Anti Nap Days

One of the joys of toddlerhood at our household are anti nap days. What are anti nap days? Those are the days that Addie decides not to nap.

These days occur on days that we leave the home. What happens is that Addie will nap on the way home and then not sleep the rest of the day, so she technically is taking a nap. The drive home is not long enough for a nap and then I have a cranky kid. I've tried everything to keep her up, I've sang songs, tickled feet (when Warren is driving), snacks, fun toys that are only in the car, and varying the time we leave the house. None of these things have worked, if Addie wants to sleep, she will sleep.

It's days like this that make me think long and hard as to if it is worth it to leave the house. There are times I decide I want Addie to nap more than I want to be out in society. Sometimes it feels like this is my punishment for making Princess Addie leave her castle.

I use Addie's naps as an opportunity to clean the house (yes every day there is housecleaning to do, being home all day makes the home messy), laundry, getting the garbage out and burned, collecting recycling to take in, and my house organizing project ( I want my sewing room back and Warren wants his office back)

Anti nap days also means that night time will also be a nightmare. She'll be exhausted and cranky and I'll be exhausted and cranky. Warren seems to know when these days are going to occur and works late, really late, like 9 or 9:30. Usually he gets home right before Addie completely crashes, after I have read multiple stories, sing bits and pieces of EVERY hymn and lullaby I know and I had almost won the battle. Then Addie is all excited to see daddy and does not want to go to bed. So another 10 to 15 minutes and Addie will not be able to stay up and will drop (literally sometimes midstep) asleep. Then Warren wonders why I want to collapse the minute after Addie is tucked in. He wonders why I don't want time to myself at night.

I am learning to roll with the punches on these days. I think it's important for our sanity (Addie's and mine) to get out once in a while. We go to toddler story time one time a week and Addie loves it. We go on play dates sometimes and I go to bible study once a week. Splash class is once a week, but Addie is so tired that she will nap past the car ride.