Me time

With two young kids there isn't much quiet time at my house. Mornings are filled with breakfast demands, the daily struggle to put clothing on the children, change a diaper, plead a 3 year old to go potty, doing the dishes, making the beds, and getting myself ready for the day. All that usually happens before 8AM and honestly it is the quietest part of my day. So, like I said, quiet time is hard to find. Sometimes I take a few extra minutes in the bathroom but they know where I am and will come knocking (I use that term loosely). If I don't answer they peek under the door and then I see their hands reach under the door looking for some piece of me they can grab. Sometimes it's cute and makes me laugh and sometimes it's so frustrating I could scream. Sometimes all it it takes is for me to go in the kitchen while they are in the living room preoccupied with toys. That usually buys me 5 minutes before they realize I've walked away and come looking for me. Those few stolen moments, wherever they may be, are precious but are not always enough. So I've discovered a time that no one in my house seems to know about, pre-dawn. It sounds silly and with all the complaining I do about not getting enough sleep I'm sure you all are thinking it's silly but pre-dawn is a wonderfully quiet, peaceful time in my house when I get to be ALONE. Some of that time is spent on the computer checking email, posting, blogging, etc. Some of that time is spent reading a magazine without little fingers trying to rip the pages, and still more of that time is spent just sitting. I sit on the couch and I look around and revel in the fact that the Leap Frog musical table is quiet, the ottoman to the rocking chair is under my feet and not being used for body surfing, the tv is off, the lights are low, there are no sounds other than Riley's noise machine making the sound of raindrops over the monitor and occasionally the sounds of the dog dreaming or Sadie snoring from the next room. These moments, me time I call it, are moments that help me be me. So it may be crazy that I give up a bit of my precious sleep time to sit alone in my house but it's what I do. Shhhhhh....don't tell my kids about this blog, they are all too willing to share the pre-dawn hours with me but then it wouldn't be "me time".