To keep my three nephews up all night?

‘All night ‘had me imagining you slapping them around and pinching them, not letting them conk out naturally

I do this with my two grandsons, 5 & 6. We push the sofas together and sleep in the living room - mainly because they are terribly twisty sleepers, and have fallen out of my quite high bed in the past. They bloody love it!

Just be aware that all kids are different - so while the eldest copes well with a flexible schedule and simply sleeps in later, it won’t necessarily translate that will be the case for the other two.

I had my grandkids saturday night ,I won’t say what shit we ate and what time they went to bed ,but we had fun and they loved it.My daughter and partner had a night off (shock ,horror).
OP you sound great have fun and enjoy,ignore the fun sponges on here.

There were ten in the bed
And the little one said........

It comes down to the children.
I have a 6 year old that's a low sleep needs child who fairly often is still awake in the evening at half 9-10 and I doubt she would fall asleep watching TV and if she did she would wake up as we tried to carry her upstairs. She would then be awake for another hour plus before going back to sleep.

Unless she has been unwell she has never fallen asleep on the sofa. At 2 there were nights when out bedtime came before hers but she was so incredibly tired and her brain was screaming for sleep so she was a nightmare. She is very sensitive to light and the late evening TV would have a knock on effect for her sleep patterns for several days.

My second is only 12 months but so far is a completely different kettle of fish and if he continues down the same path he is on at the moment. I think he would take it in his stride. .

You have to remember when taking to others about parenting and that is you can only parent the children you have and not those that others have or that are in the books. If your nephews are good sleepers and not too Goldilocks-y about where and how they sleep it sounds like a good evening!

I think it's a lovely plan, @Upfiner . When I was 6, my parents took my sister to see My Fair Lady at the theatre and left me with my grandmother. Everyone thought she was, in general, as daft as a brush but she really understood children. She knew I'd be very disappointed not to be going with them so as soon as they'd left, she and I got into our nightclothes, made up the sofa bed in the living room and got in. We watched telly all evening - all the things I couldn't watch at home (my mother wouldn't let us watch ITV and there were only 2 channels at the time). We had big bottles of Corona lemonade, crisps (only ready salted existed, then), bars of milk chocolate and a big bowl of green grapes and there was lots of laughter and silliness and quite raucous singing along to the telly. It was as magical to me as a trip to the theatre could ever have been and I still think about it regularly with huge joy, even though I'm 70 and have done lots of exciting things since then.

I'm sorry, but if someone cant get back to sleeping normally after one late night/ wake up at the same time every day even if they go to bed at late I would be worried about some neurological or psychological issue. Because its not the norm. What if they travel to US or Australia and get jet lagged? Or celebrate NY by staying up all night? Or have a baby? really really concerning.

So you said in your pp.

I'm guessing you posted from a party surrounded by all your friends.

It must have got more exciting and your friends more interesting as the evening wore on - I'll never know though, because your later posts were deleted.

Presumably she's asking here because her friend criticised her for it. You know, like she actually explained to us in her OP 🙄

It's not like she's even being that quirky. Even my grandma sleepovers are along those lines. The only difference being that if the older one (6) hasn't fallen asleep or asked to go to bed by 9:30, I take her up. Because I'm a lot older than OP and I need a rest!

I remember being a child and going to my first summer school - even going to 'real school' at the age of 5. I remember being perfectly happy and looking forward to new experiences, but I remember quite a few kids being seriously out of their depth, and VERY unhappy about being away from home (even for the first day of school).

I realise now that I was socialised like the OP's nephews. I loved visiting people overnight and having time with a different adult and being spoiled. It does sound to me as if there are a lot of MN children who don't have these experiences, and are at risk of being the unhappy kids I remember above.

Sounds fun, can I come 😂

One late night won’t do anyone any harm. They can nap on sunday if they are tired.

It depends on your child.
Dd1 slept 12 hours at that age. If she went to bed early, she woke later.
Dd2 didn't sleep, but if she had a night when she was extra late to bed it would take more than a week to get her back to getting to sleep before 11pm.
Ds always woke between 6 and 7am. Didn't matter what time he'd gone to bed as long as it was after 7pm. He's an adult now and still does! If he'd had a late night he was just miserable the next day.

So yes if you had children like dd1 you might well think it doesn't matter at all.
If you had children like dd2 you would think for your own sanity she needed to stick to routine.
And if you had children like ds, you would know it wasn't fair on him to do that as he was far more miserable the next day than any fun the night before could make up for.

Exactly. I don't remember ever having bedtime earlier than 9pm. And even then I was allowed to stay as late as I wanted to as long as I was in bed and reading. That's on a school night. There was never a set bedtime at weekends.
I am not emotionally damaged in the slightest and am actually a pretty productive member of society.

Surely times like this are Auntie’s rules? My 6 y/o would love it! And my 2 y/o would probably be more upset if the bedtime routine was attempted!! Sounds fun!

So what if some people spend a night out? Good for them for having a life. I wish I had a sister nearby who could have babysat mine when they were young, but no such luck.

Fair enough. If two year-old is easygoing and will just crash that's good news for everyone.

And yet it is also somehow perfectly normal for a lot of people. Wait till you hear that I used to spend three months living with my grandparents abroad every summer since the age of two. Or that my aunt had her grandson overnight for the first time when he was two months old. It's called being a family.
What doesn't seem normal to me is the "I have never spent a night away from my baby" when the "baby" is 14 years old. Yet, it is also normal for a lot of people.
So can we just agree that while you consider it uncaring in your specific situation, for others this would be a perfect example of the metaphorical village where everyone is caring.

Some of these responses are mad. I can’t get a single family member to take my 3 and 5 year olds for even an hour so frankly you are a total hero and I hope your sister appreciates you for doing this! Absolutely do whatever you want - it’s one night and you’ll be known as the coolest auntie ever to those boys. Have fun.

Not exactly witty nor insightful so why repeat yourself?

Parents are happy, you have a 'cool' plan.
What are you asking for here other than validation of your quirky babysitting plans.
🙄