Another small life shift for our everyday household, that really only impacts me and Craig at this point, is the new and improved bedtime routine. Since the girls were getting out of cribs and into toddler beds, for more than three years, every single night either Craig or I have sat in the comfy sofa chair in their bedroom after lights out and until everyone fell asleep. We both had different music playlists and rotated through song requests until the snoozing began; sometimes when they were smaller it involved quiet singing as well. For at least two of those years, every time I sat we listened to Let It Go (Frozen) for Emerie, Cover Me in Sunshine (Pink) for Reagan, Toward the Sun (Rihanna) for Harper and other random movie soundtracks as we watched them (Aladdin, Little Mermaid, Spirit, Trolls, My Little Pony, Tangled Adventures, Frozen, Sing, etc.). As they grew this involved arguments on whose song should play first and whose played last resulting in it being the worst thing in the world in that moment. Another hit was Craig playing Katie Perry’s Daisies.
This bedtime routine started when Reagan discovered how to climb out of her crib, even with the mattress dropped to the floor, and lasted through the transition to toddler beds and into big girl bunk beds around a year ago. While I will say this definitely impacted our ability to decompress together in the evenings, it did provide quiet time once all three fell asleep and became a routine that I really enjoyed. It also gave Craig and I a little space to ourselves at the end of every busy day; something that rarely happens during the day with young kids. It created an hour or two of calm at night, but also closeness to the girls and that was my favorite part. We sat and watch a show on an iPad, listening to music through headphones or I would write a blog about the day, enjoying the stillness and peace, since it’s a pretty rare thing. I even came to enjoy this part of my day and feeling close to everyone without the anxiety and loudness and chaos that is the life of a triplet parent, while knowing they were safe and happy and not a care in the world while cuddled into their beds with their stuffies. It’s hard to explain but I actually miss it a bit!
Of course, we started sitting this habit to keep everyone in bed and from running about and refusing to settle (which occurred frequently similarly to all kids at night!) and making nighttime routine take forever,. The bigger issue after its establishment was we couldn’t figure out how to stop doing it. The girls freaked out without our presence and that turned into tired meltdowns, so we’d cave and come back in, continuing the habit well after age five and unsuccessful on how to remove ourselves from the equation. I will also note that most of my fellow parent friends do many household chores and things after the kids go to bed; this is not how we’ve handled it the past few years, from the time of sleepless nights and getting up more than a handful of times per night, for months on end. In fact, I can easily say Craig and I are a well oiled machine when it comes to cooking, cleaning, laundry, tidying up, and maintaining order in our house, and do the majority of these things while everyone is up and active. The biggest difference now compared to years past is it is easier now that the girls are bigger. Busy chore time during the day also equals quiet post bedtime hours in the evening to mentally and physically recoup from everything, and not needing to squeeze in more chores after going strong for 14+ hours. I continue to enjoy this routine now!
And now -drum roll please- we are no longer confined to the kid room at night! By about Christmas time we managed to convince everyone that Mom and Dad are just in the next bedroom, with some strong convincing and argumentative five-year-olds on the subject, and that sisters are close by so no one is really alone. Clearly having their own rooms would be too much of an issues, since their complaints are often that they don’t want to be alone…you know…with 2 sisters still in the room. The combination of the amazing Tonie music and stories player, a white noise machine for after the music stops, and a multi-colored star projector do the trick. I should also mention we are on our THIRD star projector…because it’s used every day, travels around the house, and does not like to be drowned in water (shocking really :)). Unless everyone ran really hard that day and burned the energy, then the new routine takes longer to hear three resting kiddos, but it’s drastically improved over the past two months and the longing faces and tired eyes don’t demand our presence as often now. Everyone does not immediately calm down and often fight or argue with each other (amidst stuffed animals throwing, stealing, and unplanned music changes) about something from that day, or someone has to use the bathroom or get out of bed a million times to try to play. But all things that all parents deal with now; I can’t imagine trying to manage that when they were two or three. So we are making good progress and we are almost there, thankfully!!
I should also add the parents are getting MUCH more sleep than in the past five years, with more nights sans kiddo between us than nights with someone there. Everyone rotates through different reasons for standing at my bedside until my subconscious jolts awake, whether it’s a bad dream, not feeling well, or went to the bathroom and won’t go back to their bed. Reagan most consistently comes to our bed from a bad dream -or she just wants to snuggle- while Emerie will get up and go back to her bed nine times out of ten, and anytime Harper wanders over to my bedside, I almost think it’s Reagan until the next morning. Emerie insists that Craig’s snore mask (CPAP) is loud and I think that is part of her reasoning to always climb back to her bed; she also likes to be cuddled in her blanks with all her things. And even with kiddos coming and going, it is still huge-huge-huge progress on the sleep front for us. And ridiculously, after years of wanting to get a solid night of uninterrupted sleep or not wanting to sit while they were not ready to go to sleep yet, my mom brain actually misses the need for snuggles and butt patting to go back to sleep. It nearly misses the need to lay on the floor and pat one kid’s butt while rubbing the back of the one next to them, which is not the easiest. Mom brain is ridiculous, I tell you.
And now we are right around the corner to age six!!
The Douglets 