Seattle Bedtime Monologue

I was surprised by how much you enjoyed playing in your crib/boat/train/bus/cozy nest during our hotel room downtime.  This is the last time you'll be able to use a roll-away crib in a hotel room, though, as you are definitely too tall for one now! 

On our last night in Seattle, Mommy and Daddy were especially eager for you to fall asleep quickly so that we could go out for a late dinner date. Now, at home it doesn't matter how long it takes you to fall asleep, but in a hotel room we can't just close the door to your room because you don't have a room to yourself! Instead, we put your crib into the tiny dark entry hallway and hang out on the bed around the corner so you can't see us. As we sat in the silent darkness, you started recapping your day, as is your wont, but this time because there was no door as a sound barrier, we were able to hear everything you said. I didn't have anything else to do, so here's a direct transcript, plus my commentary, of everything you said in the hour it took you to fall asleep.


***

"Sometimes I have a poop. And then we need to change. Oh! It's just pee. Why peoples have pee? Everybody has pee. Mommies, daddies, bebbers, and babies. When people has pee, it goes in the potty. See you later alligator."

[We've been talking a lot about pee/poop going into the potty because we're gearing up for toilet training. The day before we left for Seattle, you were wearing an alligator shirt so everyone said "see you later alligator!" to you.]

"Hello! Where's the baby? Where's your mom? Mommy not sleeping. Today we make a cake. Do you want some? Waah! A baby came out! You go back to sleep. Here's some water."

[Obviously this is because we've been talking about how you're going to have a baby sister.]

"Mommy right here. It's a hippo? It's red right here. Look! Where's the dinner? You can eat your dinner now! You can climb! He REALLY LIKES dinner. Do you wanna take a bath? Ok yeah! Ready to go back home. Eat your pizza! Don't lie down! Don't play African animals, not right now! Eat eat eat! Hey! Not your seat. You sit here and I will sit here. Where we going? Going to ride buses! Ice cream ice cream yummy yummy ice cream! Can we eat? Wait, where's your mom? Come here. Hi mom! Do you have a baby at home? I have a daddy and mommy."

[Because there's no dining room/table in the hotel room, trying to get you to stay in one place for meals has been a challenge. The first night, you tried to wander all around the room and lie down instead of eating your pizza, so I think you were just processing all that. And of course, people who see you wandering around school are always asking you where your mommy is.]

"I'm not sleeping. NO! Please have my pillow? Muffin! Muffin muffin muffin muffin muffin. Sing! It's so cold! But why is it so cold? You like to feel cold? Looks like you're cold. Cold cold cold you want to wear jacket? I want to wear red. Do you have red at your house? It looks like you're a velociraptor. Look! Velociraptors are velociraptor velociraptor velociraptor. Super duper."

[婆婆 is always asking you if you're cold, like grandmothers do, and you always say no. Red is your favorite color right now. We've been singing the muffin song a lot too, as well as talking about various dinosaurs.]

"I want my bears! They eating grass and hay. Do they even eat grass and hay? Elephant! What cows eat? Cows eat grass! Grass! What horses eat? Apples! That's what they eat? On trees? And pigs eat snap peas."

[We've also been talking a lot about the diets of various animals, and in an attempt to get you to eat more veggies, we told you that pigs eat snap peas. That piece of information unfortunately did nothing to change your eating habits.]

"That's all my stuff. Mine! Mine! That's my crib. Mine! After. After the treat is cap. What is cap? It means like ice cream. I understand."

[You've recently picked up the idea of possession, and that things can belong to you, to my dismay.]

"Ve. Lo. Ci. Rap. Tor! Dinosaurs, hey! I want some African animals. This one? Yeah! Please have a farm. Please have the dinosaurs. Besides the bear...do you know the farmer man? It's not the bebbers guy? *singing* Do you know the eating man, the eating man, the eating man? Do you know the eating man? It's not the bebbers guy! Do you know the dinosaur man, the dinosaur man, the dinosaur man? *back to talking* The owie man? I like the owie man. What happened to the owie man? Did he get out? And. He ate some cheese. And he want water."

[We've been singing variations on the "Do you know the muffin man" song, but the lyrics "who lives on Drury Lane" confuses you to no end, so we started substituting in "it's not the bebbers guy" instead. Then you added in all these additional verses. The owie man is what you call Jesus, because of how I told you the Easter story; I'm surprised you remember that Jesus proved he was alive by getting out of the tomb and sharing a meal with his disciples.]

*singing* "Do you know the muffin man, the muffin man, the muffin man? Do you know the muffin man, it's not the bebbers guy! Do you know the ice cream, ice cream man, the ice cream man? Do you know the ice cream man, it's not the bebbers guy! *continue singing, but about the fruit stand man and the  ocean animal man*

"Please have one cherry pie? And ummmmm this loaf of bread? And this one is...a bread with sour cream. What's this called?"

[You've watched us purchase a lot of baked goods over the last day or so in Seattle.]

*singing again, this time "Do you know the sleeping man?"*

"Get me all of them. I can't feed all of them! Cows on the bus. Number five. Oh it's a number four bus!"

[We spent a long time waiting for the bus to the zoo, so we passed the time by talking about what number buses were going by. After this you mumbled quietly to yourself for a little bit more, then finally fell silent. Phew!]


***

At the time, I was more than a little anxious that you wouldn't be able to fall asleep in time for us to sneak out for our 9PM reservation, but thankfully you finally knocked out at 8:45 and we were able to hustle over to Shaker+Spear in time! And now that we've had our nice dinner and made it back home safely, I can read over this monologue and laugh at it wholeheartedly.

I also had to resist interrupting your independent play with exclamations of how cute you were being after we got back from the zoo. You asked to get into your crib and then spent a long time arranging your blankets into caves and telling Mssr. Bear where chipmunks, Komodo dragons, and tiny tiny frogs were hiding, then made little "animal statues" for Mssr. Bear to ride on. I love that you process your day by recreating the adventures you had for your stuffed friends!