Putting them to bed is great fun — for the kids

Press, 7 December 1988, Page 18

Putting them to bed is great fun — for the kids

My children are sharing a bedroom.

They have one each, but find sharing sleeping quarters a whole lot more fun.

Their parents think otherwise.

A 3-year-old boy and a 14-month-old girl do not share quietly. Bedtime goes something like this:

Feed, bath, powder and deposit 14-month-old in cot at 6.30 p.m. with a bottle. Resist urge to top bottle up with gin. Return to lounge and powder 3-year-old who has been drying pinkly by the heater and start first of several five-minute-be-fore-you-go-bed warnings. Listen patiently while he runs through a list of reasons and pleas not to be bedded.

“I’m not tired” is followed by “I’ll just finish this” and “You won’t put me to bed will you?” The last is accompanied by a trembling bottom lip and rapidly brimming eyes.

Why he goes through this performance every night escapes me, because once he hits the bedroom it’s party time. If, by some miracle, our daughter is drifting off to sleep, our son manages to

return her to full alert in seconds flat.

After all, it’s not party time if you party alone. On goes the radio (he has a preference for jazz and talkback) and it’s time to get down and dance. While he is doing a Fred Astaire on the duvet, his sister is rocking around the clock, wideeyed and raring to go. She is now revved up for a night on the town. Parent enters room, switches off radio, tucks 3-year-old firmly under duvet, does same with 14-month-old and leaves the room.

Silence. The radio is then slowly wound up again. Repeat above performance several times until 3-year-old is tucked in so firmly that his arms are in danger of having their circulation cut off. The name of the game

is exhausting them before they exhaust you. The other trick is getting up and pounding up and down the hallway at 100 miles an hour. The 3-year-old knows that the reception he is going to get when caught is not going to be good, so he has learnt to hide when he hears .someone coming.

Unfortunately, the 14-month-old is still at the stage where she thinks we are going to be as delighted to see her as she is to see us.

She does not hide. Not only does she not hide, but she often points out the hiding place of her brother. This enrages him and amuses us.

How long these all-night parties are going to go on, no-one is sure.

There are, among the mind-achingly tedious moments of returning children to bed some bright spots though. Like the time my husband heard nothing but suspicious silence punctuated by shrill giggles from the end bedroom.

Flinging open the door with his best stern-father expression, he found our son neatly tucking his sister into the bottom drawer of the Scotch chest and trying to close it.

Far from being upset about being filed with his socks, our daughter was in fits of laughter as our son was trying to compress her little round stomach to get her to fit.

We live in dread of the day when she goes missing without leave and we find her months later lying wistfully among his sweatshirts.