Early Bird

You know what I envy my daughter?

BESIDES her youth and her perfect, unblemished complexion. . .

I envy her the way she wakes up in the morning. The rest of us in this family are slow to get out of bed -- the two adults being the worst. If we had our way, we'd never get out of bed. (Not as sexy as it sounds, really. We're talking about snuggling under our own covers, in blissful sleep, inflicting our morning breath on no one). Nicky also loves to luxuriate in the mornings. If I don't miss my guess, he will be crawling out of bed at two in the afternoon when he's a teen. Don't get me wrong. He's not difficult in the morning. As long as I let him wake up at his own pace, he gets up and gets dressed easily. (We'll see how that changes once he HAS to be up early for school).

Laney, on the other hand, bounds out of bed. I often hear her wake up. First, the covers rustle as she rolls this way and that in those last moments of sleep. Suddenly, she pops awake and pat-pat-pat-pat, I hear running across the floor, full of life and full of chatter. If I have to wake her up before her own internal clock has, it generally takes just a soft whisper in her ear that it's morning, and she sits straight up in bed, still half asleep, but quickly forcing herself alive.

She is so excited for every new day.

I hope that she will always love coming awake in the morning. I hope that she'll always bound out of bed because there is so much she is excited to do that day. Of course, it won't be every day. I just hope those days outnumber all the others. Of all of the dreams and hopes that I have for my daughter, that she continues to love starting her day is at the very top of my list.