Sunday, October 9, 2011

How my household is sleeping (or not) tonight.

I would like to apologize right now to my poor kids' teachers. You see, they are still awake and it is way past bedtime. We sent them to bed earlier, but for some reason they aren't sleeping tonight. Our 7-year-old just loudly threatened to tell on our 10-year-old for turning out his bedroom light. We were torn between reprimanding the latter- "Leave your brother alone!" and "Why are you not in your own room?"- or reprimanding the former- "Why is your light BACK ON?"

Kind of like the Tattle-telling About Open Eyes During Prayer dilemma.

 For the record, we reprimanded both. And NOT in our sweetest voices.

Anyway, I feel now like we should have gone with the Pretend You Didn't Hear Them So You Can Believe They're All Actually Asleep route. We'd save my vocal cords and not feel guilt for their teachers tomorrow. After all  Peter worked two twelve hour shifts this weekend, leaving me solo with all six kids both days long, so we're both entitled to a little self delusion.

Speaking of sleep, my husband is a couch sleeper. Not is a bad marriage sort of way, but in an I'm not tired yet, I'll be up in a zzzzzzzzzzzzz sort of way. Drives me slightly crazy, but he might come to bed more often if I didn't sleep-complain about the noise level of the TV. Hey, I can't help what I do after I'm already asleep. (Which is, incidentally, the same argument he makes for the couch sleeping.)

Would it be bad to sneak melatonin into his Diet Coke? So he would be tired enough to come to bed when his fuddy-duddy-early-bed-time wife does? It's not like I'm sneaking in Viagra or Arsenic or anything. It's like sneaking vegetables into brownies. Only with a natural sleep aid that I'm half convinced works for me placebicly. (placebo-ic? placebo-like? Imaginatively?) 

By the way, I would never actually sneak vegetables into brownies because the only one in the house who doesn't like vegetables would be the one doing the sneaking. My kids beg me to add broccoli to the menu. It's weird, I know. Also, they order asparagus at restaurants. Maybe all that healthy eating has made them immune to sleep. Or, more likely, they sneaked some of Peter's non-melatonin-ed Diet Coke.




Peter is snoring next to me on the couch while he watches the football game he recorded during his 12 hour shift. If I wake him up, he'll claim he wasn't asleep and not ready for bed yet. Also, I think I heard one of my sleeping children walking around upstairs.

So I am going to convince myself the footsteps are ghosts and slyly steal the remote out of Peter's hand to watch something more interesting. Then attempt to trick Peter into bed. 

(And yes, I know the play on words I could make about the tricks needed to get him to come to bed, but I'm above pointing them out. Oh crap, I guess I'm not.)

Good night.

  Photobucket

12 comments:

  1. Kimberly Carlile10/10/11, 7:16 AM

    There usually isn't much sleeping going on around our house right now either. Although Tyler slept a record 13.5 hours last night! I think it is the first time ever he has slept past 8:00 in the morning!! Yeah!!!

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  2. That is great news! I did get the youngest four to sleep in as long as possible. Made the morning more hectic, but I'm hoping their days go more smoothly.

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  3. Your house just sounds fun. Just go to bed and ignore the rest.

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  4. Oh GOOD! IƦ'm glad I don't have the only couch sleeping, watching recorded football games husband. He will sometimes sleep there all night and complain about a creek in his neck the next day. I have given up....

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  5. Hahaha! I can't imagine managing that many bedtimes when it's hard enough to coordinate our own! I'm in bed before my husband these days because he's too busy watching baseball :D

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  6. I feel your pain. I finally got mine down but it's very late. Grr!

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  7. Melanie Jacobson10/15/11, 8:28 AM

    Urf. I would give a lot for my kids to like vegetables. Did you know that a three-year-old can live on Mickey chicken nuggets for a year? Aaaaargh.

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  8. GrumpyGratefulMom10/21/11, 12:29 PM

    I can very much relate to the kids not going to bed. Some nights I get lazy and just give up which encourages the behavior! Luckily my kids are out of school for the next 3 weeks! Though I still want them in bed early. :)

    And my husband used to be the stay up late couch sleeper, but lately I've been the night owl, then exhausted the next day. Not one of my best trends.

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  9. I write this as I have just gotten my 2 kids to sleep 3 hours past their bedtime;) Eh..it's Friday night...does that make it okay?

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  10. Seriously funny stuff! My husband and I have played musical bed/chairs for years.

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  11. Heather James11/9/11, 11:57 AM

    Please email me! I have a question about your blog! :)

    HeatherVonsj@gmail.com

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