Father of the Year

It probably won't come as much of a surprise to you, but Pegs has got Sofia on a pretty tight schedule. This is a good thing for the most part, since Sofia knows exactly what to expect and reacts predictably, whether it be at breakfast, dinner or bedtime. Deviate from "The Schedule," though, and you've got one cranky baby on your hands.

With Pegs out of town, I've tried to adhere to Sofia's routine as best I can. Inevitably, though, something drags longer than I expect or someone calls for work, and then I miss my window. Today, though, I was determined to keep one step ahead and prepare everything in advance; I simply had no idea that I was going to do so well at it.  

I put Sofia down for her 2:30 nap right on time, and while she slept I cleaned up the kitchen and got her next bottle ready.  I took her dinner out of the freezer so it would defrost, and I even chopped a pear for dessert. As if she were on some sort of timer, Sofia awoke like clockwork after sleeping one hour, and I gave her the bottle I had prepared earlier. Thirty minutes before I served her dinner I put the plate on a bain marie to warm it slowly, and when the time came for her to eat, Sofia was strapped in her high chair with a bib on, ready to go. 

As soon as Sofia finished her meal, I prepped her next bottle and put her in the stroller for a long walk around the park, followed by about twenty minutes of playtime in the bathtub when we got back. I dried her off, put her in her bedclothes, read her a story, gave her the bottle I had prepared earlier and put her down to sleep.  Sofia was out like a light, and I silently congratulated myself for being such a good dad.  "I could be a role model for other fathers," I thought to myself modestly, envisioning the solid gold trophy I would get for winning the Father of the Year award.

That's when Sofia started crying.  Sofia sometimes whimpers a bit after I put her down, but after a few minutes she usually konks back out. I didn't think much of it and hopped in the shower, expecting her to have crashed by the time I got out. When I turned off the waterworks in the bathroom, though, I realized that Sofia's waterworks were still going strong in the bedroom. "Oh crap," I thought, "she must have pooped right after she went down." Pegs' cardinal rule is that no one is allowed in Sofia's bedroom after she's been put to sleep, the one exception being that I can go in to change a poopie diaper, since otherwise she'll never stop crying. 

I went in to her bedroom, and Sofia had obviously been crying the entire time I was in the shower.  Her bed was soaked with tiny, tiny tears and sob-induced drool, and when I picked her up she clutched at me like I was a Snickers bar at a Jenny Craig clinic. She hadn't pooped, but she had wet her diaper, so I changed her and did an abbreviated version of the bedtime routine (shutting the door, closing the curtains, hugging her while telling her it's time for bed, and then setting her down).  Once again Sofia seemed to go to sleep the second her head hit the mattress, but once I closed the door she started another round of blubbering.  

"She just needs to cry it out," I reasoned. "I'm going to warm me up a fajita." Sofia cried the entire time I made dinner; she cried the entire time I ate; she cried while I put away the dishes; and she was still crying when I started watching TV at 7:10. And that's when I figured out what I had done wrong: I had put her to bed a full hour early.  

That's right, for some reason I had convinced myself that it was 7:30 when I put her down (the designated sleep time according to The Schedule), but in actuality I had put her to bed at 6:30. "No wonder she's crying," I choked, "she's not supposed to go to sleep for another 20 minutes." I went back over everything in my head and realized that, ever since she had woken up from her nap, I had done everything an hour early, including giving her dinner. The Schedule, I realized, was completely screwed.

The thing is, it's not like I hadn't checked my watch to make sure I was keeping to The Schedule, because I had. Numerous times. I had even thought to myself how oddly bright it was when I was closing the curtains in her bedroom, and considering we live in cloud-shrouded Paris, that should have been a pretty good sign that something wasn't quite right. The problem was that I was so focused on the minute hand of my watch to ensure I wasn't late that it never occurred to me to check the hour hand to make certain that I wasn't way, way too early.

Since I had already broken every other rule that Pegs had laid down about how to handle Sofia, I figured I might as well break them all and went back in her room. After apologizing profusely, I took Sofia out of bed, pulled out her favorite toys and played with her well past her bedtime. The whole experience must have been a bit confusing and traumatic for her, but in the end I know that I'm the one who's going to suffer tomorrow for messing up The Schedule. To top it off, I had to mentally return the Father of the Year trophy I had received for doing such a good job today. It's a shame, really; it had my name engraved on it and everything.