I hear this almost every night before trying to wrestle the children into bed. These days, it’s sometime between 9:30 and 10 PM. For me this is entirely too late, but this is just how summer goes.
The downside of summer, I mean. (I wouldn’t much of a Grumble Girl without mentioning this point once or twice. (Or a million times.)
Them: But it’s still daytime!
Me: Oh, but it is nighttime, my darlings.
Them: But we’re not tiiii-errrrred…
Me: But I AM, Lovies. To bed! Let’s go… c’mon.
Them: But, everyone is still playing outside…
Me: I assure you that not EVERYone is. And still. Different house? Different rules. It’s time. Please! Now. Goodnight.
And then they commence hating me for spoiling all their fun. *le sighs*
The big-people-portions of the evenings are short enough as it is, since I only get to see Martin when he gets home from work – seldom in the mornings, at all. If they go to bed past ten, we really only have about an hour to ourselves. It’s just not enough. (But I suppose that’s what date nights are for.)
The other side effect of getting to bed this late is though they rise a bit later than normal during the school year, by the end of the week, they’re each missing close to a whole night’s sleep, I’m sure.
This means that come 5 o’clock-ish, I have cranky kids on my hands, who are tired and irritable, and can no longer manage the simple things, like common courtesies, and not biting people, and not crying over gum. Like, with tears and everything. These are the sorts of things that make me wanna Lose My Sh*t, as Sara says.
Sometimes, the end of the day looks and feels almost exactly like this. Don’t ask.
(And? Don’t mess.)
I said feels like this – these are actually from a few weeks ago, but it was the same-same, cray-cray kind of situation… just not from the other day.
(But holy balls, was Friday EVER a day.)
I came thisclose to giving them away. I nearly lost my voice from the screaming I did.
And I implored my husband to come home at 4:30 PM if he wanted to see the children alive ever again. Oh, and you’d better bring some wine with you, my love.
I would have insisted on an early-to-bed sort of night, but we were due at another family’s house for dinner that evening, with pizza a movies for the children (bless!) and fancier grilled fare with copious amounts of wine, really excellent music, and much sparkling conversation for the grown-folk.
It was just what I needed – a bit of separation, and a bit more time with adults than with The Smalls, no matter how much I love them and summertime and all the togetherness the sunshine brings. It’s daytime ALL the time during the summer, it seems.
Of course, that’s awesome – I love summertime – it’s the eight or ten months of winter that I loathe so hard – but there’s a bit of yin in every yang… some dark in the light, and for me, this is it. The children? They are my sun… and sometimes also the blotch on it. Blarg. (You know what I mean.)
Things might also be more manageable if I got more sleep myself, but dammit, a lady needs some downtime, and I can only get it during the wee hours…
Do you stick to your school-year sleep schedule? How’s it going?
Been there done that, but we do strongly believe that they need to follow their regular schedule (to a certain point) that they do during the school year. We still have to work, we still have to get out the door at a certain time. I agree with them that yes it sucks that your friends are still outside, but you still need to get up at 6:30am. You can stay up and then be miserable the whole day, or you can get to bed at a decent time and have fun the next day.
If you have the leeway to let them sleep in, go for it. But it isn’t feasible for us. They rarely whine about it now, since that’s just the way it is.
I let them stay up, if it’s not a camp week..only so they can sleep in in the morning usually till 10 ish. I still wake up at 6:30ish – doesn’t matter what time I go to sleep (or not). This way I can get some work done before they wake up and everyone is happy. um…except for daddy who keeps on his year round routine.
Oh dude – I’m so thankful we don’t have an ice cream truck sailing through our streets at night. Seriously. Dealing with some of the other kids heading in around 11 PM is plenty enough for me night after night. No blackout blinds can help me, either.
We super-mean, jerk mothers have to stand together, yo. Whatever. *shrugs* I HATE the late wind down too. (Balls.)
YES.
Well…I try to but it’s next to impossible when some of the neighbourhood kids are allowed to play in the streets til 11 or so.
I need my time to decompress and starting to wind down at 10pm is just too late for me. Hauling them in at 8 for a bath is such a drag for them.
And then there’s ENEMY NUMERO UNO:
The Ice Cream Truck.
It drives around our street as kids are just about ready for bed and brushing teeth…then there’s a whole new meltdown to deal with.
Am I really being that much of a jerk?? 8:30pm is not a time where I want them filled up on crappy soft serve.
So ya. My kids lives suck and they have the meanest Mum in the whole world.