Sunday, January 11, 2009

from the archives: goodnight, Mister Tom

If there's a star of this blog, it's our irrepressible 5 year old Thomas, because he asks such impossible questions and makes such unique observations about life, the universe and everything. Here's one of the first posts I wrote about Tommy, on his lengthy bedtime routine.

One year later, and his bedtime routine is as convoluted as ever. Every night I sing him a song of his choice (at the moment it's usually The Carpenters Close to you, but I made up a song about Thomas last night, and I suspect I started something), we count kisses (we're counting 1 number closer to 100 every night, and we're up to 99 tonight - counting by 9s or 11s, no doubt!), and I answer the same 4 questions (When's Benny coming to bed? How long till Mummy goes to bed? How long till morning? Can I get Mummy if I need to during the night?). Then it's "kissy kissy kissy" and goodnight.

Here's how it went a year ago:

Jean (38) - "How many kisses do you want tonight?" (to be asked every night)
Thomas (4) - "60 100 and 2."
Jean - "Do you mean 162?" (and yes, I mean every night)
Thomas - "YES!"
Jean - "Let's count by 20's" (anything to shorten the process)
Thomas and Jean together - "20 (kiss kiss), 40 (kiss kiss), 60 (kiss kiss), 80 (kiss kiss), 100 (kiss kiss), 120 (kiss kiss), 140 (kiss kiss), 160 (kiss kiss), 161 (kiss), 162 (kiss), CUDDLE!"

Mummy rises to her feet...

Thomas - "I want a story."
Mummy - "Ok, Thomas. Once there was a boy called Thomas.
He woke up in the morning, had breakfast, and got dressed. Then he went on the computer.
He watched Playschool, had some special time with Mummy, played with Andrew, and had lunch. Then he went on the computer.
He went to school to pick up Lizzy and Benny, came home, and had afternoon tea. Then he went on the computer.
He played with Lizzy, Benny and Andrew, ate dinner, and went to bed. The end."
(I kid you not. Just you try keeping Thomas off the computer. And I'd make up a story, but I'm better at non-fiction, worse luck. NB Just to let you know, I do limit Thomas's computer time to 1/2 hour a day!)

Mummy begins to leave the room...

Thomas - "Mummy, open the door."
Jean - "Look, Thomas, I'm opening the door. See, the door is open. The door IS open. THE DOOR IS OPEN." (to be said every night as emphatically as possible accompanied with repeated door opening actions)

Mummy begins to head down the corridor...

Thomas - "MUMMY, YOU FORGOT TO OPEN THE DOOR!"

And yes, I mean EVERY night.

Goodnight.

2/11/08

1 comment:

Valori said...

So familiar, Jean! It's too bad we are always so tired at the end of the day because they are so cute! When he's a teen, he'll probably want to keep you up late at night, too, all ready to open up and chat about life and theology right when you are ready to turn off the lights!