Wake Up!!!!!!!

Morning time at our home is not pretty. I begin the process of waking the girls up at 6:30 a.m. and it's a rare morning that I don't feel like like pulling my hair out at some point during the process. In fairness, I should not be lumping the three of them together as if to suggest that they behave similarly in this regard. They don't. One of the three is a pleasure to wake up. I walk in, lovingly call her name and she rolls over and opens her eyes. It would be perfect if a smile then spread across her face but perfection is over-rated. One of her sisters grunts and growls a lot when I wake her up and it takes a few minutes before I am assured that she's awake but it's not too bad. Then there's "the one". There always is, isn't there? That would be the one they make films about; the one who makes me think my life is like the movie Groundhog Day because I re-live the same experience every 24 hours. I kiss her cheek, I kiss her forehead, I gently ask her to wake up, I begin to shout "wake up" in her ear, I tickle her, I yell louder, I beg, I plead, I yell some more. To no avail. She won't budge. I've put ice cubes down her back and, I confess, I've given her wedgies. She burst out laughing the first time I gave her a wedgie and then it never worked again. I threaten, I bargain and I bribe. Eventually she rolls over, tells me she wants to sleep more and grudgingly pulls herself out of bed. She holds all the cards. If I don't go through all the motions, she would happily stay in bed all day long. Since that's not an acceptable alternative, we do our dance. She reminds me a little of the protagonist in Dr. Seuss' I Am Not Going To Get Up Today who says, ""The alarm can ring. The birds can peep. My bed is warm. My pillow's deep. Today's the day I'm going to sleep!"

She insists she's tired because I wake her up too early but I'm convinced the problem is that she goes to sleep too late. She has a 9:30 bedtime but tries to extend it every night. There's always an excuse. When she was younger, she was one of those children who hated the thought of fun happening without her. Maybe she's still wondering if the party really gets started after the lights go out. Maybe it does. Take a look at Durga Bernhard's While You Are Sleeping: A Lift-the-Flap Book of Time Around the World. The book opens with a mom  reading a bedtime story to her child and considers what people in different parts of the world are doing at the very same time. What a great way for kindergarteners to learn about different time zones.  Off course, then they'll never want to go to sleep because somewhere there really is a party going on at bedtime!

Playlist for today's post:
1. A Day in The Life by the Beatles
2. The Lazy Song by Bruno Mars
3. Sun Comes Up, It's Tuesday Morning by the Cowboy Junkies
4. I Need Some Sleep by the Eels