Hayden's "Quiet Time"

Greetings all!

Well, our little Hayden is transitioning out of his afternoon nap time. It is always challenging for Mom to lose those fabulously quiet moments of the afternoon. Like all the boys, I still put him to bed every afternoon for "quiet time." Elias used to lay in bed as a toddler for two hours and look at books. Hayden does love books but he has also found his "quiet time" to be a good opportunity for exploration.

Last week's Quiet time breakdown:

Monday: This was his big debut! Because he usually announces, "I'm awake!" when he is finished with QT, I make sure to get upstairs and get him on the potty right away. Nothing seemed amiss at first glance, but when I went into the bathroom off his bedroom I noticed the toilet brush sticking out of the toilet. There was a sopping wet diaper in the trash and little pieces of wet toilet paper all over the floor. Bless his heart, he had tried to clean up the watery mess with toilet paper. Well, I began the clean up of that bathroom and then I went to put the toilet brush away in the main bathroom. Floating in that toilet was my measuring tape ... I washed it and went to put it back in my desk drawer and found that he had raided my desk as well. All over the floor were miniscule pieces of paper he had cut up with my very sharp craft scissors. He had also opened a package of glue sticks and glued every toy in sight together. Whew! No toilets overflowed and he still had all his fingers!

Tuesday: You think I would have been more alert considering what Monday's QT had been like, but alas ... He comes down the stairs announcing that he is "Awake!" Elias and Asher come running into the kitchen to tell me that Hayden had gotten into a black permanent marker ... What? Wait, this is sticky. What's that smell? Is that perfume? I think this is mascara ... Yep! He had given himself war paint and tried to "comb" his hair with the mascara brush! I took him up to the bathroom to assess the damage. He had, in fact, used my nice Lancome mascara as face paint, and toilet paint and tub paint. The smell of perfume was overwhelming! And then I noticed the nail polish bottles on the ground ... They were all capped. Hmmm? Then as I was finishing up the scan I noticed the nail polish damage. Sure enough there were some glittery streaks on his blue potty chair that were not there before.

By the next day I had learned my lesson! Now, I make sure he has some books and some quiet toys at hand. I also make sure I am on alert for the sound of his door opening. 

Love to you all!

Jodi