The Early Bird

The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese. –Unknown

According to Phineas and Ferb, there are 104 days of summer vacation. The Not-So-Little Bugs say it is more like 77½. Whatever the case, the annual problem is finding a good way to spend those days. We're only mid-way through our first week and I'm running out of ideas.

One of my goals before turning 40 was to learn to love mornings. Mornings have been my arch nemesis for many years. On-again off-again insomnia, pregnancy and having newborns and naughty energetic toddlers who wouldn't stay in bed interrupted my sleep patterns and I never had a pressing need to adjust them back. I grew to love the quiet time at night. I felt my best in the evenings and liked to create at that time of day. But I realized that it might be beneficial to make friends, once again, with the early hours of the day. I made a little progress; if not friends, mornings and I are at least allies. Logically, I know that getting up earlier and getting a jump on the day is less frustrating for me. Physically, by about 9:30 pm my eyelids are drooping and I no longer want to stay up until 1:00 am sewing. But mentally, I miss that quiet time after everyone's gone to bed. And I never spring out of bed bright eyed and bushy tailed when my alarm goes off. As a matter of fact, when my alarm goes off I wonder why it is going off so early. I can't ever think of a reason for it and sometimes sleep until my back-up alarm goes off. It is only once I get up and get moving that I remember why I needed to get up so early. I'm not a very clear thinker while I'm half alseep.

It was with great trepidation, then, that I decided that I would push my alarm time back a full hour so that I could get to work and back before the day has barely begun. There were many factors that went into this decision, but being home for the greater part of the day to help the Not-So-Little Bugs fill their summer vacation weighed in the heaviest. They have lists of chores and suggested activities they have to do, but I just feel like a kid needs his/her mom around during those long, lazy days of summer, to at least try to keep the chaos from getting too out of hand.

Having a day that is heavily weighted during the daylight hours is very interesting. Although I was getting up early enough to shower and get dressed before helping the Not-So-Little Bugs get to school, I also took a little time for myself to read blogs eat a leisurely breakfast, balance my checkbook, or send e-mails, among other things, before I went to work. I've cut all of that out of my routine and I'm out the door with my breakfast in hand before the Not-So-Little Bugs are even awake. When I get home, we have lunch, do our afternoon chores together and by 4:00 in the afternoon I'm wondering what to do with myself.

Getting up at a quarter-to-the-crack-of-dawn is definitely not my favorite thing ever. It requires that I go to bed at 9:00 pm, so that I can toss and turn the requisite 45 minutes before falling asleep. And even with a full eight hours of sleep built into the schedule, I still wonder why in the world my alarm is going off so early. I've discovered something interesting, though. The world is just as quiet in the early morning as it is late at night. The difference for me is momentum. At the end of the day I'm already moving, so it is easier to keep on moving. In the morning, I'm at a dead standstill and it is harder to get that momentum.

Perhaps if I keep plugging away at it, I'll get the hang of mornings. In the meantime, I'm going to see if I can figure out how to get my iPhone to play a few get-up-and-go tunes instead of an alarm in the mornings. And I'll keep looking for things to add to my list of fun {free} things to do during summer vacation. Maybe that will help me get rid of the earworm I've had since last Friday.