Sleep

So, it's officially, fully spring - daffodils have now died, the few tulips that rabbits and squirrels didn't eat are blooming, and it's light out so, so late at night. I love this; this is a problem. It makes me too ambitious: Yes! I can get up to run at 6:30 a.m. and then Yes! I can do some freelance writing at night after the girls are in bed and Yes! there are so many things I want to do in those still-light hours between the girls' bedtimes and the final darkness that I find myself, three or four days later, realizing that I am getting just 6 hours of sleep every night. That day, for me, was today. I dragged myself out of bed and actually went to church wearing a shirt I had slept in. No shower. (I was wearing cute shoes, which I hope diverted attention from the wrinkled shirt and semi-greasy hair.) No amount of post-church coffee with the neighbors could perk me up, and I spent the day in a fog - a grouchy fog - instead of being grateful for the sunshine. And now? When I should be sleeping? I'm wide awake because it JUST GOT DARK so it's not really bedtime yet, right? Tomorrow night, I vow, I will go to bed immediately after the girls do and I will sleep for 10 or 11 hours and it will solve all my problems.

Good things that happened this weekend: I hosted a little shower for Kelly that included lots of eating and drinking but NO cheesy games; we went to a fun neighborhood grown-up birthday party and drank margaritas until almost midnight (see my sleep problem, above); we had a good morning at the park yesterday with the girls; Jemma learned to say "waffle," I ate most of the leftover food from Kelly's shower and now weigh 3 or 4 pounds more than I did on Friday morning; we took the girls to the lake for a picnic for dinner tonight and they were so happy to be eating outside and running around; Annie, glimpsing her shadow in an especially tall form, said, "Mom, my shadow is a grown-up."

To bed . . .