For instance, mealtimes, naptimes, and bedtime for holidays or birthday parties, etc.?
My kids are 3 1/2 and 6 months. I don't mind giving them small snacks to tide over until a scheduled mealtime, they handle that pretty well (the baby just started solids, so doesn't apply to him, but you know what I mean). But changes to naptime and bedtime turn them into major cranks for the rest of the day and next day. How adaptable are your kids to those changes?
Andy rolls with the punches. If he goes too long without napping, he is a disaster, but family events don't usually interfere with that because he will sleep in the car on the way to anywhere.
He is more vulnerable to chaos. Like, if we spend too much time in a house packed with people and noise, he will crash hardcore after awhile from the stimulation.
Post by revolution on Dec 16, 2013 14:24:28 GMT -5
We usually adjust a lot and deal with it the best we can. Disney, Hersheypark, IL's - there are no naptimes set or mealtimes and we just feed and sleep when they can.
We were not this laid back when DD (the first) was teeny tiny - I wanted a nap, and meals at mealtimes. But I've unclenched a little and we go with the flow. My kids go with the flow too fairly easily.
For holidays and bday parties, I would go with the flow.
Everything goes to hell because I will do anything to soothe or placate my children at a function. Want candy? It's yours! No nap? Whateverrrr! Mommy is the most fun person ever! You can lose your shit at home later! Woo!
When my DD was little I worked very hard to keep her on HER schedule with naps and eating. And ignored the flack from relatives that I didn't need to bother.
My MIL used to love to tell me how EASY my DD was .. I was so lucky that she was so EASY. Yeah, no Shit Sherlock, why do you think? Because I work damn hard to keep her on schedule, HER schedule. It takes a lot of WORK to have an easy baby.
Now, at 5 1/2 - I can ease-up a lot. She's much better with running with her cousins and then just crashing at the end.
Everything goes to hell because I will do anything to soothe or placate my children at a function. Want candy? It's yours! No nap? Whateverrrr! Mommy is the most fun person ever! You can lose your shit at home later! Woo!
This is pretty much what we do, too. We usually travel to see family so we're always on the go with various outings. It messes with his schedule and his naps end up all over the place but overall he settles back in when we get back home or take a day off to chill.
I'm pretty strict about bedtime so it's a good thing H and are homebodies. I was militant about naps until very recently. I'm still insistent about his one nap a day but the time of it is a little flexible.
Everything goes to hell because I will do anything to soothe or placate my children at a function. Want candy? It's yours! No nap? Whateverrrr! Mommy is the most fun person ever! You can lose your shit at home later! Woo!
My kid is a picky eater, so if there is going to be something he won't eat, I'll bring stuff for him. And if he's hungry I'll feed it to him before the actual meal we are getting together for. Naps and bedtime, I will only screw with by about a half hour. He wakes up anywhere between 5:15-6:45 in the morning, so I don't mess with putting him to bed too late in case he wakes up super early.
Totally depends on a lot for these guys. Generally speaking, they do okay with a later nap than usual (they usually go down 12:30/1, they can go down as late as 2:30 if they're busy).
We can do a quicker bedtime and have done so before. We skip baths and do a quick 20m bedtime. They have to be asleep around 8/8:15 but that gives a lot of time to actually do stuff.
But, if they're already in bad moods or didn't sleep well the night before or are just crankybutts, we can't skip a nap. And, they usually do best the NEXT day if it's EITHER their nap OR their bedtime that's screwed up. A day w both messed up is horrible the next day.
We still have a rule if people ask too much of us schedule-shifting wise to invite them over the next day to take care of what they disrupted, lol. It ALWAYS hits them the next day, never the day of the fun/disruption.
Post by sunshineluv on Dec 16, 2013 14:40:41 GMT -5
I adjust as needed, and try to time drives during naps. DS (he is 20 months) usually does way better than I anticipate. I get more worried than I should that I will have to deal with a meltdown, but he usually has a blast. (The tons of attention he is getting doesn't hurt).
I used to get annoyed with my sister who planned her life around her kids naps, so I try to be more relaxed about it (in theory).
Also I will admit that the sleep schedule is about 95% for me lol. I NEED to know when I will be getting a break and there is not many things that I think are worthy of delaying that break.
I'm a total stickler about schedules. She's just such a crab if I'm not. Unfortunately, on thanksgiving we had to skip afternoon nap. It wasn't great that night, but we survived.
But yeah,I won't alter her schedule unless I really have to.
Oh, we were so laid-back. We were so proud of what super cool laid-back parents we were. Schedules? What are those? We're so good at this that our kid can handle anything. Up late for a cocktail party? No problem! Miss a nap for boozy lunch? Sounds fun! We ate whatever, whenever, slept anywhere, anytime. It was fantastic.
Then we had our second. Turns out our super cool parenting was only effective with a super cool kid. Kid #2 cried for 18 months. He was easily understimulated, overstimulated, thrown off by change. He needed routine like a person needs food and water. It was essential to being. So, while we would've chosen to be super flexible, it wasn't an option anymore.
Now that they're older (4 and 8), we're a lot more flexible but we do try and mitigate the meltdowns by making sure they get fed something decent (and eat it!) and gets decent sleeps throughout the season otherwise none of it is any fun for anyone!
Naps are semi-negotiable (ie he will nap in the car on our way to or from somewhere and if he misses one entirely, the world goes on). However, bedtime is only negotiable by about 30 minutes! He goes to bed at 7. If we are out and 7:30 hits, he starts to drag DH or I around the room and says bye to everyone!
HA! That's adorable. That's generally their end-time too but it depends on how much fun they're having. They don't do anything that cute, though, they start throwing tantrums
When my DD was little I worked very hard to keep her on HER schedule with naps and eating. And ignored the flack from relatives that I didn't need to bother.
