The Chronicles of Bedtime

“I’m still hungry mom…”
“I want some water mom…”
“I have to go potty mom….”
“Can I come up on your bed, just a little bit, mom?”
In our house, bedtime is an occasion for extremes. We have excellent nights or horrible ones, there is no grey area. If my two-year-old does not happen to fall asleep right away after her bath and book, she swiftly enters into the “point of no return,” where we all get pushed to our limits on energy and patience. It doesn’t matter how no-nonsense I get. Her melt-downs predictably wake up my five-month-old, or vice versa.
Sleeping arrangements air on the “open nest” format in our house. Our most restful nights come from the Dr. Sears side of advice (open-nest/attachment parenting) versus the Ferber method (cry-it-out/separation). Currently our master bedroom is cradling our entire household; my son’s pack-and-play and my daughter’s toddler bed next to our king-size mattress, which my husband and I also share with the cat and our 60-pound dog.
Last night, after being denied a second cup of milk, a fourth bedtime story and yet another stuffed animal to sleep with, my daughter, at three hours past her bedtime, decided to go for broke and ridiculously requested, “Can I watch ‘The Lion King’?”
What?!? No, you cannot watch The Lion King, go to sleep right now!
On nights like these, after I have passed my personal tolerance level for exhaustion and shenanigans, nevermind The Twilight Zone, it feels more like we are living in an alternate reality along the lines of C.S. Lewis’ Narnia. Half asleep with not an ounce of patience left, I could easily be confused as a lion, a witch, or perhaps I will search for a wardrobe to lock myself inside of.
Yet I am assured by a C.S. Lewis quote that, “miracles do not, in fact, break the laws of nature.” I guess that means I don’t have to wander into another realm looking for a good night’s sleep.
Indeed, on other evenings everything magically falls into place. The kids are both sound asleep by 6:30 p.m. for the night and my husband and I actually enjoy uninterrupted conversation or delight in a non-Disney movie for once. On these nights, I gaze at our sleeping babes in amazement, wondering what miracle sprung their cry-free slumber. I wonder if I could bottle the secret to forty winks. I would store it in an air-tight jar, unscrewed sparingly; specifically on nights when I felt even Prince Caspian couldn’t save us from a bedtime struggle. Until then, whether we are reading bedtime stories or creating them... The Chronicles continue.

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Making (Toddler) Time

Leaving the house makes me sweat. Don’t get me wrong, as someone who is tied down to the house most days of the week with a two-year-old and five-month-old, I enjoy breaking free of the cabin fever I often suffer by staying home. However, it is a significant ordeal to get packed, prepared and ready to leave. Regardless of how rigorously I prepare the night before, when I go out with the kids in the morning, the unexpected (which can always be expected), can be an industrial size wrench in the wheel. I can have the diaper bag stocked, lunch-box filled with nutritious snacks and drinks, clothes for the kids and myself neatly picked out and set aside all the night before… and still miss my mark for leaving the house by an entire half an hour or more.
Before we depart, I need to:
Have my toddler sit on the potty. (She sets her own timetable for this)
Change diapers.
Let the dog and cat outside and inside.
Feed the kids. (Have you ever tried to rush a toddler with breakfast or an infant with nursing? Not possible.)
Change more diapers.
Brush teeth. (“I can do it myself, Mommy!”)
Dress kids.
Get toddler to put down toys and have her hair brushed, and/or follow toddler around with hairbrush as she is playing with toys hoping to get a few strokes in.
Get baby in travel car seat.
Get baby back out of car seat because he is screaming.
Nurse baby again.
Change my clothes and baby’s clothes due to additional, unexpected spit-up.
Put baby back in travel car seat.
Put shoes on toddler.
Microwave a cup of coffee for myself to take along as breakfast.
Have toddler try to use the potty before we leave.
Grab keys, cell phone, bags, along with whatever stuffed animals my daughter has chosen to join us for the car ride.
Change my toddler’s clothes due to potty accident.
Let the dog and cat outside and inside.
Set house alarm and lock-up.

