Go to sleep!

Here it is 9:38 pm and HL is still awake. He goes through these stages where he won't fall asleep before ten for several nights in a row and it is superbly frustrating! Why does this happen? He went to preschool, got plenty of fresh air, and we did the usual bedtime routine- just like any other day. Except that he's still up. I find that the one thing that saps my patience the fastest and most consistently is when my children refuse to fall asleep when they should. My expectations are that both kids will be asleep by 8 and the rest of the evening is mine and Hubby's for couple time or alone time- not fight-with-the-kids-to-go-to-sleep time. It leaves me rather irritable... I read in Dennis Prager's book Happiness is a Serious Problem about how expectations can be responsible for our unhappiness. If we didn't expect a certain outcome, we won't be unhappy that it didn't happen as planned. Makes perfect sense to me. But this is something I really struggle with. I often have such vivid expectations in my life, that I invariably end up disappointed. Perhaps if I expected Hayden to be up until ten....