Bedtime Story

I assume all kids and most adults have a bedtime routine.

Mine is purposefully (and perhaps overly?) simple.  I brush my teeth and lay down in bed.

Meghan’s is longer–more face washing, flossing and lotioning.

Cash’s bedtime routine is by far the longest…lasting about an hour from start to finish.

It begins with Meghan or I filling one third of our bathtub with water and dropping in the toys.

Then getting the wiggly boy out of his clothes, into his birthday suit and into the tub.

He enjoys  bubbles. Who doesn’t, right?

Cash is pleasantly distracted by the bath toys. His favorite now is a little bucket that holds one bath toy at a time.

He also used to really like splashing the water with full swings of his arms, slapping the water like it owed him money.

That spirited splashing is now replaced by scooping water with his bucket onto the bathroom floor as if he’s keeping a boat from sinking.

For awhile there, he thought squirting the water out of the mini-baseball was the funniest prank on the planet.

After his bath, we wrap him in a towel and he is transported to his bedroom-which is a little extra warmed thanks to a space heater.

There, his loving Momma gives him a light massage with massage oil-baby safe of course. With the essential oil diffuser, dimmed lighting and soft music playing, his room highly resembles a luxurious spa retreat.

I fear if this keeps up, he will want to have his 5th birthday party not at Chuck E. Cheese but at Sundara spa.

After his massage, Meghan usually reads to him from one of the many books on his shelf. Cash is more into the pictures than the plots, which is a good thing since most children’s books are absent of them…plots that is.

Meghan winds down the process by nursing him for a little and then laying him down in his crib.  Lastly, she gives him a kiss and turns on the white noise machine. Just writing this, I want to pass out and sleep for three days.

Believe it or not, Cash will still fuss a bit as Meghan tries to leave the room, sometimes pulling himself to his feet and screaming through the crib bars like a wronged prisoner.

We know he does this because I installed a Nest camera with night vision perched above his bed.

The bedtime fuss has become less and less and there are some times where he just lays down, snuggles up to his bunny and doesn’t make a peep.

After a half hour or so of his slumber, I quietly enter (and try not to trip over anything in the blacked out room) and drape a knit blanket over him.

Meghan and  use the next hour or two to clean up and catch up on anything we have to get done and/or watch a show, read a book, or sometimes silently stare at the wall in exhaustion.

It’s getting to be that time…bedtime.