My MIL used to love to tell me how EASY my DD was .. I was so lucky that she was so EASY. Yeah, no Shit Sherlock, why do you think? Because I work damn hard to keep her on schedule, HER schedule. It takes a lot of WORK to have an easy baby.
Now, at 5 1/2 - I can ease-up a lot. She's much better with running with her cousins and then just crashing at the end.
This is largely me too. DS was a sleeper. He needed sleep. Missing naps, late bedtime- it just wasn't pleasant for anyone.
But once he got to around 4, I started lightening up. I won't do a late bedtime a lot - but if I know an event is coming up that will push him late, I'll do it - but I try to be strict about the week leading up and the week after. More so after, but still - the more rested he is, the better.
Freddie and I were at my friend's house the other night and he was perfectly fine hanging out with us watching Sleeping Beauty and White Christmas until we realized it was almost 11 o'clock. Luckily, I remembered to bring jammies and a paci, and he passed out in the car before we were even out of her subdivision.
MIL wants to have our Christmas celebration on Friday the 27th, due to BIL and FSIL's schedule. Problem is, both H and I work, so I wouldn't be able to get there until 5:30, non-negotiable due to the my end of the year duties. We would need to leave around 7:30 to get the boys to bed on time, we could maybe, maybe, fudge it by a half hour without having a meltdown.
I told her we could do it, but it may be tight, because H's family does a long, drawn out, one at a time gift opening ordeal. Add that to a big meal, and I think it would be tight. I think MIL is irritated that we mentioned we would need to leave at 7:30 (not new information for her, it's always been like this). I said they could start without me, and she wasn't happy with that solution either.
We will probably go and end up staying later than I want, and it just makes me not look forward to it. Ugh. I kind of wish my kids would grow up a tiny bit faster and then stay the same age for a while.
Holidays and vacations are times when I throw out the schedule. Even if we tried to maintain it somewhat, the excitement of the event/day and new people, etc... would keep him from napping, eating at his usual time if others weren't.
No point in fighting it. We let the kid go and enjoy himself.
Post by hopecounts on Dec 16, 2013 15:01:07 GMT -5
DD did not handle nap time being messed at all so I was a nap nazi (this year she's kind of stopped napping so is able to roll with it) bedtime can be pushed to a point before meltdown city occurs so we will hang out as long as we can and then head out when its close to her limit. In general I keep sleep as sacred but for the holidays I try to be as flexible as DD can handle and bring pjs so she can pass out in the car or go straight to bed. Meals I let her snack as needed since she's eats pretty early (around 12 and 6) and just roll with it.
MIL wants to have our Christmas celebration on Friday the 27th, due to BIL and FSIL's schedule. Problem is, both H and I work, so I wouldn't be able to get there until 5:30, non-negotiable due to the my end of the year duties. We would need to leave around 7:30 to get the boys to bed on time, we could maybe, maybe, fudge it by a half hour without having a meltdown.
I told her we could do it, but it may be tight, because H's family does a long, drawn out, one at a time gift opening ordeal. Add that to a big meal, and I think it would be tight. I think MIL is irritated that we mentioned we would need to leave at 7:30 (not new information for her, it's always been like this). I said they could start without me, and she wasn't happy with that solution either.
We will probably go and end up staying later than I want, and it just makes me not look forward to it. Ugh. I kind of wish my kids would grow up a tiny bit faster and then stay the same age for a while.
First, yeah, I feel this a LOT especially since they have greater understanding but not enough words to communicate well.
Second, can you guys just go for dessert and presents? I would absolutely not do a huge meal with that time crunch. You could always feed the kids in the car on the way so they don't just eat like pie for dinner, lol. Or see if they can scale back the dinner some? I don't know. I feel you on the meal aspect of trying to get this to work.
MIL wants to have our Christmas celebration on Friday the 27th, due to BIL and FSIL's schedule. Problem is, both H and I work, so I wouldn't be able to get there until 5:30, non-negotiable due to the my end of the year duties. We would need to leave around 7:30 to get the boys to bed on time, we could maybe, maybe, fudge it by a half hour without having a meltdown.
I told her we could do it, but it may be tight, because H's family does a long, drawn out, one at a time gift opening ordeal. Add that to a big meal, and I think it would be tight. I think MIL is irritated that we mentioned we would need to leave at 7:30 (not new information for her, it's always been like this). I said they could start without me, and she wasn't happy with that solution either.
We will probably go and end up staying later than I want, and it just makes me not look forward to it. Ugh. I kind of wish my kids would grow up a tiny bit faster and then stay the same age for a while.
If I were you I would get the kids in their jammies around 7 pm and then the second shit starts hitting the fan you are out of there. Then they can fall asleep in the car and you don't have to do the tantrum/get ready for bed thing.
For me that would make me dread it a bit less. Knowing they were ready for bed when we left.
And maybe they will be having fun and you can stay until 8 pm.
I would be annoyed that we needed to celebrate on a Friday night though. That just sounds like rush rush rush, which sucks with kids.
Meals I don't care about at all, there's usually something at anything we go to that she will eat and we have a pretty loose meal schedule as it is.
I can push a nap/skip a nap OR push a bedtime, but not both. Generally I try and put her down for a later nap if we're going out that night. She's good as long as she's busy or having fun. For one day I would say try and stick it out without worrying too much about bedtime - holidays are like that for all of us.
At three years of age, E still naps after lunch. We try to plan events around his nap time. If he doesn't nap, I try to put him to bed an hour earlier.
For Christmas, he will probably skip his nap, and just go to bed sooner.
4 year old is pretty flexible she can take a late nap or skip a nap and be pretty functional. 2 year old is cranky for a day or two if he misses his nap. I also find that if we push it too far back he just won't nap.