Parental Tag-Team Wrestling

We've been so used to the infant schedule. I knew that the sleepless nights would soon be over (teething aside). But I don't think Ryan or I were ready for the change in napping schedule.

Ryan is such a good daddy and a great husband. He works so hard to keep our house together and in a semi-functioning state while I'm gone. And when I get off work at midnight and come home, he's always waiting up for me. Then we chat about the day for a while. It's usually 2 or 3am by the time we're done talking and laughing. (We love to 'bug' each other just to make the other one laugh out loud.)



Mom and Dad - Tag Team Infant Wrestling

So, Mom and Dad don't get to bed till late and the girls are usually up around 8:30 or 9am. Now, with the infant schedule, we took turns. One parent could get up (letting the other parent sleep in), make them breakfast and know that the girlies would peter-out and be needing a nap in about 90 minutes. Breakfast Parent could get back to bed and then Sleep-In Parent would get up when the nap was over and 'start the day'. (Writing it out like that makes me feel lazy. But, for crap's sake, neither of us got to bed until 3 am!) And a second nap time would be early evening while Mom was at work, so Dad could regroup and think about dinner.

Oh, the woes of toddler-hood parenting.

Now, we are changing: our lives and time schedules out the windows. Most days now, there is only one nap per day needed. Usually it is a longer 2-3 hour nap, which is really nice. But this long nap doesn't come 90 minutes after they wake up. That is the hard part. Breakfast Parent is awake now for 4-5 hours until the girls peter-out or when Sleep-In Parent wakes up. And that in itself has been the hardest part.

Ryan's business has been doing really, REALLY well the last few days. Like: "no one except babies get naps" kind of really well. Sigh.

It's been good for me to try to keep my New Year's Resolution, but it's harder than I imagined. I've been depending on Ryan to wake up with the girls alot more frequently. For a few months, it was your 'turn' to get up with the babies every other morning and be the Breakfast Parent. But since iStGeorge has been starting their day at 8:00am, I have to drink my fair share of Taster's Choice to stay awake. So, I kind of consider my cup of joe to be my alternate tag-team member. And if I'm not in the mood for joe, I can always take a few 'Headache Relief' caffiene pills to do the trick.

Thank goodness the girls have a fixation on the movie Wall-E, or my Breakfast Parent job before the Taster's Choice kicks in would be a lot tougher.