Midnight Blankie washings

It's the middle of the night and I'm awake AGAIN doing a midnight blankie washing. Let me explain....
My children all went through varying stages of attachment to their blankets. My first one was a thumb-sucker and a blanket girl but never formed a major attachment to either. My second one was a thumb-sucker and a blanket boy and has a mild attachment (i.e. if he doesn't have it, he can still sleep soundly). My third was a pacifier baby for the first two years and a blanket boy and had a moderate attachment (i.e. threw a fit at bedtime if it wasn't there but could sleep okay without it). My fourth little one, though, never had a pacifier or sucked a thumb passed three months of age...she has her blankie.
In our house, Sydney's blankie is considered a being, not an object most of the time. She can be playing quite nicely without blankie and not seem to notice and, all of the sudden, blankie's presence is necessary immediately and she runs off to get it. I have witnessed this happening in the middle of a movie/t.v. show she likes, while building with blocks, and everything in between. She can function quite well out and about without it for hours at a time and yet it's a necessity in the car if we're going to be gone too close to bedtime or for an extended period...she may not even touch it in the car but just wants to know it's there. Poor blankie has had an incident with the washer and had to be trimmed down several inches. Blankie has been puked on, pooped/peed on, drooled on, and dragged through the dirt. Blankie has been sobbed for through the toddler years when it took a trip through the washer and anticipated greatly as it makes a trip through the dryer. Blankie is often called "Sydney's best friend" and anybody that knows her well, knows that blankie is just part of life for her.
On the incidence of her first bout with vomiting since infancy (by the grace of God, she has avoided the flu), she threw up all over her bedsheets, pillow, and blankie in the middle of the night. After cleaning her up and stripping the bed, I laid her on the makeshift bed on the sofa and started to train her on throwing up IN the throw-up bowl. Here's a short passage of our conversation....
Me: Do you want me to sit with you for a little while?
Sydney: No, I just want blankie
Me: Blankie's in the washer right now but you can have this Tinkerbell quilt instead
Sydney: (after recovering from a complete meltdown) Can I have blankie when it's done?
Me: Of course you can. I'll stay up until blankie's dry and then you can have it back. Do you want me to sit with you now?
Sydney: No I just want to watch cartoons and feel sickies.
I realized a few small lessons while staying up during this midnight blankie washing....
Lesson 1: The cartoons during the middle of the night are just as bad, if not worse, than what's on during the day for the most part.
Lesson 2: It is completely rational to take a load out of the washer and put it into a basket to wait for the sheets from the sick child's bed to wash just so that you can switch blankie (by itself to dry faster) into the dryer before putting the clothes from the washer into the dryer.
Lesson 3: I am TREMENDOUSLY fortunate that my children are healthy, vibrant kids. They have little health issues here and there but, overall, they are healthy, strong kids! God has truly blessed our household with tremendous health.
Lesson 4: (And I learn this lesson daily it seems) God's plan is always better than ours. If our family planning methods had worked the way they were supposed to, we wouldn't have the four healthy amazing kids that we have. In fact, we took drastic measures to prevent more children after Daniel and God's plan brought us Sydney. I can't imagine life without her, or any of the other children
Lesson 5: Everyone has their own "security blanket" that they hold onto. For myself , it's Jesus but it hasn't always been that way. I've held on to things and people and have even held on to habits like a security blanket and I didn't just have a minor attachment...mine was a red-alert-no-holds-barred attachment. The bad news is that things get broken, disappear, get lost, and have no real value in the end. People are going to disappoint you sometimes because we're all human and it's part of life. Bad habits are going to prove to you while they're called "bad" habits when it comes down to it and they're going to make your life harder for you. Jesus never fails. His love is abundant and overflowing. He doesn't break, disappear or get lost. He won't disappoint you and He's always there when you need Him. And the best part of all is that Jesus' gift of love and salvation is free to EVERYONE and isn't dependent on how pretty you are, how much money you have, who your family is, or anything else...it's unconditional and abundant love.
So while I'm yawning and pleading with the dryer to hurry up and finish drying blankie so I can go to bed, I ended up with a humbling lesson that I never expected.