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Ever since Jolie was born, we've been fairly neurotic about her schedule. Mainly, the sleeping part of the schedule. For, a well-sleeping Jolie is a Happy Jolie and a Happy Jolie is a Happy (read: non-postal) Mommy and Daddy.

We've done everything possible to protect her bedtime (note: that is, once she had established that wonderful quality of having a bedtime after those initial Please-Shoot-Me-Now-and-Get-It-Over-With Days) including running madly through the mall parking lot trying to get home for a nap, STAT. (On one of these occasions, I think a couple who observed our manic actions thought we were abducting her. We didn't have time to explain that No, we are actually her parents and she's late for a nap!)

And of course, we were always in a wonderful sleeping schedule equilbrium when the time change came along- that lovely man made Daylight Savings Time ritual- that threatened to turn our perfectly scripted worlds upside down in CHAOS.

I know it seems like a one hour difference is just a drop in the bucket, but I begged to differ that first year when it was the difference between her waking up at 6 am everyday (Yes, early bird much?) and suddenly have it be 5 am. 5 am awakenings for children are UNHEALTHY. I also think there are some children who do very well with time transitions and if you put them to bed later than usual, they just wake up later to make up for it. NOT OUR CHILD.

It was with grave trepidation that we approached any one of these changes, either moving the clock ahead or behind, choosing instead to fret and plot and dance around the inevitable for weeks prior to The Change. What would be our strategy? Should we put her to bed later a little bit every day? AHHHHH.

Can you tell this is our first child? Can you?

So, this year, again we plotted and strategized how we would handle the upcoming Fall Back. Now, we'd be dealing with a mental-friendly 7 am wakening, possibly converting to a far-less-mentally-friendly 6 am wakening. We started, last week, to inch her bedtime a little later and later, moving from 7:30 ish to 8 ish. And this past weekend, anticipating the change early Sunday morning , we let her stay up until -gasp- 8:30 ish and once 8:45 ish knowing that this would be an hour earlier in no time.

Good thing I checked online to confirm which day we would be losing Daylight Savings Time which SURPRISE is next weekend, not this one. DOH.

(Our information came from JP's Day Timer which still has the old date of the change, not reflecting the 2005 Congressional decision to postpone Fall Back for one week).

Joy. I'm so glad we kept her up on purpose for nothing. The irritability and crankiness she's displaying from subtle sleep deprivation is refreshing!

Is this really necessary, Congress? Don't you have children? Can you tell I don't handle change well?

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