Baby naptime: the Holy Grail of parenting. If you can just get it right, you can get the washing up done, have a shower, or get your head down yourself (dream on!). But as any parent knows, baby naptime can be a fragile, unpredictable affair. It is Mission Impossible. But never fear! As with most things in life, you can learn how it’s done from the movies! Here’s how to turn Mission Impossible into En-Nap-Ment.
We’ve all been there. You’ve fed, winded, and changed your baby. He has yawned (yessss!) but you are not yet in the dreaded Overtired Zone. You’ve plumped your pillow ready for your weary head. You’ve put your phone on silent, after setting the alarm so neither of you sleeps too long and misses the school run (yeah, right!). All you have to do is pop him in his bed. You bend over to put him down, keeping your body against his, despite the protestations from your screaming back. So far so good. You lay him down as gently as this most precious thing in the world deserves. Still going well. You gently slide your hands out from under him. His eyes flip open and he starts to scream. You want to cry. So does your back.
What you need is a harness, Tom Cruise-style! Then you could simply lower yourself and the baby down from the ceiling, with none of the strain on your back. After depositing him, you could comfortably keep your hands there for a couple of minutes. If the eyes flicked open, there would be your reassuring face, millimetres from his. Slowly, slowly, you could winch yourself up, up and away. Mission Accomplished.
The baby’s down, but now I have to get out of the room. You might think that one of the airborne superheroes might be a good role model for this. Spiderman, for example. But look at him, swinging around all over the place, making little comic asides into his mask, eyes only for Mary-Jane. What use is that? Any baby would spot you a mile off. No. You need to make like Catherine Zeta-Jones in Entrapment. Just like the red lasers guarding the priceless mask she tries to steal in the film, bedroom hazards guard your priceless baby’s right to stay awake as long as he wants. You have to silently – and without being able to see them, thanks to the blessed blackout blinds – contort yourself through these; number 1, of course, being your baby’s line of sight. Stumble across that beam and all is lost. This limits your escape route to anywhere below cot level. But there are other traps too: that creaky floorboard, the VTech baby laptop you forgot to turn off, the bear with the squeaky heart, the knob of the chest of drawers, the crunkly wrapper left on the floor by one of your older kids. Encounter any of these and the game is up. You’re done for. But by channelling the agility of CZJ, you can turn Entrapment into En-Nap-Ment. If only my derriere were so shapely.
I got busted tonight as I hovered outside my baby’s room checking if he’d gone to sleep so I could safely go on to child 2. Betrayed by my own shadow, no less! There it was, looming larger than life on the wall with the landing light behind me, causing my wee one to stand up and bellow immediately – or as quick as he could in his grobag, poor thing. Foiled again! Why oh why didn’t I emulate Peter Pan and lose the treacherous thing?
Failing all the above, you could just get three guys with dodgy hairstyles to sing your baby to sleep. Good night, sweetheart.
I never thought I’d want anything more than a nap – but right now, I’d rather have a place in the Brilliance in Blogging final! If you liked this, I’d be so happy if you would pop me in for the Laugh, Fresh Voice or Writer category. Just click on the badges below!
Kids’ Bedtime – The Last Straw – featuring The 7pm-8pm Vortex. “You can be primed, kids in PJs, teeth done, their eyes (despite themselves) drooping, sitting on the bed about to read a story at 7pm. You feel pretty smug. But then, the Vortex opens. It has no mercy. It can sense a parent desperate for a break and it will gape its all-encompassing jaws and swallow time. That hour will be gone. It is beyond your control.”
Picture credits: the relevant film studios.
Beware of baking while your baby naps. I once made gingerbread men, and when I tiptoed upstairs to check (at what should have been the midpoint of the nap) my twins were standing up in their cots with their noses quivering like the Bisto Kid of distant advertising memory.
Ha ha ha! No wonder they were not napping with your delicious baking going on downstairs! x
This is hilarious!!!! I think the ceiling harness would be a great help! X
Thanks! Just think of all the poor mummy backs it would save! Tom Cruise could come round to give us a tutorial too…x
Hahaha, this is so funny & {terribly} accurate.
Esp those damn/spooky creaky floorboards, always when you’re one step away from freedom!
I know, you always think you have them all mapped out but they always trip you up!
Betrayed by your own shadow. Happens to the best of us. Children are uber-sensitive hour-stealers!! 🙂 x
I know, I don’t know why I even hope to get anything done during naptime! x
This is so funny. Love it. Happens to us all! Still laughing at three guys sings to the crib. hahaha Thank you for linking up to Share With Me. Love reading your posts! #sharewithme
Thanks Jenny! I’d like to be sung to sleep by three guys sometimes 😉 x
Hahaha I have been in this exact place all week with my teething baby. And today due to a non nap we have the terror of the over tired baby!
#pocolo
I know, it’s a nightmare isn’t it? Hope the teeth are better this week.
This is brilliant…. I love the Tom Cruise harness – why oh why I never employed that when Little A was a baby I will never know! X
I know, it would have saved many a strain on the back and interrupted nap! x
Yes, yes and yes! This is SO true. Trying to get Grace to have her nap was a complete and UTTER nightmare!! Thank you for linking to PoCoLo x
It should be so simple, yet nearly always isn’t! x
Oh that is so true, and now I know every single creaky step and floorboard in our house. Grrr!
pahaha this is so true!! #archiveday x
Haha oh yes I’ve done th entrapment moves but not so smooth as Catherine zeta Jones. And the catsuit chafed a bit x