Long Weekend

I forgot it was Memorial Day weekend this past weekend. My 6 year old daughter E wanted to sleep over at her cousin’s house and I was thinking it’s not a good idea. Last time she slept over, they didn’t go to sleep until way past midnight and it took days to fix her sleep schedule. With some reluctance, I gave in.

I ended up dropping off E’s things that same night and her 4 year old brother C was really sad. He didn’t want to miss out spending time with his cousin’s and also he would miss E. I tried to convince them to have the sleepover at our place, which didn’t work. So during the drop off, I told E to sleep early and that’s how she earns trust so she can do more sleepovers there.

To my surprise, they did go to sleep early enough and once I found out it was a long weekend, I felt even more reassured we could fix any issues with the sleep schedule in time for school. Even though C was sad, we tried to make it fun for him the next day and ended up taking him to the bookstore. He got to pick out a bunch of new books and eat some treats. It was a fun day for him, but he kept asking when we were picking E up. He clearly missed his big sister a lot.

After lunch, we ended up picking E up and one of her cousins wanted to sleep over at our place. So the sleepover continued and C got to play along with them. Of course it was chaotic, but it’s fine. It’s the long weekend. Somehow, my wife decided that scheduling a morning playdate was fine and we ended up with two more kids at our house on Memorial Day. There were 6 kids in the house with my wife and I managing to keep everyone happy and fed.

In the afternoon, things finally calmed down and we were finally left with just our own kids. Hosting was fine for me without kids, but after I had kids, it takes a lot out of me (especially if it’s hosting more kids). I know my wife is the same way, but we try to do it so our kids can have an awesome childhood. Long weekends are meant for fun and we tried our best this past weekend. Hopefully our kids will look back and appreciate the effort when they are older, but for now, they are asking when the next long weekend is.