This year I'm having the hardest time getting the older girls to bed by 8:30PM. I don't know what the problem is. Do I lack motiviation? Are they rebelling? Has the New Baby messed up the rhythm of the household so much?
I try to get them to bed. I really do. But then there are other nights where I just don't feel up to the fight. And yes bedtime is a fight.
Professionals all talk about having a bedtime ritual. They say do not deviate from it. But really do these people live in the same world as I do? I mean... what about the school event scheduled for 7PM. What do you do then? Tell the school, "I'm sorry but that is conflicting with the bedtime ritual I've created for my children." And yes to get them to bed for 8:30PM you must start the ritual by 7PM.
Frankly we lost what ever ritual we had. I don't know where it went to. All I know is that by 5PM I'm ready to shut the house down but the kids are not. In fact their schedules are so that we don't get home until after 5:30 most days.
Today I got lucky and got dinner in the crock pot. In fact today is our longest day. We won't get home until after 6:30PM. In fact Wednesday we won't get home until 8:30PM. I love Wednesday nights. I get to meet with some mothers that I absolutely adore. These are the neatest young women. We sit and talk and watch each other's children. Between the 3 of us we have 13 children. One of them wants a 5th child so bad you can see it shining in her eyes. I just love watching us herd our kids around together. We make quite a group. Plus it's like herding kittens. It's impossible.
What's really funny is to see the disapproving eyes of folks. They don't like our children at our church too well. They think we have too many. Funny that, since we are all Catholic. Our kids aren't bad. Okay. There are times when they get a little loud and run but hey they are kids! Kids do that. Those rich bitch kids at the Catholic school are ruder than our kids ever are. Oh well. Money smooths everything over I suppose.
Sorry for the tangent. Anyway, I'm just wondering if I'll ever get back into the swing of things. Bedtime. How very difficult bedtime is for me these days. If only PF won't bellow so. I don't know. I'm just feeling very mellow these days. I'm wishing the kids would just get motivated to go to bed on their own. Pipe dreams.
The ramblings of a mother with four small girls.
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Me from a past life
About Me
- pastgrace
- My life is a journey. This journey is full of twist and turns; ups and downs; storms and rainbows. My greatest accomplishments are my children. My pride and joy and challenge. This blog records those events.
3 comments:
Now you are sounding like Mom. She always complained about bedtimes as being the worst part of the day. For some reason, us kids just didn't want to settle down and go to bed. Seems to run in the family, then.
There is no trick to getting kids to go to bed. I think all parents, if they are honest, would admit that it is a challenge to get their kids to go to bed. Hang in there sister. Maybe as they age they will mellow and WANT to go to bed, ha ha.
I agree...professionals really get under my skin with all their advice...kids do not get rituals. The only ritual is that each night they fight bedtime. Most of those professionals don't have children or are stuck in a time warp. I remember having a bedtime and going to bed, but then again, there was nothing else to do...no cable tv, no computer, no cell phone. No practices...nothing to give us that second wind. Being a mother of a teenager who thinks she can function on four hours of sleep, I have no advice...lol. Good luck!
Bedtime has always been the worst chore to undertake for me. I just don't know how I'd manage getting 4 to bed -- the 2 I've got nearly kill me! Now that one's a teen, we just leave it up to him to go to be when he's sleepy. Thankfully, the youngest one passes out by 9:30.
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