The Boy will use almost any excuse NOT to go to bed and if forcibly put there will inevitably find legitimate ways of not staying there. These run along the lines of:
- I need to do a pee
- I need to go to the loo
- I need to do a poo
- I need a drink
- I had a bad dream
- I need to tell you something
This one gets me every time as I am too curious by half and if and when I do send him packing without taking the bait I can no longer get back to doing what I was doing because all I do is wonder what he was going to say, so land up bombing up the stairs to ask, which of course completely undermines what I was trying to achieve in the first place. Discipline.
In the past the things he has to say to me which are too important to wait until the morning run along the lines of Knock Knock jokes and the like but the one he came up with last night was quite simply:
I love you - definitely worth an extra cuddle don't you think?
The Boy's younger brother will actually stay in bed, which is good. The problem is getting him there in the first place.
It's a mixture of promises and threats.
I promise to read you a story and if you don't stay in bed you will have to sleep in the greenhouse. I don't think he knows what a green house is but he is suitably in awe of it and thinks that bed is a more preferable place to kip.
We go through a bit of a rigmarole before I use the threat, down the lines of:
- Where's Jelly? (His unique Jellycat - in that I have not been able to find a spare so live in permanent terror of losing said Jellycat as he refuses to sleep without her. Jelly of course gets lost lots. Mostly she is kidnapped by the Dog and usually found either hiding in the long grass or the Dog's basket. Luckily none the worse for her adventure - I on the other hand am worse and require a medicinal brandy to restore my equilibrium)
- Where's my water?
- Where's Daddy?
- Mummy sleep now?
- Huggie?
- Kiss?
Repeat as often as you can get away with before Mum blows a fuse then:
- I sorry....kiss?
If they procrastinate about going to bed where do I start? Well it actually involves work - which is what I should be doing now - but hey there's the ironing...
17 comments:
I love that 'I need to tell you something!'. Now get on with the work!!
PS, Have just read your previous post. We've had extensive experience of epilepsy in the family and my youngest niece has absence seizures and is doing fine at the moment. Hope your family continue to get the help you need.. and congratulations on what you're doing in the 2009 London Marathon. (Runner trots - you don't want to know!!).
Procrastination is my full time occupation! I loved reading about the excuses used by The Boy and The Littlest not to go to bed. My two girls major on emotional blackmail at such times.
Like ChrisH I've just caught up with your previous blog too - it sounds a very scary experience. But The Boy sounds as if he's in good hands.
And congratulations about the London Marathon! It's my ultimate ambition to do it, so I'm extremely jealous that you've got a place. Lovely to be part of a team and for a good cause too.
As for runner's trots - not a sufferer myself luckily! It's one of those things that you find out once you start running, apparently! (See Running Made Easy by Susie Whalley)
we stock the cow range of jellycats if the need arises!
We used to get 'I need to tell you something' from my nephew. Now we get it from Boy #1. Boy #2 watches closely as well, I can tell. What do they do, have crib notes they pass around between them all?
'I see picturey things' was H's excuse. As well as 'I want to tell you something' and 'can I have a cuddle'. Now he's just hungry or needs the loo or just lies in bed and talks to himself. Odd boys they are.
You bring back happy memories of putting the kids to bed. So much better when seen through a veil of years.
I have gold medals in procrastination - but while it's a trait I can tolerate in myself it drove me mad at boys' bedtime. Looking back though how could i be so mean as to growl 'Go to sleep NOW!' at those sleepy(?) babes?
Jedi is now fairly sensible about going to bed, but Trouble hates it. The "I want to tell you something is a classic" but what can you do when it's "I love you"?
Gosh, I was ferocious about bedtimes like mountainear looking back. I wonder whether it was to do with having children quite young and so being rather more selfish than my older self?
And yes, I could tell you all about procrastination but have a gin to drink.
procrastination is my middle name. My parents may think it's Charlotte, but they are wrong!When they get to wanting to read in bed it eases up. Am now at the catching F9 reading under the covers with his DS as torch stage. Feel a bit sorry for the DS. I got my boys and their cousins the jellycats at the garden centre - a lovely lovely pig and a cow and a sheep. Expensive mind, but so saggy and lovely, and I was buying 5. Gulp. Oh, see Muddy has them.
Would there be any bloggers if there wasn't such a thing as procrastination? It must be the ultimate distraction from unwelcome tasks.
If you rule out "I need to tell you something",I've used those other reasons to put off doing the ironing.
We used to have "Wait, where's my blanket?" necessitating a trip down 4 flights of stairs to get it. Now he believes me when I say I'll bring it up when I go to bed - but if he wakes up in the middle of the night and it's not there, by george I'm in trouble.
In the merest blink of any eye you won't be able to get them out of bed............
Gosh your bedtimes sound just like mine, except i've never resorted to ironing....
Procrastination is the thief of time as my husband always tells me and he is right! It's a common ailment and I admire people that have the discipline to thwart it with hard work.
Hope your lad has a good outcome soon.
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