Though we can't really take any credit for 'saving the world' one watt at a time unfortunately. This was all attributed to -The Worst Bedtime Ever-. All was going swimmingly at first, we have been cracking down at bedtime, and the boys were all going to bed at 7pm. But one dark and stormy night.. no it wasn't, it was just a normal beautiful Autumn evening in Tassie.. too beautiful in hindsight, the warmer evening probably did contribute partly to the chaos that ensued. So they had stories read to them, had their teeth cleaned, toilet trips completed and kiss good nights all round, including a round of kissies from Pichu who has just recently perfected his own little schmack! Then it started, the calling out, the needing more milk, needing water bottles, talking, wrestling.. then fighting, stealing blankets and more fighting. Several trips back and forth later, we thought we had nipped it in the bud, they had gone relatively quiet.
But alas, Legoman appears in the lounge room claiming he needed to sleep elsewhere as his bed was wet. I was slightly annoyed, thinking Oshawott had probably spilled his water on Legoman's side of the bed. I then noticed his top was half soaked. On investigation it was revealed that the 3 week old new double bed mattress was now soaked on one side. Argh! What happened?! They said they had a water fight. Oh of course you did! Who doesn't? Sounds perfectly normal to me. Thank goodness they only had one bottle each, they had to be full though, typical. So Legoman and Oshawott were evicted to the downstairs bed. Voltorb had to sleep on the dry side of the double bed. We kept very calm, well mostly.
They went to sleep.
Right, that was it.. we took away the 2 laptops they use, unplugged the TV from behind the cupboard, took their 3ds', iPod, and hid the iPad. I then rummaged through the bookshelf and scattered a dozen various colouring and activity books across the floor, and placed a tub of puzzles in the middle of the floor.
When they woke up they didn't (at first) even question the missing laptops, didn't ponder too long over why the tv didnt turn on. They did actually do puzzles and drawings! Later as they inquired (and I was awake enough to reason) we talked about the punishment and what they had lost access to. They took it reasonably well, because it's not like they use these things all the time, but tell them they can't and..whoa! So all day there was no electronic entertainment in this house. It was really nice, and we will definitely do it more often, not as a punishment so much as a decision we all make.
Though it sure does make them go to bed easily now!
