Top of the Morning to You All

I have recently noticed a very distinct pattern to our morning wake-up routine here in this house. Each weekday is pretty much alike, and each weekend is pretty much alike, and the two of them are different really only in the way that Darling Husband and I choose to deal with the other creatures in the house.

Let me break down this morning for you and see if any of it seems at all familiar to anyone.

Sometime between 6 AM and 6:30 AM, Big Black Cat marches up from the foot of the bed and curls up next to my stomach to begin purring. When the rumbling sufficiently rouses me, I reach my arm over and shove him back to where he belongs and roll over onto my back. He retreats for a few moments, then regroups, by walking up my leg to my stomach, where he sniffs my face to see if I am awake. I pretend I am not, and Big Black Cat shifts his weight to lay down on my stomach, purring loudly while he stares at my face to look for any signs of consciousness. I tolerate this constriction of my rib cage expansion capacity for about a minute, and then I roll over again and shove Big Black Cat back to the foot of the bed ... again.

Big Black Cat retreats again for a but a moment, only to try the same project with Darling Husband. The cat walks up to the husband and begins sniffing Darling Husband's face to see if he is awake yet. Then, finding that Darling Husband is unresponsive, plops himself on Darling Husband to wait for the wake up call. The difference between me and Darling Husband is that Darling Husband often sleeps on his side, so Big Black Cat balances himself carefully on Darling Husband's side to wait. Unlike me, however, Darling Husband sleeps soundly enough that he does not notice the extra 15 or so pounds compressing his rib cage, and he snores slumbers on.

Then if we are talking about a Saturday or Sunday, this is about the time when Toddler wakes up, hits his music toy, and yells, "ME NEED GO POTTY!" If this sound is not enough to wake Darling Husband, me smacking him on the shoulder is usually sufficient. Either way, the moment Darling Husband does wake up, he begins to roll over, at which time Big Black Cat begins to feel slightly concerned and immediately extends claws. All gradual wakeup routines immediately cease with the sound of Darling Husband yowling at Big Black Cat to "GET OFF AND TAKE YOUR CLAWS WITH YOU." Darling Husband then tosses Big Black Cat to the foot of the bed (for the third time, if you are counting). Girl Cat views all the commotion as her personal invitation and leaps up to come lick Darling Husband's mustache and "make bread" on his shoulder with her tail near my head. If he refuses to allow this, she simply turns around and tries again on my shoulder. No matter what happens, one of us ends up with a furry cat tail in our face.

In the meantime, Toddler has been yelling, "ME NEED GO POTTY FOR REAL, DADDY, MOMMY!" while Houdini has been silently sneaking further and further up the bed so he can sandwich himself in between us to steal any mis-timed pets without risking getting slapped by Girl Cat.

Yes. This happens every morning.

Every. Morning.

One or the other of us (whomever is bleeding less from cat claws at this point) will usually go to get Toddler, take him to the potty, and send him back to bed. Toddler will often go back to bed (but often not), but nowhere does he concede that he will sleep again, no matter how often we say, "It isn't time to get up yet."

Eventually, Toddler will decide that it absolutely is time to get up and/or he has to go potty again, and his conversation is usually puncuated by the sound of his doorknob turning. Next we see Toddler's head poking into our room with the high pitched chirp, "HI, MOMMY, DADDY! ARE YOU STILL SLEEPING?"

We usually admit to being awake because we fear the alternative. Once we pretended to be asleep to see what he would do. We caught up to him in the kitchen trying to turn on the light so he could get a glass of milk.

What are your mornings like?