/diy/ - Do It Yourself

I have a circuit like this, I'm trying to control high power LEDs with an IC to flash a pattern. With the voltage regulator regulating the power to the IC, if I increase the voltage to the circuit, the blinking pattern of my small test LED goes wacky and will just shut off completely if you increase the power to the circuit. I assume the voltage regulator is doing this for whatever reason. When I use my multimeter and read voltage before the regulator on the input pin side, the voltage drops low like the rest of the circuit. Why is it doing this and how do I make it not do that? I need the voltage before the regulator to be higher so I can power my big LEDs on the other side of my relay.