Backwards Night

It was a night of family fun at our house last night, as Mommy had a new trick up her sleeve...Backwards Night!!

When Regan got home from school, the front door was locked and she found a note attached that said 'Welcome home Regan! Get ready to have some fun because tonight is Backwards Night! Now, please, come in through the BACK door!!'

Once she came in the house, she had already been thinking about what that meant. When she started asking questions, I directed her to another note that said:

So, what is backwards night?

Nothing is as it was.
Daddy does what mommy does
Mommy is Daddy
Regan is Sage
Dessert is for dinner
and don't act your age!

The grownups are kids
and go to bed first
and maybe you
wear each others shirts!!

What else will happen?
Let's wait and see!
I only know one thing,
how fun it will be!!

The note was printed backwards, so she did a bit of quick thinking and took it upstairs where she could hold a small mirror next to it and read what it said. She was pretty excited and immediately began jabbering about all the details of Mommy and Daddy going to bed first and her and Sage staying up late.

The next step was transforming each girl into the other. Sage was all in and was eager to have braids in her hair and put on Regan's pjs.

Regan was not quite as thrilled. Our fun plans hit their first snag as Regan began to let her long list of 'I'm NOT going to...' be known, complete with hands on the hips and a foot stomps. She was NOT going to have her hair in bundles, she was NOT going to wear Sage's clothes or pajamas or even her own pajamas that matched the snowman ones Sage always wears, etc..

OK...parenting dilemma  number one. What and how much do you make your child do in the name of fun? I didn't want to force her to do things, just to fit into my expectations of what the night was supposed to be, yet her attitude was one of complete disrespect and was not by any means acceptable. A few gentle encouragements and alternate suggestions made little impact on her disposition. In the end, I got down on my knees and had an eye to eye conversation with her. I let her know that I was really looking forward to a night of fun, but that she would not be able to participate if she could not turn her attitude around. She agreed to change the way she was behaving and we made a fresh start. It still took a little bit, but she worked through most of the attitude issues.

Once they were all dressed and hair fixed, we had two adorable little backwards kids!! They were giggling like crazy while they discussed that Marley was 'kitty' and kitty was Marley for the night and started acting like dogs.

Next, I knew we would need to fill a bit of time before Daddy (or should I say Mommy!) came home, so we played a fun game that I made up. It was inspired by a conversation with friends based on Regan's aper pairplane tongue twister from the night before. I made a whole list of mixed up word combinations for girls to solve. We started with a couple easy ones, like flutterby and aper pairplane, so they could get the jist of the game. After working through my list of 20 or so, things like tish fank, fird beeder, gray plound, Regan quickly caught on and took her turn making some up for Sage and I to solve. We read them all to Daddy at dinner time and let him try to solve them too. The girls got a good laugh at some of Daddy's silly answers.

Once Daddy was home, it was dinner time! And what do you have for dinner on backwards night? Dessert, of course!! Sage and I made some brownies earlier in the day and picked up ice cream at the store. We got out all the fixins we could find and had ice cream sundaes for dinner!

After dinner was family movie night. We signed up for Netflix last week and received our first DVD in the mail - Despicable Me (or Destickable Me as Sage would say!!).

We all enjoyed the movie, but I think the girls were even more excited when the movie was done. That meant it was time for them to put Mommy and Daddy to bed!! First, Daddy demanded his bedtime snack. After some discussions about how many 'strikes' he had for misbehavior and whether he had earned enough back doing his chores, it was decided that daddy could indeed have some popcorn.

After the popcorn was made, we were ordered to our bed. The girls tried to quickly escape so they could return downstairs to watch some more tv and finish all the ice cream (just like daddy would do when they go to bed! LOL!). Daddy and I weren't quite finished with bedtime routine though! We insisted on bedtime story and, of course, had to pull all the antics the girls usually do! I think we burned off all the ice cream we ate with all the laughing we did!!

The girls returned to the living room to have their night of staying up late and watching tv. They were able to find lots of fun things to watch on Netflix on demand. Of course, they had a few interruptions from the 'kids' who were supposed to be sleeping - you know, requests for water, to turn down the volume, bathroom visits. :)

They wandered upstairs shortly before 11 pm to put themselves to bed. It had been discussed earlier that they would switch beds for the night. What sounded good to everyone a few hours before no longer sounded like a good idea to Regan. So, we ended the night with another list if 'I'm NOT going to...' sleep in Sage's bed, use her sleeping bag, let her sleep in my bed, etc....complete with crying and tears. Parenting dilemma number two - there is never an easy answer to make everyone happy. We stuck with the original plan of switching beds and in five minutes it didn't really matter, as everyone was sound asleep. :)

The girls have already asked today when the the next backwards night will be. I had a brief conversation with each about how much fun it was and if they liked it, which they did! Regan and I also chatted a bit about changing some behaviors next time, which she agreed to work on.  It was a fun night and definitely something we will do again. Hopefully these will be the  memories they will carry with them for a lifetime. :)