Babbling With Angels

Typically, I put my baby to bed while my husband puts our 7 year old to bed; I'm really good at the baby bedtime routine and he's really good at telling 2nd-grader-bedtime-stories... so, well, it works.
I usually start by giving Ava a warm bubble bath in our master bathroom Jacuzzi, then I massage her tiny body with baby lotion, button-up some warm cozy PJs on her, and hum "her song" as I lay her down in her crib and tuck her in. She loves her new pillow and fleece blanket I bought her last Christmas, and I have to tap her baby mobile so its flowers can sway around in circles above her bed...

If anything is off in our routine, it has the potential to throw our entire night off, so I'm certain to follow each step, making sure to tip-toe out of the room and down the stairs after I tuck her in before relaxing for the rest of the evening.
And that's our bedtime routine!
Well, usually.
This week my husband came home from work early feeling sick and achy, he's been in bed for 2 days straight now, whatever it is- it must be bad. Raising a family without a village means I have to pull double-duty during times like this, so tonight, I did my bedtime routine with Ava, and then picked up Ryan's baton and tucked in Delilah.
Ava's nursery and Delilah's room share a wall, so I'm particularly quiet tucking Delilah in because waking the baby is a huge regret! Tonight I sat in Delilah's cozy purple & pink room and talked with her awhile.
I love those still moments with just Delilah, she is growing into a young lady and I find it absolutely vital to just talk with her. So I sat there and played with her golden curls and asked her questions while she asked me some, too; she told me about her thoughts and feelings and I told her about mine. The lamp by her bed was reflecting off her blue eyes and I swear they looked just like the ocean waves, between her flawless skin and big eyes it was hard to not flatter her.
As we were talking, I thought I heard a noise from Ava's room, so I paused and we listened; sure enough it was Ava making sounds. "Oh no," I thought, "I need to be quiet and wrap this up with Delilah", but then I heard Ava talking!
It was honestly adorable. It was like this happy chatty babbling, completely cheerful and jubilant... yet I had tucked that baby in nearly half an hour ago! Had she been laying there awake the whole time?! And who is she talking to?
That's when it occurred to me-- she doesn't shut her eyes and fall asleep the very moment I shut her door at night, she lays in the bed like the rest of the human race as she awaits for sleep to come.
Just the thought of a 1-year-old angelically laying in her crib in a dark empty room, watching her baby mobile spin, while she's thinking, looking around, pondering, talking... it made me smile, I'd never had that thought before. I'd never even thought of her as someone who is in her own world... as she's usually always in mine.
And that's when I began wondering what it was she was saying, and to whom. This was a new concept to me, this idea that babies have to lay there for a bit before falling asleep.
So?
What are they doing?
What do babies mull over while they're drifting off?
What do they think about in those quiet, isolated moments?
What do they dream about?
Maybe they're thinking about their favorite moment that happened that day?
Maybe she's thinking about me? (aww)
Maybe she's processing all the new things she learned today?
Or maybe babies can see so much more than we can, more than we can fathom...
Perhaps she's watching angels dancing around her room, they're the ones making her giggle, twinkling around her room as they watch over her.
Or maybe she is more tuned into The Universe on levels I could never understand, and that babbling is far beyond my comprehension.
I suppose I'll never know.