sleepover
i love my son
This morning, just after my alarm went off and I lay in bed staring at the ceiling, I heard a sound I hear most mornings: my son slowly opening his door, whimpering in his ever constant “I need something but I’m not going to tell you want” whine.
But this morning it was a little different. Normally it only takes him a few seconds to travel from his room to ours. But now his whine seemed sustained, and stationary. And with it an occasional odd squeak. I lay quietly, trying to figure out what he was doing. His whines grew louder. I decided I should get up and see what’s going on before he graduates to full tantrum, which can be hard to come back down from.
What I find is my son, laying on the floor, half conscious, trying to drag his bike out of his room. The handlebars were stuck on the door. He woke up from sleep, walked to the end of his bed, and tried to ride his bike out of his unlit room. The first thing on his mind when he woke up was “I wanna ride my bike.”
I love my son.
so much for lunch
Slept like this for at least half an hour.
my first race
Saturday morning I’ll be participating in my first ever bike race. It just so happens to also be a 24 Hour relay race.
Starting Saturday at Noon, ending Sunday at Noon, I’ll be racing with a 5 man team. Each lap is about 12.2 miles. It’s up to your team to decide how you’ll ride. You can do a lap at a time and switch, you could take a couple, three laps at a time, however you please. There are two ultimate goals, highest lap count, and highest points. Points are achieved by doing side missions, most of which are secret until the race begins. After all, the whole time the race is going on, 4 of your team mates are sitting around doing nothing.
I’m nervous to say the least. I road the course Monday, but other than that, my bike has been hanging in the garage all week. Events of the week fell just right so as to prevent me from riding to work at all. Maybe tonight I’ll try and ride, or, worse case scenario, I can try out that bike trainer I got at a garage sale last weekend. Something weird about watching TV while you bike though…
I feel very unprepared. Exercise aside, I have no idea what to bring. I’ll be camping, sort of. I’ll never go longer than 3 hours sleeping. So I probably won’t bring a tent. Plus I have a slight romantic notion about sleeping under the stars. In reality I’ll just hate myself for not bringing a tent. I’ve never ridden with endurance in mind, so I don’t know what to eat or drink. I’m basically just skimming youtube tutorials and articles on race nutrition, trying to pick up as much as I can, all while not being willing to go out and spend a bunch of money on crazy ‘gels’ and other such fitness nutrition supplies.
I plan on twittering and such during the race. Apparently you can watch the race “live” in Google Earth from the race tracker. Not sure what it will do. No video or anything that fancy…but it’ll track the race somehow I guess.
This is a long, rambly, unentertaining post, and I apologize for that. I’ve had a long, rambly, unentertaining day, and I just want it to end. But while I feel like just vegging out on the couch, I’ve got to motivate myself enough to give this race real thought so I can prepare.
Blah.
delayed grounds
Welp, Juan got a serious sinus infection, and so our meeting was canceled. I’m glad to say everyone was bummed. I’m glad to say that because it means everyone was excited simply about having a meeting about making an album. If a band is excited to have a meeting about recording, then you know they’re into their music, and they’ll be willing to work hard on what they’ve got.
As I said last week, getting Noah to sleep has been a task. We spent three nights standing outside his door, putting him back in his bed each time he’d get up. Then we had two good nights where he was sufficiently pooped and just conked out. Unfortunately tonight he’s back to his old games. He finally quieted down for a few minutes, so I sat down here to write, and within a couple seconds I heard his door open, and before I could get out of my chair I heard the pitter patter of his feet across the floor, and found him streaking across the hall towards our bedroom, screaming “Mommy! Mommy!” Again, he prefers whichever parent isn’t currently putting him to bed, and his ultimate goal is always to be on the floor in our room. Always.
Before it was lights out, he was trying to convince Teresa the best bed for him is me, laying on his floor. He demonstrated this, and truth be told, it didn’t seem so crazy when coming from the mouth of an adorable little boy. Then again my judgment is always swayed by a cuddling toddler.
