Up too Late

My daughter and I are sharing a problem these days. We're staying up too late. We're both hurting in the morning. It's a compounding problem. She is four. Her bedtime is eight. It used to be, we'd tuck her in bed at eight, read her a story for fifteen minutes, then she'd read to herself for another fifteen minutes, maybe a half hour, there'd be a round of water/potty/tuck/music box/what else can I get Mom and Dad to do, but she'd be asleep by Nine. No longer. I've tried getting her in bed at eight and she's resistant. When I convince her to do so, she's still reading/playing with stuffies at nine and nine-thirty.

So... maybe eight isn't working as a bedtime. I try doing story-time at eight-thirty, quarter to nine, she plays/reads and should still be getting to sleep around nine, quarter after nine. Nope. She's staying up until ten, ten-thirty. This is a problem. That's MY bedtime. I used to ritualistically shut things down at ten-thirty, give myself ten to twenty minutes in bed to unwind with a game or a book and then konk well before eleven. Now, at ten thirty, I'm still getting, "will you tuck me in?"

Have you read/heard Go the F**k to Sleep by Adam Mansbach? There is a man who knows what I'm talking about. Now I'm staying up later, missing my usual one or two hours of quiet writing time (which is now filled with story and multiple request hour) so I'm staying up later to try to finish what I've set for myself to do. Like this blog post. I should have written this earlier today, or a little later, once Delilah is in bed. Except I know I'm not going to get that hour.

Causality
Daughter stays up later, not going to sleep.
Mom stays up later trying to get stuff done.
Dad stays up later waiting for Mom to come to bed.
No one wakes up well or on time in the morning.

Last week was a vacation week. I let Delilah stay up later. I encouraged her to stay up as late as she liked and woke her up relatively early. My plan was to have her exhausted and ready to go to sleep Sunday night for dayhome. Well, that part worked - Monday wasn't too bad. Monday night was not good. Last night was bad. Tonight... I'm writing my blog post in anticipation of another hour of story/multiple requests.

What is the moral of my story? Please tell me... I'm a little sleep deprived and think I missed it.

Oh, right. Make a schedule. Stick to a schedule. Don't let the schedule go. Some kids cannot live without a schedule. Mine isn't one of those, she's pretty flexible, but in general all kids do better ON a schedule.

My writing has gone off schedule. My book released when I wasn't quite expecting it. There are aspects that are still not quite running properly (namely it's not in the major bookstore here). I'm wanting to set up some sort of promotion, but summer is a terrible time. I'm trying to write too many things in too many directions. I'm overwhelmed. Why? Because I went off the schedule.

Now. It's twenty minutes past Delilah's bedtime. That's a lot closer to on schedule. Tomorrow, I have work, so I won't be doing writing, but I do have a couple small tasks set for lunch/coffee breaks (emailing, calling, ordering). Tomorrow night, I'm making a schedule.

It may or may not include a new serial which I hope to eventually update weekly. I used to post fanfiction chapters twice a week. I'd love to get back up to that speed again, but with the publishing details taking up so much of my 'writing' time, it's not going to happen.

Finally, I'm going to get a guest in.

Yep, that's me, making room in the schedule. Saturday, Rainy's post will be here in place of mine. Then, on Wednesday, I'll be back, from Fort McMurray, with a blog post. It might be about mosquitos - we'll see how bad they are.