Bed Time and Hide and Seek

Anna has a hard time going to bed most nights. She's often awake until after nine even though we read stories and tuck her in around eight. Some nights she plays quietly in her bed until she falls asleep. Some nights she calls out regularly, doing anything to get us to come visit her in her room. Tonight is one of those nights where she's been calling out and since I've been home alone while Dan was at Church meetings, I ignored many of her shouts for attention. Finally I went in to check on her and she said, "my pants came off" as if they just leaped off her body. I guess I should be surprised she doesn't strip all her clothes off more often. So I put her pants back on and tucked her in. Maybe this time, she'll start to settle down.

Yesterday morning she talked me into playing Hide and Seek with her. She learned this game from our neighbors Hayden and Parker when they came over to play. Hayden is five, but since Parker is only a little older than Anna, neither he nor Anna really understood the hiding part. Hayden would start counting and they'd both run to the opposite end of the house squealing. Then they'd stand in plain view, waiting for him to "find" them.

When I played with Anna, it was pretty similar. She let me hide first, so I hid under a sheet she had been playing with in our family room (she was making bubbles and popping them). After that, whenever I started to count, Anna would ask me to help her hide under the sheet. I tried to pick hiding spots that would be easy for her to find, like crouching down on the far side of our bed. But that one was a bit too hard for her. I had to call out to her so she could find me. Once I hid in the bathtub, making sure to make a lot of noise with the shower curtain so she'd know where to look. Another time I hid in my closet, just inside the door. It was so fun to watch her check beside the bed where I had hid before. When she realized I wasn't there and turned around, she could have easily spotted me, but she wasn't looking for me in the closet. I couldn't resist. When she got close, I jumped out and yelled "boo." She shrieked and it was loud. Not a great thing to do when Evie is taking a nap. I think she felt genuinely betrayed by me for scaring her, so after that the game was pretty much over.

As I was huddled in one of my hiding spots, I thought, "this is so much fun. Why don't I think to do this with Anna more often?" For some reason, I am always so concerned with all the things I need to do, like cleaning the bathrooms and balancing the check book, but when I do take time to play with my kids, it's always the highlight of my day. Of course, today we didn't have time for Hide and Seek as we were rushing off to story time and then to Costco. Maybe tomorrow.