So I wake up this morning to the little boy's cries in his crib. The girl is already in our bed, as she is wont to do. That notwithstanding, I go to see if I can buy the little boy off with a sippy cup of water. No dice. It's time to move, dad!
So I get him and take him to our bed, where he lays down next to me and his sister, with mom on the other side of the girl. This naturally requires the boy to climb over his sister's face so he can play with mom's hair. After a few minutes of grappling, the girl decides it's not worth the fight and retires - not to her room, where she would be in peace and have space to lay out, but to the bottom of the bed. I now wish I had gone to her room.
You see, when I take the kids to our room in the morning, it's because I'm too tired to get up myself, and I hope that by dropping them in bed, they'll get a little more sleep so I can do so as well. I do this every day. You'd think I'd learn by now, but no. I never get to go back to sleep.
This time, after successfully evicting his sister from the prime real estate, the little boy apparently decided it was time to get up. I was semi-conscious and don't completely remember him getting out of bed, but a couple minutes later, I hear a voice calling, "Daddy? daddy? daddy? Get UP, daddy, diaper." (or something to that effect)
So, after trying in vain to get the wife to get up (she took a nap yesterday so is arguably more well rested than I), I get up and go to the stairs, where the little boy is already halfway down. I get to the landing, where the boy is and recognize that he is completely naked. He had taken his diaper off somewhere (I still haven't found it; it's going to turn up in 5000 years when some future civilization will think it held some mythological relevance to me when really it held pee), and is letting me know that he needs a new one. So he drags me downstairs and gets a new diaper. I know this because he holds it out to me and says "Diaper!"
Then, as I take the diaper, he says "Lay down?" and lays down and throws his legs in the air, so that I can hurry up and get the diaper on instead of wasting his precious time. It's five in the morning, after all. We need breakfast!
So we have an orange, and eventually try to get the other kids and the mom awake.
I'm not getting out of bed tomorrow.
3 comments:
I remember my friends used to say "Michelle, it gets better when she's around 9 or 10, she'll sleep past 5am"! I could put this girl to bed at 11pm, and she'd still be ready to roll at 5am! I tried everything....to no avail.
She's 10 now, regular bedtime ranges between 7.30-8.30 on a school night, and she wakes around 6-6.30 these days. It's a vast improvement from 5!!
Have patience, Grasshopper. The Universe is teaching you that 5:00 comes two times in the day...
Your love for your family shines through in every post about them. You won't miss getting up at 5 when they gradually disappears, but some day you'll miss those snuggly times in bed, and they're knowing that you are the most important person in the world. I know I just didn't understand why everybody didn't know how smart my daddy was. Why didn't they make him president? It will be a few years yet before they find out you are human.
Human? Me? I presume you meant that in the nicest possible manner, so I elect not to be offended. But once one reaches my level of nirvanic perfection, "human" is not the accurate adjective.
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