Sleep

This is how the girls sleep. Margot in matching long jammies with mismatched socks (yes, that is intentional) and Ada in her skivvies. Bright eyed and bushy tailed from another blissfully restful night of slumber.  Here they are enjoying some time with Daddy this past Saturday morning.. or as we refer to it in our home "Chocolate Waffle Day". 

Now, go out and drink 5 double espressos, run 13.7 miles and work an eight hour shift in a wine glass storage facility that employs 13 year old boys who play basketball around the merchandise on their Doritos breaks. Tired? Anxious? Are you so tired you could sleep backstage at a Rage Against the Machine concert without a pillow? Are you so anxious you could adios an entire bottle of Xanax? Aight then. This is how Mommy and Daddy sleep. This month makes the 15th month since we attempted potty training the twins and subsequently caused them to wake during the night over and over and over and over..and over again. Our babies who were the greatest sleepers around just vanished (POOF!!!!!!) in a puff of smoke. We have been down this road before on this blog.. I am too tired to even talk about all the things we have tried to do to "fix".."solve" (?) this problem.  A few months back we reached a mutual understanding. We would set up pallets on the floor of our room every night before we went to bed. At some point during the night they would wake up and come sleep on said pallets. They didn't disturb us, we didn't have to deal with them. It wasn't ideal but it was something we were willing to put up with until this phase was over. Then it all went south again. Now we are having to deal with waking children at 9:30 and 10 at night. They wake up and sneak downstairs, sniffling on the stairs to get our attention. One of us will coax them back to bed .. and the other starts turning out lights and preparing to turn in for the night.. because.. they never, EVER stay put. In frustration we have stopped movies early, and gone to bed, wide awake mind you, so that our offspring could run into our room and lay on the floor and sleep. We have returned from date nights to find both of them up and had to go straight to bed rather than fight with them to stay in bed. This has gone on for the last 3 or 4 weeks. No more. We are tired. We are irritable. We can't get more than 2 hours IN THE ENTIRE DAY to ourselves.. and by that I mean me really. They get up at 5:15am.. they don't nap.. and then they won't stay in their own beds after 9:30. WTF people!? (don't look that up if you don't already know what it stands for..you will be disappointed in me) Do you know how hard it is to spend time with your spouse/best friend/ lover (Ah-HEM!) when the kids could walk in at any moment ? Gettin' old. Gettin' real old, real fast. Actually it's been old.. none of that even makes any sense but I am too tired to use the delete button! See?!?!? 

Latest strategy. If they don't stay in their beds at night.. they lose all desserts the next day. They each have an entire bag of Easter candy they collected from an egg hunt last weekend.. incentive? It was for Ada. She made it the whole night last night without a problem. Margot did not. This is her second day in a row with no desserts and man has it been a doozy. Praying like everything that she will make it through tonight. 

So.... if I have been absent the last few weeks I hope you will forgive me. I have been unwilling to sacrifice the few precious moments I have in my day to the internets. Crossing my fingers that soon this will all be a distant memory. Cross your fingers with us will you? Or pray, or light a candle, or both or all three. Yup. Thanks.