Why I'm Getting Up Earlier

I really am a morning person.  Deep down I know it is better for me to get up before the rest of my house. All that said, I have been struggling in this area.  Badly.  

During the school year, the absolute latest I can sleep and get all of us to school on time is 5:40am.  What time have I gotten up most of the 100+ days of the current school year?  5:40am.  Not good.  Every night I set my alarm for 5:00.  Every morning I hit snooze until 5:40.  

Weekends are worse.  For a long time I have been waking up to my kids on Saturday and Sunday.  7am or 8am or maybe even later.  I love them to pieces, but waking up to a constant stream of requests is not so pleasant.  It does not create a great tone for the day.  Not at all.  

Summers are just down right embarrassing.  Let's not even talk about that...

When I think about changing bad habits, this is #1 on my list.  I have to train myself to be an early riser.  

What's working for me...

1--I plug my iPhone in in the master bathroom and set my alarm for 5am.  I'm on day 4 and I've done pretty good so far.  Minus the snow day and the sick day this week.  But, progress is progress.  When my alarm goes off I turn on the light, start the shower, count to 10 (seriously), and then turn off the alarm.  

2--Going to bed by 9:30 or 10pm.  I read a little and then try to shut down for the night by 10:30.  

Today, even though it was Saturday I got up at 5:15.  Here's a list of everything I accomplished today:

• Showered, dressed, dried part of my hair
• Bible study, coffee
• Graded 3 assignments @ 20 students/assignment
• Started the dishwasher

Kids up at 7am

• Breakfast for kiddos
• Helped Miss G with her Hello Kitty sticker project
• Finished getting ready to go take care of a couple errands
• Washed and dried sheets
• Started second load of sheets
• Wrote long email to my student teacher outlining the week
• Went to Target to take care of Valentine's Day stuff
• Went to the local library to re-stock on books
• Lunch
• Read with the littles for 45 minutes
• Helped littles pick up living room
• Helped littles find activities for rest time
• Outlined and posted lesson plans for the week
• Snack
• 2 more loads of laundry
• Cleaned 2 toilets
• Dinner in the crock pot
• Unloaded and re-started the dishwasher
• Helped Miss G address and put together half of her Valentines
• Re-organized/cleaned out our mud room drop spot
• Spent 30 minutes cleaning out the basement
• Dinner
• Unloaded and re-started the dishwasher again.
• Cleaned up from dinner.
• Read to littles again
• Put littles to bed.
• Updated blog

I am so impressed with myself!  Usually I wouldn't accomplish half the things on this list during the whole weekend.