Springing Ahead

My kids are early risers. I'd love to whine endlessly about this, but I've always been one myself. Well, that's not true. I was one right up until the kids came along, and now I'm more of a "darn it, it's morning and I have to get up. I wish the baby would have allowed me more than three hours of sleep last night" kind of person.

That whole early riser thing has been a trait of all my kids. I had a friend who was once telling me that she bribed her children to get out of bed at 10 AM by promises of going to the library. That completely boggled my mind. It's something that I just can't comprehend. As my kids get older, they learn to sleep later. The teen is now a late sleeper and will lounge around in bed until after 9. (I know, right?!) But Micah, still stuck in the toddler phase, is also stuck in the "hey, it's light out! I need to get up" phase. I know this because of this little scenario.

Micah has been getting up between 6 and 6:30 for the last few weeks. That's when the sun rises in these parts. I am not fully risen myself at that time in the morning so I generally catch him as he's headed downstairs and ask him to writhe in agony on my bed while simultaneously kicking my kidneys until somewhere closer the 7 AM range. The other morning he filed his official protest by pointing to the sunlight streaming through the blinds. The sun was up, clearly one should no longer be in bed. For being nonverbal, the kid can communicate quite well. Even at 6:30 in the AM.

For this reason, I have always loved Daylight Savings Sunday. I am not losing sleep because Micah is my alarm clock, and his internal alarm has been reset to the Spring Ahead for a few weeks now. This happens every single year. Oh, the joys. This weekend, instead of losing an hour of sleep, my clock told me that I had slept in an hour later than usual. Woo-hoo!

Now I'm just hoping that the Spring Ahead thing is a call to Mother Nature to get rid of our snow. We're still a foot under white at this point. The unfairness of that is worse than losing an hour of sleep. If I would have.


6 comments:

The Sports Mama said...

The benefit and the drawback to Arizona? Needing to be reminded of DST by someone in a state that recognizes it.

Here's to hoping that you thaw soon!

Annette W. said...

I have been telling Derek for a couple weeks we need to buy blinds for the kids' rooms...because they are up around 6, too. He reminded me that DST would be happening...and all would be okay...for a while.

Our snow is finally melted. All the rain we got this week...and sun...helped!

Roger Miller said...

I don't mind DST, I mean I have to get up early for church anyway. :)

The kids are the losers in all of this, in my opinion. I mean they do have to go to bed an hour early now.

It looks like you have had sun at least. We've been stuck in the UK(overcast and rainy)for so long here. I would love to see the sun, even for only an hour, or two.

Trisha said...

Glad you got that extra hour of sleep. If only my kitties had Micah's internal clock! They woke me up even earlier than usual!!!!

Karen Deborah said...

I used to cheat when the kids were little. I'd hand them something to eat and turn on a video and fall asleep for a bit longer while they watched it. I never have been a morning person. The only reason I could work the day shift and be ready for report at 6:30 AM was because it was life or death business. Adrenaline lots of adrenaline...
these days I get plenty of sleep.

Anonymous said...

Cooper and Maren are early risers as well, and Maren frequently greets me in the morning by exclaiming, "Mom! The sun is up!" Thanks to DST, they slept until 7:00!

And despite knowing full well that it was coming, and looking forward to it, I am still running an hour behind on everything!