Pirates and Blue Nails

Complete and utter boy fabulousness and I LOVE it! I had a moment this evening, when Bear and Steve were out at the shops (Bear was, blessedly, asleep) and Bean and I were supposed to be having Mama-Bear time, when I just switched off to him, irritated and tired. Eventually I realised he was pretending to paint his fingernails so I suggested we paint them with his real nail polish (the dark blue polish that is his, that he chose). "YES! Paint ALL my nails Mum, ALL of them!" I couldn't persuade him to just let me do the thumbnails as usual. So he has all his nails painted dark blue. He likes them a lot. I said Daddy might not be especially pleased, because Daddy thinks that nail polish is just for girls. "But it's NOT mummy, it's for boys too!" It totally is, too :)

We got up late this morning. So late that we had lunch for breakfast (or breakfast for lunch, or something like that). The boys are being very difficult to put to bed at the moment. Bean wants to go to sleep (generally), but Bear fights sleep. All the time. Perhaps he is scared he'll miss out on something when he's asleep. Or is realising that Mama goes off somewhere when he's asleep and he has to make sure she doesn't go anywhere and leave him. Whatever the reason is, it's taking me over two hours in the evening to get him to go to sleep. So this evening, Steve took him to the supermarket by car and he was asleep by the time they got there - result!! I think we may try that trick again. As often as we can. This will mean having to eat earlier so that Steve can get the boy off to sleep before heading out to whatever meeting he's going to of an evening... but if it means less battling and less stress for me while he's out, I'm all for it.

But Bean went off to preschool, and Steve and I went out for a walk to get Bear off to sleep. Yes he was fighting his afternoon nap as usual, despite being tired and grumpy. Mondays are made for afternoon walks together and Steve and I finally had a chance to talk openly to each other, challenge and encourage, reconnect, and figure out what we needed to do to move forwards. It was good.

Bedtime has been half a struggle this evening. Bear stayed asleep in his carseat, but Bean just couldn't go to sleep. I had to take myself away several times so I wouldn't completely lose it with him. I think he recognised this, and tempered his behaviour a bit because he could see I was really trying to stay calm. Eventually Steve had to go up and stay with him while he fell asleep but my goodness he's pushing all my irritation buttons again. I honestly don't think he's doing it on purpose. I think my tolerance levels are just still a bit low at the moment... Glad that Steve and I are more connected now. Hopefully we'll manage to maintain that connection, and it'll filter through to the boys too.