Our Routine Child

When Ryan and I first even thought about having children, my (and assuming Ryan's) first 'concern' was - 'Keep a child on a routine - it's important.'  I can firmly say that from the beginning, Kayson has been on a routine. I remember working very hard at getting him on a sleeping/eating routine when he was a baby, and we were successful - and we are still successful at 3 1/2 years old.  This routine includes everything -- eating, napping, how we do baths, some of the activities we do, morning routine, etc.  Daycare has had him on a good routine as well - which has been awesome, since he spends A LOT of his time there!  I'm actually very proud that we have done so well with Kayson.

There are obvious pros about having a child on a routine - some things I can think of right now are: 

• We can really tell when he's tired, crabby, hungry.  We don't have to guess when it comes to stuff like that.
• We make the time for his naps...  sure, we may miss out on some things, but I'd rather have a child that takes a nap and is happy, then to 'force' a child to stay active during his nap when it's obvious a nap is needed.

And there are some cons to having a child on a routine - examples:

• When Ryan takes Kayson to daycare nearly 80% of the time (or for a long period of time), and then all of the sudden he needs to travel, and I do the drop off for daycare.  Kayson gets off.  Just something as simple as that can mess up a child (or our kid) for several days.  
• When one parent (me) does the bedtime routine 95% of the time, and we try to 'mix' it up a little bit, that throws our kid off.  (This is something we really need to work at over the next 6 weeks in prep for Baby Girl - will be a little difficult when Ryan's traveling.)
• And when a kid is as smart as Kayson - he knows something's going on (with Baby Girl - prepping, room stuff, more talk of her, my belly is huge, etc)...  it's gonna mess with his routine.  Period.

Like I said, I'm very proud of what we have done... and I only hope we continue with him... and making a routine with Baby Girl.   We are currently going through some 'stages' with Kayson - back talking, making up words and sentences (with not so nice words) - that he's learning from daycare kids by the way!, and a lot of just plain not listening.  I know and understand this is his age, and again goes back to the routine being kind of 'jacked up', but we are working hard on figuring this out and keeping Kayson (and the rest of us) happy. 

Being a parent is hard.  But I wouldn't trade it for anything.