Perfect Days

Since it's summer,* I've been pretty lax about bedtime. My kids all have different nighttime habits. If I give Nicky the freedom to stay up as late as he wants, he will put himself to bed by 9:30 most of the time. With that same freedom, Daisy will fight her fatigue until she crashes on the couch. Then she'll eventually wake up and either A) come find me and tell me she doesn't feel good or that she thinks she broke a bone or B) shuffle her way to her bed and wake up the next morning wondering how she got there. Zoe's sleep patterns are all over the place because she is four, and four-year-olds should have 18-hour days instead of 24-hours days. Eva has decided in recent months to stop sleeping through the night, and just for the sake of being true to her two-year-old ways, she wakes up yelling at 5:45 a.m.

Last night, Nicky, Zoe, and Eva went to bed around 9:30 while Daisy stayed up watching Doc McStuffins. I brought Daisy a glass of water, and I thought, This would be Daisy's version of a perfect day - watching TV and being doted on.

Then I started thinking of what each of my kids' "perfect" days might be like.

I can think of two different versions of the perfect day for Nicky.

Version 1 would be waking up at an Anaheim hotel, enjoying a free breakfast (Nicky is frugal), and then spending the day at Disneyland with no sisters. At the end of the day, he'd go back to the hotel, sit in the hot tub for 15 minutes, the fall asleep watching the Disney Channel or Nickelodeon.

Version 2 would involve a day home from school with no sisters. He would have pizza for breakfast, a cheeseburger from the Habit for lunch, and sweet and sour chicken for dinner. He would spend a few hours wrapped in his favorite blanket watching TV in his room (in this fantasy, there is a TV in his room). He'd probably also appreciate playing a few board games with adults.

The perfect day for Daisy would, as I mentioned already, involve being doted on every moment. She would love to wake up and have breakfast brought to her in bed. Just like her brother, she would be in favor of eliminating all siblings for the day. She'd request a pedicure at the nail shop, lunch at Chick-Fil-A or McDonald's, and then freedom to wander the dollar store where she would buy a cart full of useless junk.  The day's schedule could be flexible as long as she is allowed to pick everything from what songs to listen to in the car to which route we take to Target. To be honest, she would probably thrive on being pulled around in a wagon with someone fanning her, and she would love to spend a fortune on claw machines.

Zoe's perfect day would include taking a three-hour bath with limitless toys. She, of course, would want her siblings gone. After her bath, she would want four hard shell tacos from Del Taco for lunch. She might want to go ride her bike around the block, but other than that, she'd just stay at home. She would be content to pack one of her 8 backpacks (that is not an exaggeration - she has a backpack obsession) with random toys and haul them in the living room to dump them out. She would spread towels all over the living room floor to make a "beach" and then sit on them to watch a show, possibly Phineas and Ferb, though she prefers to jump from show to show to show. She would probably like to have a friend come over, but it would have to be someone who will agree to do everything Zoe wants the exact way she wants to do it. She'd want to wear a costume and some make-up. For dinner, she'd want a kid's meal from Chick-Fil-A but won't eat it. Then she'd want to sleep in mom and dad's bed... without mom and dad.

On Eva's perfect day, she would be carried around from morning until night while drinking a sippy cup of milk.

As for my own perfect day, all I ask is for 24 hours with obedient children, a clean house, and NO FIGHTING. Simple, really.


*I started this post in June and finished it in August