The lights are still on at the church!

I recently made an off-hand comment on face book about the late sunset of the second day of Daylight Savings. I commented how nice it was to be past 7 p.m. and still be light outside.
My niece, a young mother of two beautiful girls, replied “you don’t have children to put to bed!”
NO I DON’T!! Lucky me. I remember those days. Trying to convince  young children that despite the light, it really was night time and time for bed. AND, it only gets worse as the summer wears on and it remains light until 9:00 and beyond.
I don’t rightly remember what I did as a parent. I know I was usually covering a meeting for the city council, or county, or a ball game at the school. OR, I was selling something across the kitchen table, or drawing circles on a whiteboard. It probably wasn’t fair, but that’s the way it worked out. I know we had to beg, bribe, compromise, and often wear the kids out so they dropped in their tracks.
Daylight Savings isn’t kind to young parents.
My mother reminds me that I had a curfew delegated by some fancy spotlights at the church at the end of the street. There were three  large spotlights that lit up the steeple. They would turn on at dusk. When I was a little, little kid, probably the range of my niece’s girls, my mother said she compromised one March evening that I had to come to bed when the lights turned on. That was good enough for me. I remember checking the lights when I heard her call to come in. “the lights aren’t on yet,” would be an occasional reply.
I learned what a great compromise I had made as the dark nights of winter rolled into the long nights of Daylight Savings summer. She would call, at what should have been a decent bedtime anytime of the year, and I could yell back, “the lights aren’t on yet!” Trapped, she had to let me stay out to play “kick-the-can” or “No Bears Are Out Tonight.” (I know many of the yunguns have no idea, but these were elaborate games of tag.)
Oh yea, the long days of summer. Only problem was those games of kick-the-can turned into nights to mow the lawn, pull the weeds in the garden, and other adult-type chores.
There was those summers in Arizona. Late-night softball tournaments. Mmmm, the memories of long summer nights.
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Photos: Granddaughter Faye is learning to read. She does a pretty good job for a three-year-old.
Parker had his Fifth ( Yes 5) birthday party. Big piece of Red Robin Mud Pie!