Hollow Tree Ventures parenting humor

As The Dollhouse Turns: Bedtime Nightmares

Episode 15: Bedtime Nightmares

"Bedtime, girls," Sunny calls out with a bit too much glee in her voice, setting the kitchen clock from 8:12 to 8:30 in case anyone checks. "Brush your teeth," she quickly continues, before any Bedtime Stalling Tactics can begin.

Too late.

"Five more minutes!" begs Charmeuse. "I'm not quite finished with, ummm, my homework."

"But I just got started on a craft project," whines Chenille.

"No," Sunny yells, standing firm because structure is important, and because kids need sleep to stay healthy, and because she can't start shoveling Oreos into her face until the kids are asleep.

But Chenille has one last stalling technique up her sleeve. "Can we at least read a story?"

It's educational. She knows her mother can't say no.

"Fine," Sunny relents. "You girls agree on a book and I'll be right up." Sunny hastily pops a cookie in her mouth and heads upstairs, already filled with calorie regret.

"We couldn't decide," Chenille informs her.

Sunny sighs and settles onto the bed. Immediately, the Story Time Stalling begins.

"I smell chocolate!" announces Chenille.

"I'm too old for stories," Charmeuse claims.

"Why does the baby get to sit on your lap?" Chenille wants to know. "She always gets all the attention. You love the baby more than you love us."

Not usually, but she is  the quietest one right now...

Sunny sighs again. "Girls, come on. You know none of that is true. Now, pick one book for us to read. One book."

Chenille hops down to inspect the pile, then climbs back up on the bed.

"Really?" says Sunny. "What is this, the encyclopedia?" The cover says something about fables, and Sunny suddenly remembers that she'd intended to burn this book. She barters the kids down to just two mind-numbing fables instead of the entire 467-page collection, but before she can start reading... "Where did the baby go?"

Sunny finds baby Chiffon under a pile of stuffed animals in the corner, then returns to find Chenille missing. "CHENILLE???"

Teeth rebrushed, all three girls assembled on the bed, and four  outdated, boring fables later, the kids are tucked in.

Sunny allows herself to start thinking about cookies again as she slips down the hallway, but within minutes the Secondary Bedtime Stalling Tactics begin.

"Mommy? Mommmmmmmy? MOMMY!"


"Mommy, I need my teddy bear."

"What? Oh honey, you don't want that old thing... do you?"


"Okay, okay, hang on, I'll be right back..."

"Ugh," Sunny gags a little as she retrieves the germ-
infested lovey she'd tried to smuggle out of the
house - in the trash - for the fortieth time.

"Better?" she asks Chenille. Before she can answer, the baby's cries send Sunny sprinting up to the nursery. After rocking Chiffon until her arms ache, and nursing her until other parts of her ache, she's just nestling the baby back into her crib when she's urgently summoned by Chenille again.

"What?" Sunny hisses.

"I need a drink of water."

Sunny briefly considers bringing her a shot of NyQuil on the side, but refrains.

"Alright, now go to sleep."

Sunny almost makes it to the bottom of the steps before she hears Charmeuse's terrified voice. "MOMMMMMMMYYYYY!"

Sunny vaults back up the stairs. "What? What's wrong?" she asks, breathless.

"There's a monster in my closet."

Sunny starts to get annoyed. "There's no such thing as monsters. If you're too old for story time, you're certainly too old for monsters!"


"No buts - go to sleep!"

She storms into the hallway, at this point ready to forget the Oreos and just go to bed, only to hear Chenille calling again.

"Mommy, I heard Char say there's a monster in her room."

"There are no monsters," Sunny says, gritting her teeth.

"I need a nightlight."

Sunny has to count to ten. She wants to say no, but she also knows from bitter experience that things will only get worse without one. She gets the nightlight from the bathroom and takes it to Chenille, even though not having a nightlight in the bathroom will probably mean washing somebody's pee sheets in the morning.

"There. Anything else?"

"No, Mommy."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, Mommy."

"Goodnight, then. Go. To. Sleep."  Sunny tiptoes downstairs, feeling a little guilty about losing her temper. To make herself feel better, she decides to have a cookie after all. Or better yet, a glass of wine. Maybe two. But before she can swallow the first sip, she hears Chenille again.


Sunny bolts back upstairs, praying that Chenille's yelling doesn't wake the baby and set her rendezvous with wine back another 45 minutes.

"What is it?" she demands. "What?"

"I love you."

"Oh honey," Sunny says, melting a little inside. "I love you, too." She kisses her little girl on the forehead and retucks the covers. Chenille closes her eyes, and as Sunny leaves the room she looks back at her sweet little angel and thinks, Now you'd better go the hell to sleep.

More real-life dollhouse drama next time - until then, please feel free to catch up on previous episodes of As The Dollhouse Turns. Then click the Top Mommy Blogs banner below while I change all my clocks to 8:30.
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  1. Morning = Made.
    Thank you so much for this post. Again. I'm still hooked.

    1. Thanks for the encouragement. :) I'd tell Sunny you liked it, but Buzz let her sleep in after all that bedtime rigmarole - oh wait, no he didn't.

    2. That's because he was up late himself, trying to figure out where Sunny found a bathroom to steal a nightlight from.

  2. This is exactly like it is at my house too but with one major difference; I shovel double stuff Oreos into my mouth instead of just Oreos.

    1. How efficient of you! That's quite inspirational.

  3. Perfect!! I look forward to these so much! :)

    1. Aww, thank you, that makes me happy to hear. :)

  4. I just eat up these "Dollhouse" posts--& Oreos!!

  5. This episode should have started with a "based on actual events" tagline. The pics are priceless, yet again. Love the spilled water on the floor, and the Bieber Fever on the screen. That explains the Bieber pic in the downloads folder. Whew!

    1. I know you were worried! Thanks for the support, babe - even if you did think there might be a chance I was pining for the Bieb. ;)

  6. I, too, love all the little details you add, both in your pictures and in the story. I was already laughing at her setting the kitchen clock back. It wouldn't be so funny if it weren't true!

    1. Thanks! Sometimes I wish it weren't true, but then I guess life wouldn't be quite as funny, eh? I mean funny *later* of course - it's never funny at the time. ;)

  7. Adorable! A little terrifying since my little one has started the same bedtime stalling tactics, but adorable nonetheless!

    1. Thanks! And also, good luck. Ahh, bedtime... ;)

  8. Your Dollhouse stories are fantastic!

  9. I'm always so blown away by your creativity with this series. Oh, you spin a fanciful yarn. When I see a ATDT in my feed, I get very excited.

    1. You're a fine specimen, Ms. BPM. Thank you eversomuch. xo

  10. Oh now this, this is premium. Found you via "Finding the Funny" this week. I very much dig the design of your space and now, after reading my first "As the Dollhouse Turns", I am absolutely spending the remainder of my glass of wine catching up on previous episodes. Cheers!

    1. Thanks so much! I hope you liked them - we went off on a very soap opera-ish tangent for a while, but we're back to regular ridiculous now. ;) Honored you're spending your wine with me!

  11. I too, found you on "Finding the Funny" and SO glad I did. This is awesome!

  12. I love that Sunny meant to burn that one book. I've got a whole pile of precious gems that I dream about setting up in flames--bring on the bonfire!

    1. Some day, Meredith, some day... We need to wear masks, though - the fumes from the gold edges of those Mother Goose books probably aren't healthy to inhale.

