TheMommyBlog

Monday, February 09, 2004 Tidbits on the Kidbits

Hey everybody, let’s sing it together!

Oh, it’s 1:30 in the morning
but we’re all wide awake!
Dylan wants his mommy
and Logan made a big mistake!
He fell asleep a-watching Beauty take her rest
and forgot to wake back up and is driving his mother up the fucking wall with his whining.

Seriously folks, sometimes it’s really easy to get your kids back to sleep in the middle of the night, and other times it’s, well, like tonight. I fell asleep with the kids watching “Sweeping Booty” at 8:30, and woke up at 12:30 to spend some quality time with the blog. (BTW, Lee, that cursed flash program is stealing my soul). Ten minutes into it, Dylan started whimpering. I tiptoed in, tucked him in, and tiptoed out. Another ten minutes. Whimper. Cry. Repeat routine, but throw in a five-minute lie-down for good measure. Repeat four more times. On sixth rep, try to wait it out. Go back in when cries wake up the other sleeping child in the room.

Decision point: calm the freshly tearful child in the hopes that he will be an easy soothe? Or go to first one to make up for having ignored his cries on appeals five and six? Right. Go with the one screaming the loudest, or you’ll soon have three crying children.

Logan was wailing about not being able to fix something, and I thought, “Ooooh, he must be dreaming--I can fake him out.” So I started out tellling him that it was all right, that we could fix it. He protested that it was impossible, so I turned it up a notch. “Look, hon, it’s almost done… Look! We fixed it!” “Nooooooooooo! We can’t!” “Why not, honey?” “The clock can’t go backward! Waaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!”

Uh, oh. He’s got a point. The space/time continuum does not respond to my ministrations. Shit. I continued to let Dylan wail over on his side of the room and dropped the charade. “What seems to be the problem, Logan? Why do we need to turn back time?” “I fell asleep and forgot to wake back up!” “OK! Well, there isn’t anything I can do about that for you. We are all trying to sleep, and if it helps you feel better, I was right there with you. Out cold and drooling on my pillow by 9 pm.” “Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!” I looked up at Gil standing behind me. “Well, I’ve done what I can. He’s all yours.” And I climbed in with Dylan.

I usually try to stay on top of the covers, because it wakes him up if I try to slip out from under the comforter when I leave. In fact, I could hear Gil rustling under Logan’s blankets and thought, well, he’s toast. He’ll be there till morning. So, I lay there, shivering, teeth chattering, thinking, “It’s frickin’ cold in here (or as Lee would say, letting his facial lips go limp and blowing them out so that they flap like a hound dog’s ears in a stiff breeze. “brbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrr!”)!" And, being the blog nerd that I am, I thought, “Well, at least I have something to post while I wait to be sleepy enough to go back to bed. But, holy tomatoes, it is frickin’ cold in here! Brbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrr.”

But soft! I hear Daphne now, and she sounds pissed! Time for the midnight shuffle to begin again…