Confession Time: It’s been five years and I STILL don’t know how to get my child to go to sleep at night. And I’m a bit tired.

A lot tired.

My husband is a night owl, so I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised that our daughter, River, turned out to be a night owl as well. I didn’t expect it though – I kind of assumed that all kids just ran out of steam eventually. Usually at about 8.

We’ve approached sleep in many different ways throughout the years – early bedtimes, late bedtimes, (attempted) naps, no naps, early morning wake up times – they all created a lot of stress in our home and nothing worked. And I feel like we’ve been struggling with sleep since day one.

Once, after trying to get River to nap for well over an hour and a half, I plunked her down in her crib and left the room. It was a sanity thing – I desperately needed five minutes away or I thought I would lose it. No less than 90 seconds after I sat down at my computer, I heard angry footsteps as River stomped out of the bedroom and stubbornly sat down in my lap. She was 13 months old and had just learned to walk weeks before – yet through sheer determination, she had apparently mastered flying too.

Sigh.

“It’s easy,” well-meaning people keep telling me, “just wake her up earlier in the morning!”

And of course we tried that. For a full year, River attended a morning pre-school program that ensured we were up early yet she still laid awake until 11 or 12 each night. And the poor thing was exhausted.

Eventually I just gave up. I decided that bedtimes just aren’t worth the daily stress that they cause, and I relaxed about times. And that was okay, I suppose. My husband works wonky hours and letting River stay up later than the typical bedtime means that she is able to see him after work more often. And because her school is in the afternoon, we don’t really need to get moving in the morning at all beyond church on Sundays. She sleeps in and I feel better knowing that at least, for once, she’s getting enough sleep.

This relaxed approach has given our home more peace overall, and a peaceful home is very important to me. However, it leaves almost no time for me to be child-free. If you read my typical daily routine in my Sleep or Sweep post, you saw that Harbour wakes up at about 7am and River falls asleep at 10:30 (or later). If I’m going to get 8 hours of sleep, this schedule gives me 30 minutes to frantically cram in as much relaxing “me time” as I can. By the time River drifts off I’m too tired to actually do anything but sneak a second bowl of ice cream and watch 90s reruns on Netflix. 90210, anyone?

And then we discovered Sparkle Stories (imagine some sort of heavenly choir-like sound effect right here.)

Sparkle Stories is a collection of delightful stories that you download one week at a time.  The site offers five different series of original stories to choose from, plus another series of classic stories. Be sure to check out the site – you can download samples for free! We started off with So Many Fairies and now we’ve been listening to At Home with Martin and Sylvia. It reminds me of the Adventures in Odyssey stories that I listened to on tape each night when I was a kid. (Anyone remember those? Adventures in Odessey? Cassette tapes in general? Anyone?)

For the past month, River – the child who has fought tooth and nail against sleep for five years – has happily gone off to her room at bedtime with the promise of some stories on the iPad. She doesn’t necessarily fall asleep any sooner, but she generally stays in her room quietly until she falls asleep. No nightly tears, no regular tantrums.

I cannot tell you what a difference this has made for me.

For the first time, I feel like I have my evenings off. And I’ve been fairly good about sticking with my January resolution to stop working and cleaning at 8:00 and enjoy the rest of the evening when I can.

And guess what? I get to share some Sparkle Story magic with you too! 

I wrote the lovely people at Sparkle Stories to tell them how great the stories are, and they generously agreed to give one of my readers a Original Sparkle Sampler worth $20 – awesome! If you’re interested in trying Sparkle Stories out, please enter below by leaving me a comment. And you don’t have to like my Facebook page to enter, but my ego would sure like it if you did.  Contest ends on Saturday, March 23. Contest is closed. Tell me your favourite way to indulge or relax when you can sneak a moment for yourself! With all these peaceful evenings ahead of me, I may need more ideas of what to do!