Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Ruminations Upon Sleep

My sleep training is going well. Whenever I drive home at night, I turn the heater up an give everyone a blanket. Then I pop in our new favorite CD, a Jazz Lullaby gift for Zoe from Paul and Maria, which we just love. It is VERY relaxing. The dark quiet road, subdued tones of The Velvet Fog, and warm air combine in a magical way that almost completely knocks me out. That's right, by the time we get home, I'm barely able to keep my eyes open and the kids are wide awake.

At home, our bedtime ritual still involves bath, books, family prayer, and toe pinches. But why is it that Michael can get away with reading like THREE pages out of a twenty five page picture book? He just randomly chooses disconnected bits to read and then announces "THE END," and Jed totally swallows it. When I try to do that during Quiet Time, we are all protestations and discontent. Today, Jed grabbed the popularly detested "Rotten Ralph's Nine Lives" and disgustedly said, "Mom, I need you to read the lots of pages. LOOK!" He turned to each skipped page and demanded I read every word, pointing to the sections I surreptitiously attempted to forget.

Also, any boring children's book can be improved upon when made into a full family opera.

Also, whining children can be harmonized upon with considerable enjoyment.

5 comments:

Brooke said...

It must be a dad gift! Pete often summarizes the books he doesn't care for and no one seems to notice... I just have Hannah read to Leah these days (though I do have some favorites I like to read). I do the chapter book read aloud at bedtime these days... much more interesting!!

NessaAnn said...

Jed must be too tired at night to protest.

NessaAnn said...

The comment above is from Michael. You can tell by its brevity.

BBC said...

that's hilarious jed pointing out all the pages you missed! he's one smart cookie!

Kelsie Stanfill said...

It's the Stanfill-man-family voice! It's very deep and relaxing!!!!