By the time I am actually stepping onto my back porch, bearing two kids, a diaper bag, lunch tote and a travel mug of coffee, I am almost always late, certainly sweaty and most unfortunately impatient.
It is difficult for me not to feel rushed and annoyed when I have been nearly ready to leave the house four or five times before having to leap back ten steps and try again. Like rolling the die in Monopoly and never getting to pass Go and collect $200, because you keep landing on the Go Straight to Jail square.
The other morning, I was trying to rush through the routine to get to a friend’s house for a playdate. My daughter was taking her time as God gave it to her to take. I was trying to cheer her on to go faster so we could see her friend (and so that we could take advantage of the fact that my son was finally asleep in his car seat and if I was lucky, he would use the entire car ride as his nap time).
Suddenly, my two-year-old, who happened across a plain brown paper lunch bag, asked if she could make a puppet for her friend we were going to visit.
“We don’t have time…” I answered hastily.
“Sure we do, mama… (hands me a clock) its right here.”
I couldn’t help but smile as I held the toy clock in my hands. If only it was that easy to “make time.” But then I thought, well, maybe it is. Perhaps we do have time, and it is right here, right in front of us always to do with as we chose. In the state of anxiety and aggravation that I self-created, I found myself in too much of a hurry. Through my child’s innocent concept of having time, I decided to take a deep breath and remember that God tells us to wait.
“Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.” -Psalm 27:14

The paper bag puppet is hanging proudly on our friend’s refrigerator.

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Beer or Cigarettes, anyone? How about just God?

Boy! I have had A DAY. And it's only the early afternoon! I'll tell you what, I don't drink and I don't smoke. But when I am lost in the chaos of a day like today, my mind wanders to find a vice. Any release to escape, to exhale, to relax and unwind!
I've been up since 5:30 a.m. with my two-year-old and four-month-old, which, in itself, is an hour and a half earlier than normal, not to mention, we went to sleep an hour and a half later than normal last night. Lost sleep. Cranky toddler. Did I mention, my daughter has decided no more diapers in her potty training process, and when I'm not hovering, I'm cleaning potty up off the floor? She started off good and had #1 and #2 in the potty. Whew! Then.... not so much. I was scrubbing pee off my new rug, and then she wanted a story but wouldn't get on the couch. I discovered that was because she had pooped her pants. *Sigh*
Meanwhile my son refused to take a nap anywhere but on my shoulder, while I was trying to get the dishwasher unloaded and reloaded and the mess on the counters from dinner the night before because I hadn't the energy to take care of anything before going to bed. (Moms, you've all been there.)
Next thing I know, while my son is nursing, my daughter, who was happily snacking on a small cup of cottage cheese with her spoon watching Blues Clues like usual, has picked it as the time to scientifically experiment with squishing the cottage cheese in both hands and smearing it completely and utterly all over her face and the table and floor (something she hasn't done with food in about 10 months). It is literally SUCH a mess that I have no choice but to strip her down and try to shower her off and wash the cottage cheese clumps out of her hair, along with the rest of her. The entire time I'm trying to clean my daughter off, my son is screaming bloody murder in his swing. On top of which, because it is raining and because our dog is a neurotic sissy, she is following me around acting scared of the "storm," making me trip on her as she tries to linger and stand under me or between my legs. This is an unignorable annoyance since she is a 60 pound lab/boxer.
By noon, everyone in the house needs a nap and I'm ready to kick the dog. My daughter resorted to a full melt-down, crying because she didn't want to hear me read Gerturde McFuzz and didn't want to take a nap. I started to pray for my much needed break. As I was sitting unshowered and half dressed on the floor next to the toddler bed, with my lap filled with my son on his boppy pillow, I started to daydream of different "fixes" I could use to escape since I couldn't physically leave the house. Too bad I don't smoke anymore. (The idea of it is appalling.) My husband and I don't drink so there's no alcohol on hand. No candy bars left after Easter. Maybe I could "unwind" with a nice cup of coffee, seeing as how caffeine is the only thing I have in the house. Love those imitation powdered mochas. As the idea of getting a break felt more and more utterly impossible, I was suddenly filled with the faith that God would answer even my small and seemingly impossible prayer that both the kids sleep and give me a break this afternoon by remembering one simple sentence:
With God All Things Are Possible.
All things, every little thing to every big thing. All things, are possible when I ask our Father. Right now? Both of my kids are completely passed out asleep and even the dog is content on the couch. My fix? I'm enjoying a nice cold glass of water as I type this in silence with nothing but the sound of God's rain drizzling down the window. Life is GOOD.

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