Jennifer and I celebrate twelve years of marriage this week; something like 17 years total together. That’s a lot. Over the course of an evening we discuss the following things we already know:

• We are lucky.
• We are happy.
• All we ever needed to know we learned from our six-year-old.
• Life is good.
• We are lucky.

In other news, we visited Spa Velía for the first and maybe not the last time for a couples’ massage. The place itself is very nice, the ambience is great, the massages are good (though we’ve had better). Throw in a couple or three martinis and a kickass NY strip on top and I really really have nothing about which I can complain. My life and my ability to appreciate it seem to get better with every passing year. Here’s to lucky thirteen.

Anna and Tara spent the night at M. and K.’s house, so Jennifer and I had the first at-home date night in a very long time. By the time we were ready to go, I was really in no mood to go out for dinner; I had a very long and lousy day at work which left me without time to eat breakfast or lunch. After some deliberation, we stopped at the KFC drive-thru. We very rarely eat fast food, so this was something out of the ordinary for us. Sitting at our kitchen table, ignoring the toy-strewn disaster around us, it was wonderful to sit and talk not as parents, but as people. Without a menu to peruse or noisy patrons to ignore, we actually had the freedom to pay attention to each other for what seems like the first time in forever.

To top it off, we each got at least eight hours of uninterrupted sleep; an event so rare and precious in our circles as to inspire awe and jealousy among our friends.

For the last couple years, since our child-free Western Carribean cruise, we have been seeking to reproduce “the cruise effect”–the liberated feeling that comes with putting our responsibilites aside for a time. We know it’s within our grasp for short periods of time, but it’s so hard to let go of all the unresolved issues and logistical juggling that make up the bulk of our daily interaction. Our $12 date surpassed any $150 meal I’ve ever had.

The challenge now is to do it again. and again…

Last night Jennifer orchestrated a terrific evening to celebrate our tenth wedding anniversary. But wait, I have to back up a bit.

Anna has been waking up at night for about the last week, and each night it has been getting progressively worse. Jennifer is a light sleeper to begin with, so she has been getting progressively more tired as a result. In the old days, when Anna would have a problem sleeping, we would have to start ignoring her cries at night; after one or two nights she would stop waking up, because she knew she’d get no attention. As a result, she’d sleep better and be happier around the clock. This strategy is complicated by the fact that Anna’s night waking now means that Tara will wake up as well, and Tara is too young to have her cries ignored. This is a problem.

So, we’ve been getting up to settle Anna back down, and this has resulted in habitual night waking, leading to the entire family being tired and cranky around the clock, with no resolution in sight. Since we have a standing reward for Anna for sleeping through the night¹ (choice of video, stickers, book, other trinkets), we chose to have consequences for not sleeping, namely losing Bear for the night and having her door closed. Didn’t work. Saturday was especially rotten in the morning, as Anna was having epic bad behavior, and as the two of us battled with Anna over her behavior, I could not remember a time where I felt less competent as a parent. Such is life with children. At least I did manage to handle both girls at nap time so that Jennifer could take an hour nap; she was just exhausted. I was too, but I usually sleep pretty hard and I knew that Jennifer would probably be up before I would if one of the girls started making noise. In the afternoon, we had a zero-tolerance policy on Anna’s whining, and she behaved much better as a result.

Jen had C. and her sister C. come over to watch the girls² while the two of us went out to Donovan’s for a very nice dinner, then we scooted up to Del Mar to walk along the coast. We reflected on our ten years of marriage, and fifteen years together. It was wonderful.

When we arrived home, the girls were asleep. Anna had gone to bed early, and Tara had gone very late. This is fine for us, because Anna sleeps better when she’s not overtired, and Tara sleeps better when she is. Our nighttime strategy was to ignore Anna’s waking for the night, so Jen slept in my office wearing earplugs, while Tara and I slept in the master bedroom. As Jen was putting Tara to bed, Anna was awake enough for Jen to explain the rules for the night. The result was that Anna didn’t wake up at all, Tara slept eight hours, and I slept so well that I was wide awake at 5am–I’m just not used to getting that much sleep lately. Hopefully everyone will be rested and happy today, as we have two birthday parties to attend today, and Anna will not have a chance to nap in between.

We often talk about how little we knew about ourselves, each other, and marriage ten years ago. We talk about how fifteen years ago we wouldn’t have guessed that we’d be married (to each other) with children at this point. We certainly wouldn’t have guessed that on the occasion of our tenth anniversary we’d be sleeping in separate beds and thinking it was a good thing.

¹ When you’ve lost as much sleep as we have, a full night’s rest is a bargain at twice the price.

² When Tara gets older, C. should be able to handle them both by herself.