Teresa just leaned into my door to let me know it’s going to be another marathon night. Maybe that’s my cue that it’s time to switch shifts.
the return
It’s been almost a month since I’ve posted, but I refuse to fall back to my old ways and make whole posts about how I haven’t posted in a while.
Just over a month ago I posted about turning the lock around on Noah’s door, giving us the ability to easily lock him in his room. Well, we’ve changed our minds and decided this isn’t a good idea.
Over the last month Noah has taken to coming into our room and sleep on our floor. It started out with an early morning, maybe 3am, and Noah wouldn’t go back to his bed. I can’t remember the exact details, but it ended with him voluntarily laying on the floor next to my side of the bed.
Since then its continued to get earlier and earlier in the night. 1am. Midnight. 11pm. It’s come to the point where as we put him down for bed he asks to go lay on our floor. We even tried this one night when he refused to sleep. It had gotten to around 9:45, and we just gave up and put his blanket out on the floor for him. But then he preceded to just toss and turn and kick the wall.
So last night Teresa and I made the decision we would stick it out and put Noah to bed, sans locks. As soon as she left the perfectly silent bedroom he began to cry. She sighed real big. “Ten minute shifts” I said. “You go first!” she replied.
I’ll admit, I’m biased, but the ten minute shifts idea was genius. It was the only thing that kept my sanity intact. And even the 10 minutes felt really long. You’d be surprised how many times a toddler can lay down, let you shut the door, and then get up screaming and open the door within one minute.
Noah tried everything. He tried lamenting about the missing parent “Mommy Gone!” when I was on, “Daddy Gone!” when it was Teresa’s turn. Sometimes he got confused. “Daddy Gone!” “No Noah, I’m right here.”
He was thirsty. He was hungry. He was scared of the ‘”roars”. He used every pity tactic he could. I’m pretty sure one of the many books on his bookshelf must be a psychological operations field manual, cause that kid can break a man down.
We each took a try and sitting with him quietly until he’d doze off. Both of us found he’d just wake up as soon as his face hit mattress, so we gave up and just kept laying him back in his bed, not saying a word.
I was pretty sure we’d go on forever, but finally, at about 11:30, Teresa laid him down, he complained for about 15 seconds, and then fell silent. That was a welcome relief to be sure.
So yeah, that’s my update after a month long hiatus. In summary, I think locking my kid in his room kinda messed him up, and fixing it sucks. May not be the same for you, but now you have one anecdote to reference someday. I don’t blame myself or anything, no great remorse over screwing up my kid. I never said I knew what I was doing.
ch-ch-ch-changes
Yeah, you know the song. That’s one of the great things about the success of the internet. If the record labels had it the way they wanted, I couldn’t link to a listenable version of the song, but they’d totally be cool with me recommending you go out and buy the whole album!
But I digress. (I think. I don’t really know what that word means.)
Today marks a couple big changes in the Bullard Atlanta HQ. Last night was awful. Teresa decided to try and ween Noah, and that meant me struggling for over an hour to get Noah to stay in bed. This included him learning that he is able to climb out of his crib, perfecting his door opening skills, and teaching us that we can no longer leave his light-switch stool in his room at night. Yeah, it was fun. Oh, he can also unlock a door.
So tonight, we start some changes. I’m sure this will mean another night of endless returns to his crib.
Change numer eins:
I figure if he’s going to climb out of bed, then it’s our job to teach him that him being in bed is a decision he has to make for himself. Might as well make it less dangerous. Of course, it’s in the picture, but Teresa has made a Great Wall of Pillows to shelter our snowflake from any falls. I figure there’s no better way to cure a kid of fitful sleeping than to take away his since of security in bed. No one sleeps sounder than those wrought with fear. or something. Maybe that’s backwards. Whatever, none of these decisions will have any lasting effects on any persons.
El Chango Numero Dose:
That’s the outside of his room. And that’s the lock, on the side I like to call “our side.” Because this is a war, and he’s on his side, and I’m on mine. Rar.
