabet. I will write about something that starts with the day’s letter- think Sesame Street meets the blogsphere. Of course there are more days in the month of November than there are letters in the alphabet. I’ll cross that bridge if I come to it!***

Our school district has the entire week off of school for the Thanksgiving holiday. Not having to get up early any of the days for school portends well for rest for the students and staff. I hope to sleep in slightly longer than I normally do on the days that I sub. Family coming in to town for the holiday and staying with us does not portend well for rest- lots of things to coordinate, food to prepare, activities to plan, etc. I’m thrilled people are coming and can’t wait to see and feed everyone but it will be a lot of work. 

Last weekend, I made a purchase for our bed which means that sleep/rest has been on my mind. It’s kind of a stretch from bed to sleep/ rest but they are definitely related. Speaking of sleep, I have never been a good sleeper. That can be looked at positively or negatively. I mean, I don’t need a lot of sleep and that is a good thing. It served me well when the kids were babies and waking up multiple times in the middle of the night, when I trained for marathons and needed to go on long runs early on summer mornings, and now when I sub at two schools that both start really early in the morning. On the other hand, when I have trouble falling asleep, know that I can’t sleep in (if I fall asleep at 3:00 am, I won’t be able to sleep past 6:30 am), when I wake up at 2:00 am wide awake and KNOW that sleep is not forthcoming, well, it can be frustrating.

Donnie is the exact opposite of me in the sleep department. He can sleep anytime and anywhere. That fact about him makes me feel better when I wake up in the middle of the night and leave the room to go and read. I know he will likely not wake up and if he does, he will go back to sleep. I feel badly on the occasions when my getting up awakens him and he has trouble getting back to sleep. Perhaps he should heed his advice of, “just close your eyes and you’ll fall asleep” when I am having trouble sleeping and that will solve everything!!

But this post is not about the differences that Donnie and I have with regard to sleep… It is mostly about our bed, how comfy it is, now how festive it is and what I do to increase my chances of a good night’s sleep.  

A few years ago, we replaced our mattress with one of those memory foam ones. It is like what you’d imagine sleeping on a cloud would be! Highly recommend! These types of mattresses aren’t expensive either. I’m sure there are various price points/ different brands but ours was not pricey at all. I think we ordered it on Walmart’s website. 

A couple of years ago, I jumped on (well, under, to the extent you can jump under!!) the weighted blanket craze. I had read about them and the praise heaped on them seemed too good to be true. How could a weight placed on you be a good thing, something conducive to sleep? I decided to try for myself, being highly skeptical yet willing to try that unicorn of thing- a nice, long, restive night of sleep. I was shocked with how much I liked the blanket. It really did seem to help my sleep... for a little while. It could have been a placebo type thing (though I don’t think so- I don’t think you can placebo yourself a good night’s sleep). I still use the weighted blanket but not all the time. For instance, I took it off our bed in the summer (though truthfully the reason that I took it off the bed was to take it to New Jersey for the month of June. I was worried about how I would sleep out there and wanted to do everything to increase my chances of sleeping well.  When I came back to town, I didn’t put it back on our bed) but I will add it back to the bed soon. I should say, I will add it back to my side of the bed. Donnie wanted nothing to do with a weighted blanket when I told him that I was ordering one so I got one in a smaller size for just me.

One purchase/ product that we both agreed on was a down filled comforter. We discovered the brand Cuddledown when we were in Maine. These comforters are made in the USA, in Maine, to be exact. We are like most Americans and buy so much stuff made in China and other non- US countries. It is always nice to support a made in America business. 

This is from Cuddledown’s website- it cracks me up! We did not pay $16,999 for our comforter! We did not get an eiderdown filled comforter. We got a much cheaper filled comforter! There are all sorts of price points for the comforters. I think we paid less than $1000 for ours. 

I just ordered and received this coverlet to add some festive cheer to our bed.  I need to find some throw pillows to add; I will take a picture of the final festive product if/ when it happens. 

It may seem odd to love a weighted blanket and a down comforter; they seem to be mutually exclusive. However, I don’t always use the weighted blanket and Donnie doesn’t use it all. He loves the comforter and doesn’t have to worry about “competition” with an airy, lightweight covering’s polar opposite...

Throw in a noisemaker (but make the noise constant and not one of those varying sounds like frogs chirping randomly, thunderstorm- those sounds fill me with low grade anxiety) and I should be set for a good night’s sleep. Well, I girl can dream (if/ when she gets to sleep!). Wishing everyone lots of rest this weekend and all the others!