Kindergarten is the cure for insomnia
03 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in Back-To-School, Family Fun, Horses, Kids Quotes, Stay at home Mom, Twins Tags: Family
I have been a night owl as long as I can remember. I would stay up late waiting for my dad to come home and help me with my homework after teaching his students, then sit and talk with him well after midnight. In college, I was moved to the single bed in our triple because my two roommates couldn’t bear to be awoken at 3 in the morning as I climbed into bed. Before the girls were born, I was a night owl because I just couldn’t turn my mind off at a reasonable hour. Once I was feeding, burping and changing diapers all day, I stayed up all night because it was the only time I could pay bills, do laundry and update my basketball stats.
Now, the girls are in school full-time, and I should theoretically have more time during the day to get everything done. However, as is typical in my world, I fill up every free second in the blink of an eye. The difference is, I can no longer type into the wee hours of the morning. My perfect little sleepers who never arose before 8 – 8:30 now have to be on their bus at 8:15, and someone has to pry them out of bed…yours truly. However, I have been failing at my motherly duties as of late. Yawns encompass me at midnight now, and I can’t lift my head in the morning. When my alarm clock goes off in the morning, it is all I can do to reach over and hit snooze. I find myself reliving my teen mornings. You know the routine you played in your head: “It only takes me 8 minutes to shower, 10 minutes to get breakfast…hmmm I can sleep 9 more minutes.” My daughters now wake me in the morning! It’s sick really, but I guess I have just joined the rest of the world where children arise before brunch. That cuckoo woman everyone thought was miraculously running on four hours sleep, has met her match and has succumbed to the comfort of her pillow.
The girls’ sleeping pattern has also been completely overhauled. They are in bed with lights out by 7pm these days, and it is still all I can do to get them ready in the morning. By the end of the week, they’re hanging onto a thread. When they’re awake though, they consistently remind me how simple life can be. We were hit pretty hard by the recent Nor’easter. Pretty much everyone in our town has been without power since Saturday, and schools were closed Monday and Tuesday. I enjoyed the chance to sit and have lunch with the girls again, to cuddle on the couch with a few books – though I still can’t get over the fact that they’re now reading to me – and most of all to visit their shoe stores, restaurants and hair salons. Needless to say, I have accomplished very little in the real world these past few days, but I will always treasure Victoria saying to me “I like it better when you don’t talk on the phone in meetings all day.”
I have a long list of things I’d like to share – quotes, stories, etc. but as I said, my eyes don’t seem to work after midnight any longer, and I’m quickly turning into a pumpkin. Pancakes have been promised for breakfast so I’ll sign off now. More soon… I’ll leave you with a few visions of our life before the storm….
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
