Mornings

Mornings around the Hans household can be a challenge. With Jon at work by 6 am, that leaves me to get myself and three boys dressed, fed, packed up and out the door by 7 am. 

I refuse to get up earlier that 5:45 and even that pains me a bit, so I do all of this in just over an hour.  And it does happen almost every day.  It means that I have to be focused from the moment I wake up and it means that I have to have a lot of strict rules about what is and isn't allowed in the morning.  But it works.

Most of the time.

Then, of course, you have the mornings when nothing goes right.  Nobody wants to get up, everyone is cranky and fighting.  Or everyone gets up on time, but can't seem to stay focused on getting dressed and getting breakfast...instead they wander around the house seemingly at a loss as to how to proceed.  Or, everyone is up and chattering in my ear before I even get my shower which throws off the entire schedule.  Of course these things happen, though probably not as often as you might think.  When they do, though, it takes me a while to recover.  As I mentioned in a previous blog entry, my life is very LOUD so those precious few moments that I get alone (in the quiet!) each morning are indescribably important to my state of mind.

But then there are mornings like this one, which was a whole different animal. 

This morning no one wanted to get up, but it was in a quiet "Five more minutes, Mom, I'm still sleepy" kind of way rather than in defiance or crankiness.  While I was working on getting Eli up, we got to whisper for a while together.  And there is seriously nothing in this world that is more adorable than a tiny kid whispering.  I came downstairs to find that a cheerful Jonah had gotten up and dressed without me saying a word to him.  Josh was still lying down when Eli and I arrived downstairs, but he, too, got up and began to dress without any prompting and then he told me a very long story. (The contents of which I have already forgotten, but that isn't the important point here...)  When it was time to walk out the door, they were all dressed, fed, and with me. 

It was the kind of morning that I wish I could clone.  So, we were a bit less efficient that usual.  So,  we were a bit late leaving the house.  We were able to steal a couple of moments together.  And as we made our way to the car, we were all happy, calm, and ready to start our day.

I'll take it.