Our First Sleepover

Tonight is Jake’s first official sleepover at our house. He has slept over at other people’s homes on several occasions. His first sleepovers occurred when I was put on bed rest while I was pregnant with Jolie and Justin was deployed. I was very lucky that some church friends came to my rescue before and after my parents flew out to help. He has stayed a few times with my parents (either at our house or theirs); once while Justin and I took a trip for our fifth anniversary, and again when we were house hunting for this house a few months ago.

For those of you who know Jake, you know he’s never had any trouble with shyness. He is definitely my outgoing, extraverted child. We were nervous when he was a toddler that he might strike up a conversation with someone, find out that they had a cooler car than we had (he could seriate cars at 19 months old), and decide to leave with them. Luckily enough for us, our (at the time) Ford Ranger and Ford Escort were “cool” enough that he decided to hang around.

When we moved in last month, Jake immediately asked when the local kids got out of school for the day. I had to explain to him that they were already out of school for the summer, but that because we now live in a somewhat hotter climate, the kids probably wouldn’t be out to play during the hotter hours of the day. We left a cul-de-sac that had enough children to fill one school bus with elementary school kids. It's a bit different here.

Luckily Jake has really hit it off with a nice neighbor-boy who lives across the street. I think they spend at least eight hours a day together. Jake slept over at his house two weeks ago, being Jake’s first official sleepover of his choosing. This is the other boy’s first sleepover away from his house (which I didn’t know until he came over tonight). Because they live across the street, I’m not too worried about there being any problems.

All seems to be going well thus far. Friday is “pizza and a movie” night for us, so we had pizza and a double feature show, watching “Hook” and “Surf’s Up.” I also made cookies (of course a new recipe…I know I shouldn’t try out new recipes when I have guests, but I just can’t help it) that the kids loved. Everyone brushed their teeth, got on their jammies, and I can say all (except Jensen) were asleep before 10:30pm, the boys on the floor in sleeping bags in Jake's room, Jolie in her bed, and Jensen in ours.

Not too bad for a first sleepover. In the morning, I’ll make our traditional Saturday morning breakfast, pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon or sausage (veggie kind for Jake).

This hasn’t been nearly as stressful as I was expecting. Maybe boy sleepovers are different than girl sleepovers. I remember the elaborate sleepovers that I went to as a child (multiple children, up all night, pizza, popcorn, pop, sweets, etc.) Maybe my kids are not into all that hubbub. Maybe it's because of their lack of exposure to some of it. I’m okay with that. I can serve my homemade pizza, granola cookies and milk, watch a nice wholesome movie and maybe play a game or two and we’ll call it a sleepover. Then again, I haven’t yet experienced a Jolie sleepover. We’ll have to see what her expectations are in a few years when we make the leap into girly sleepovers.