TIME - lost and found

"i dun wanna sleep" - now this phrase is very common among children ... and it always amazes me how they can "stay awake" and not want to sleep...

iggie is a classic case ... everyday its a fight around 3pm to get him to try to shower and be ready for nap time ... knowing that after shower is milk time and nap time, he refuses to go take his afternoon showers ....

everyday after school he will ask if its still morning and he wants to play the whole day ... even though he does that all the time anyway, besides eating, shitting and napping, all the remaining time is PLAY TIME....

well - today another one of those days ... after school we picked him up and i wanted to bring my mum for a nice lunch as she helped me out with the two kids while i was sick for 2 weeks .... and in the car, iggie started to ask "where are we going mummy? i want to go home first. i want to play."

so there we go negotiating about just out for lunch and he will be back home "in time" to play the whole day ....

"i dun wanna eat my lunch. i only eat breakfast and dinner. i will just sit there and not eat.".... the war begins...

so my mum simply tells him the longer he takes to eat, the longer we will be out and the shorter time he has to play.... not sure if that message actually got to him at all... but we did manage to have a nice lunch .....

then on the ride home, iggie will start again "i dun wanna sleep later, i just want to play the whole day"

and he keeps repeating that sentence for the whole car trip from Centrepoint til Holland V .. and guess what ... the one who refuse to sleep started to nod off ...... and so i thought "not bad, get home quickly carry him upstairs, give him a bottle of milk and he will take his nap"..... but ... NO .... not to be... just the same like any other day we tried, by the time i carry him quietly upstairs ... the minute his head touches the pillow, his eyes BLINK OPEN and he says "i dun wanna sleep, i want to play."..........

and i told him i am tired and we will just rest for a while .... and now he even knows how to retaliate that statement ..... today he said "mummy, jie jie will take care of me downstairs so i can play, and you can do your things..."

now that woke me up .... my boy has GROWN up again !!!!!! instead of just telling me to play with him and he knows its a losing battle, he has decided the next best thing, have jie jie (maid) look after him so he can play and play and play .....

the other day grandma brought him out for lunch and came home with him napping in the car ... while carrying him out of the car, he started throwing tantrums ... and i asked why ..... my mum replied "because its afternoon now, grandma needs to go turn back the clock to morning so that iggie can play the whole day....."

now - where do children get to learn about time being lost while sleeping??? and where do they learn that clocks can be turned backwards so that it's morning again???

so learning about time .... iggie now realises that daddy is gone for long periods of time .... and on monday when daddy left for the airport, he asked how many days more before daddy is home again ..... daddy told him 10 days .... and that evening he asked me again... "is it 9 days already?" ..... and i told him no, it had only been 1 day ... 9 more days to go ..... and so the count down goes .... but once we got to the third day ... he has lost interest in counting and talking on the phone with daddy.... the present time is more important, he is focused now on not losing the mornings, afternoons and evenings of EVERYDAY for PLAY TIME......

now.... i want my sleep time ..... wonder at what age would iggie start to appreciate sleep time like we do .... sigh .... another 14 years more ????? ..... time ...... its always too short ......