At heart, I’m a pessimist . . . except on Saturday mornings. On Saturday mornings, I somehow trick myself into believing that I will get extra sleep, even on days when my husband leaves the house early, as he did this morning. My daughter wakes up at 6:55 a.m. and I barely open my eyes as I pluck her from her crib and run bath water.
As the water runs, I return to bed and precisely four minutes later, return to the bathroom to turn off the water. I am still mostly asleep, convinced I will be sleeping in this bright Saturday morning. I am a Saturday morning optimist. I crawl back under the covers.
Six minutes later, she beckons me and I stumble back to the bathroom to answer her nonsensical question (ie. “can I have a cloth-cloth?”). She has very few made-up words in her vocabulary, but she calls a “washcloth” a “cloth-cloth,” which I find very charming. But I still would rather sleep. So back to bed I go.
Ten minutes later, she’s finished with the bath. I wrap her in a towel, turn on her television, bring her a bowl of dry Cheerios and a drink and stubbornly return to bed. I am sleeping in! It’s Saturday!
Soon, she appears at my bedside. “Can I sleep with you?” she asks. So, I scoot over and she climbs in. Moments later: “Will you turn on a show, please?” I turn on Nickelodeon and plump up my pillow. I am sleeping in!
She’s eating saltine crackers in bed. She turns on the light. She’s in. She’s out. She’s up. She’s down. She’s talking to me, even though I AM SLEEPING IN! It’s Saturday!
At 9:15 a.m., I’m still in bed. “Sleeping.” Lights are all on, so I’m suffocating under the covers. The television is loud. How did it get so loud? And then the alarm begins to ring in the bathroom. This alarm clock almost outsmarted me, but one day I read the instruction booklet three times in a row and figured out how to turn it off. Only, somehow, now it’s beeping. I say to my daughter, “Hey, can you go push the buttons on that clock and turn it off?”
She goes, but can’t get on the counter because she’s wearing her 8-year old brother’s pajamas and her feet swim in grievously long pajama legs. She keeps slipping. I say, “Can’t you push the buttons?” She says, “I can’t! I’m slipping!” Finally, I throw off the covers with a mad flourish and stomp to the bathroom. I say crazy things like, “FINE! WHY WON’T YOU LET ME SLEEP IN?! IT’S SATURDAY!”
And so the day begins.
May 14th, 2006 at 9:13 am
hmmm, sounds a lot like my house on Saturday mornings.
May 14th, 2006 at 9:46 am
Ha!
Happy Mother’s Day!
May 14th, 2006 at 11:02 am
Love the set of pictures at the top of your blog now, Mel.
I’m trying to imagine what it will be like in 20 years when you’re waking up early (age does that, so I hear) and the house is quiet.
Happy Mother’s Day to a truly fine MommyBlogger.
May 14th, 2006 at 11:31 am
Happy Mother’s Day! I like the new web page design, although I miss the picture of you as a young girl at the top.
May 14th, 2006 at 12:12 pm
Boy–can we relate! And let me just add…..about the time your children and grown and gone–it will be your HUSBAND who insists you get out of bed to go for an early breakfast before the crowds arrive!
Sleep–it’s overrated!
Happy Mother’s Day (take a nap!)
Diane
May 14th, 2006 at 12:18 pm
While I hate to be a pessimist, you may never sleep-in again. By the time the little ones are gone, you probably won’t be intersted in sleeping-in. But that’s just my experience, and it may depend on what you call sleeping-in.
Your template is looking good btw. Blogs in Focus is a good idea. I think that I would say that even if … , but thanks all the same.
May 14th, 2006 at 12:21 pm
happy mother’s day, mel!
May 14th, 2006 at 12:58 pm
Happy mother’s day! You continue to scare the everloving crud out of me.
May 14th, 2006 at 3:09 pm
HAPPY MOM’S DAY!!!
Gosh, your household sounds so much like ours on a bright and early Saturday morning – complete with Crackers.
You new website is now in my blogroll.
Enjoy!
May 14th, 2006 at 3:48 pm
My mother’s day present? I got to sleep in until 8:10 this morning! At which time they all brought me breakfast in bed and jumped into bed and ate with me.
I still fantasize about REALLY sleeping in some Saturday.
Your blog looks great!
May 14th, 2006 at 8:55 pm
Oh my, I thought it was only my child!
May 14th, 2006 at 10:51 pm
[sigh] I have SO been there.
I’m tellin’ you, we gotta figure out a way to get you, me and Red Fish together for a chick weekend somewhere, completely sans kids.
May 15th, 2006 at 1:58 am
See, that’s when I wonder where my husband is and why he isn’t entertaining them. If someone comes into the bed with me like that, I have already resigned to any possibilty of sleep.
May 15th, 2006 at 11:11 am
At 41, I’ve stopped sleeping longer than 5-6 hours a night, though my body often longs for 10 or 12. I’ve become the one that wakes everyone else up before they want to.
By the way, the site looks awesome!
May 15th, 2006 at 11:45 am
I love your new look! Love it!
May 15th, 2006 at 12:54 pm
Yes, vague memories of never being able to sleep in on Saturday. Now, though, at 24 and 20 my *kids* are more interested in keeping me up to the wee hours of the morning. I’m not complaining–I’ve gleamed some interesting factoids during some of these sessions.
I sometimes get to nap on week-end afternoons.
May 16th, 2006 at 8:49 am
After many years of screaming at them “I’m asleep” on Saturday mornings, my boys have finally learned to not disturb me before 9am…. if I could only get them to leave me alone when I’m in the bathroom…
May 16th, 2006 at 10:12 am
Mel, FYI, I linked this at “motherhood potpourri.”