I know this may look awful at first glance, but to you I say loosen up your panties and think with me for a moment. The bed thing makes getting out of bed a decision on Noah’s part. From there he makes the decision to open the door, find us, and we put him back to bed. Last night I learned this is a game for him. He finds it funny. So locking the door is a way for me to make it less fun. He’s gained the control of being in bed or not, I’m keeping the control of him getting out of his room. We’ll never leave it locked through the night, and I hope to not have to use it at all. It’s really no worse than putting your kid in a wooden, padded cage that’s too deep for him to climb out.
And thus far everything is going fine. He’s been down for 15 minutes now, open bed, unlocked door, and it would appear he’ll stay down for the night. I’m still a little worrid, as he seemed to be telling us the small thunder outside was caring him. I told him it was God telling him goodnight (it’s loud cause you know…He’s God.) And of course, because God has that wonderful sense of humor, He made sure to tell Noah goodnight REALLY LOUD right after Teresa put him down. Let’s hope He doesn’t keep it up all night.
So there you have it folks. A quick look at the draconian parenting methods of the Bullards. Hey, if we seem to conservative in our parenting ways, maybe I can soothe you liberal folks with the story of Teresa making her own laundry detergent. Yep, first she’s making clothes, now laundry soap. Expect paisley shawls and bell bottom jeans any minute now.
UPDATE:
(Imagine the Unsolved Mysteries Update music here)
Noah got out of bed twice last night. At 3am he found me out on the couch asleep in front of the TV. He was excited to watch TV with me. I laid him back down and he seemed to be fine, but as I was moving my pillows into the bedroom he found me in the hall. I laid him down again and laid down next to his crib. He poked his head up a few times, but then went back to sleep. Then of course this morning he came into our room to wake us up. I guess that’ll be the new norm. Overall though, not too bad. No real fights.
haHA!
Looks like my song works!
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musica dormio
I don’t care if the title mixes languages, it’s my blog, I’ll do what I want.
So lately I’ve been doing my best to write more songs. I’ve been making music for a while, but ever since I left punk rock for death metal I’ve doubted my song writing abilities. Occasionally something will pop up that vaguely resembles music, but for the most part, I feel like I piece together stuff and it sorta comes out.
So I’ve been trying to focus on actually writing songs. Even if they’re just 2 verses and a chorus, every one is like a musical push up. The more I work at it, the better I’ll get. Ideally.
But I always get a creative road block really early. Mostly in the “what should I write about” stage. That tends to halt things pretty quickly. But since I’ve been aiming for musical pushups and not musical triathlons, I decided that the subject shouldn’t be the stressing point. So I passed that responsibility over to Teresa.
It goes like this: I walk up to Teresa at a random time, and I go “Song subject, GO!” Then I count down from five with my fingers, as she babbles something out. This is why later you’ll get a song about “Um…Laundry?”
But for now you’ll get a song that came from, “Baby, I’m really tired.”
I have to say, I really like this song. I don’t think it’s a particularly great song, it may not even warrant more than a couple listens, but I’m really happy with the result. While there are many other reasons, the fact that Teresa found herself getting sleepy just listening to an early version of it is more than enough for me to chalk it up as a success. Yep, I aimed for my music to put you to sleep. That’s the kind of “win with failure” kind of mindset that can really boost my confidence. None the less, the song really does make me think of sleep, and I think that’s great. It came out almost exactly as I heard it in my head, which has been nearly impossible in the past. Either I’m imagining within my personal limitations, or I’m getting better at this stuff. You can guess which way my pessimism is leaning.
So without further ado, I present to you, Tired.
[audio:http://tonybullard.com/media/TonyBullard-Tired.mp3]
“Tired” by Tony Bullard
»download«
I’d like to dedicate the whistle solo to my father. He and I had an incident in our past regarding a whistling performer, and I’d like to consider this an apology.
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