We have no-one to blame but ourselves, of course, for this
chaotic polka of whirling dervish clowns that we call the grandchildren's
nighttime ritual. For we have allowed
the bedtime routines to be designed and executed by the grandchildren -- Conner
(3.2), Noah (2), and Kay (.8-ish).
I won't speak for my dear, long-suffering wife, but for my
part, I promote "Grandchildren Gone Wild" for two reasons. First, because I think it is a grandparent's
duty to feed candy to small hyperactive beings.
And secondly, because I secretly relish confounding my son
and his wife who take parenting seriously.
They always send the grandchildren with instructions and notes on their disciplinary
progress. I take devious pleasure in ignoring
all instructions and spoiling the grandchildren as much as possible. Of
course, we pay a price for this.
Parent's suggested routine: 7:30 pm -- quiet time, read a book, brush
teeth, go to bed, sleep through the night.
(They wish! It doesn't work that
way for them either.)
Nana and Diggy's routine:
7:30 p.m. - Television (Team Umi-Zumi, Dora the Explorer,
Barney, Go Diego Go) and snacks (ice cream, lollypops, roll-ups, oreos and (for
some unknown reason) cheddar cheese. A
bottle for Kay which she will usually barf completely up on my shirt which
means she is still hungry, so I'll fix her a second bottle and remember not to
wear a shirt.
8:00 p.m. -- Conner and Noah begin their nighttime ritual of
chasing each other all over the house, knocking each other over, and screaming
in hilarity, excitement and sometimes pain (hard to tell the difference). Kay crawls, spits up in smaller quantities,
and tries to climb up on anything taller than herself -- which is almost
everything -- particularly light and fragile pieces of furniture that she can
pull over on top of herself.
8:30 p.m. -- Noah is the first who begins to fade. Nana takes him into the master bedroom (odd
name since the so-called master never sleeps there when the grandchildren are
here). She goes in with him to settle
him down, telling me she'll be out shortly to help with Kay and Conner. 10% of the time, she appears after getting
him to sleep. 10% of the time, he appears after getting her to sleep. 80% of the time, I don't see either of them
until sometime after midnight.
8:31 p.m. -- Conner, who takes after his daddy, requests a
second dinner -- usually chicken nuggets or hot dogs. I prepare these with one hand while holding
Kay with the other.
9:00 p.m. -- Kay suddenly goes sleep like a switch has been
thrown. While Conner eats hotdogs, I
change her diaper (an appetizing combination).
I place her gently in her crib.
9:05 p.m. -- Kay wakes up in her crib and protests loudly. Change diaper even through it doesn't need changing. Three swallows of bottle to top her off. Switch is thrown again and she is out like a
light.
Conner and I turn off
Barney (not his favorite) and turn on any of a gazillion recorded
videos -- Cars, Toy Story, How to Tame Your Dragon (maybe I should take notes),
Madagascar, Tangled, etc. -- any cartoon movie that is vivid, loud,
action-packed. I fall asleep on couch.
9:15 p.m. -- I am
awakened by Karen's voice from bedroom asking that we turn down the volume.
9:45 p.m -- Conner voluntarily moves upstairs to the boys'
bedroom. Unfortunately, this is not
because his bed is there but because most of his toys are there which he
scatters around the floor to make future walking in the dark a challenge. Loud bright videos continue since the boys
have their own television - we're grandparents, remember . I go up with him and fall asleep on his
bed.
10:00 p.m. -- Conner finally comes to lie down on his bed...unfortunately
he does this to wake me up and request more snacks.
10:05 p.m. -- Returning with requested snacks, I discover he
has fallen asleep. I tuck him in and
head for my studio where I usually sleep on the day-bed there. Leaving his room, I step on a tiny plastic triceratops. I wake everyone in the house up with an
explosion of unrepeatable words.
10:15 p.m. -- Start over.
Diaper, bottle, snacks, walk recently awakened Daisy-dog, and finally
relocate self to my studio where I have a day-bed. But my computer is also there and my computer
addiction forces me to browse -- Blogspot, Email, Facebook, Overseas stock
markets. I fall asleep in my office
chair.
10:30 p.m. -- Awakened by Noah crying in the ironically
named master bedroom and Karen's footsteps back and forth downstairs. Relocate
self to day-bed and fall asleep, still dressed.
11:30 p.m. -- Conner wakes and, thinking I never brought him
his 10:05 snacks, yells out for me. I step
on more toys, give him a slice of cheddar cheese. I try to leave but he demands that I sleep
with him.
11:32 p.m. -- His bed is barely big enough for him, so I curl up at the bottom of it. His feet jerk in his sleep, kicking me
mercilessly. However, the barrage fails
to keep me from falling asleep.
Midnight -- Although I can sleep through kicking feet and
his television which is still blaring, just the quiet whimper from Kay in the
nursery instantly wakes me. Step on more
toys. Change diaper, which this time is
full and odorous. Top her off. Go downstairs, reload bottle. Fall asleep on the guest bed in the
nursery.
1:30 a.m. -- Conner has a nightmare. Screams hysterically. I rush to him barefoot over minefield of toys
only to find he has already gone back to sleep.
I finally turn off televisions. Unsure
who will wake up next, I fall asleep on carpeted hall floor near the stairs,
equidistant from the three grandchildren.
2:00 a.m. -- I hear Karen's voice softly calling me,
"Are you still awake?" I
pretend that I am not awake.
2:15 a.m. -- Everyone is finally asleep and I realize that I am the one who is hungry. I sneak downstairs for a spoonful of peanut
butter.
2:16 a.m. -- Moving stealthily around in the kitchen like a
burglar in the dark, Daisy-dog mistakes me for a burglar in the dark and goes
into bark-alarm mode, waking the entire neighborhood.
2:20 a.m. -- Everyone in the neighborhood goes back to
sleep.
2:30 a.m. -- I walk around in the dark, eating peanut butter
and petting the dog. And fall
asleep...or fall into a kind of sleep. I seem to have evolved the art of
walk-sleeping which is related to, but different, from sleep-walking. I have no accurate memory of anything after
2:18 a.m. However, in the morning,
there is evidence that I have continued to move around since bottles, snack
bowls, television remotes, toys, used diapers, etc., will all have been moved
from where I thought they had been to places where no-one can find them.
FOUR HOURS OF BLUR
6:30 a.m. -- Karen calls up to me to ask if I can give Daisy
her morning walk. After figuring out (1)
who I am and (2) where I am, I take Daisy for a nice long morning stroll,
watching the sunrise, picking up poop in a little plastic bag, and noticing
that nobody else in the entire neighborhood seems to be awake yet. I use
my cell phone to call my son and his wife, just to wake them up, but they have
learned to put their phones on silent so my sense of humor is thwarted.
7:00 a.m. -- Daisy and I return home and, if it is a
weekday, we try to wake the grandchildren so we can get Conner and Noah to
day-care. But, of course, they are sleeping like angels.
Or logs.
"The only thing
more difficult that getting a child to go to sleep when they want to stay awake
is getting them to wake up when they want to stay asleep."
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