Waking up at 5AM

When I joined Johan, here in Doha that one fateful night in January 2006, I was four months pregnant with Sera. By then, I had started to enjoy being pregnant as my morning sickness was OVER. Yippeee. I was an active pregnant woman and I remember waking up with Johan at 4.30am. Yah, talk about utter devotion. I used to crawl out of bed, into the kitchen, to lovingly prepare his breakfast. I would then kiss him goodbye and wave while he drove off into the early morning darkness. And, this woman here didn't crawl back to bed. Most definitely not. I would hop unto my yoga mat and do my practise for about an hour. But things have changed since Sera came into the picture. Actually, everything has changed! Ha ha.

Nowadays, Johan wakes up alone. Hey, that is a given since for the past year I was waking up during the nights, if not to nurse her, then to pacify her back to sleep. My waking hours have now become in sync with Sera's. Besides, Johan says it's too early to have his breakfast at 5AM so there really isn't any good reason for me to wake up that early.

Okay, from this paragraph onward, this post is going to make sense now because I was trying to give a nice prelude to what I'm about to share with you all - a resolution I made two nights ago. You see, since we came back from Holland, Sera has been, miraculously, sleeping through the night. That means, this mama here has been getting full stretches of uninterrupted sleep. It's been wonderful and though I've gotten used to being sleep deprived, I have to say, it sure feels good waking up, feeling rested and refreshed. So back to my resolution. Well, I decided that aside from getting more hours of sleep I wanted to go back to my morning yoga routine, which I tried to jump-start many times this past year but have failed due mainly to plain tiredness.

So the plan was simple, to wake up with Johan at 5AM. Yes, these days he wakes up 30 minutes later. He has concluded that it is most unhealthy to wake up before 5AM. Ha ha, go figure. Johan, of course, shared my enthusiasm and I knew he would MAKE SURE I'd wake up when he does. My first attempt at waking up at 5AM started on Thursday morning. Johan nudged me up but I had an extremely difficult time for two reasons - Sera woke up in the middle of the night so I had to attend to her and I was basically lazy. Anyway, this morning I did wake up when Johan nudged me. I was very eager to start my new morning routine (before Sera wakes up) and to ultimately regain some strength and flexibility in my body. I rolled out my mat, stepped unto it, took a breath .... and I was abruptly disturbed by Sera's 'wwahhhhhhh'. That is her wake up call for me.

Sigh.

I looked down, longingly, on the mat I was standing on ... hmm, maybe she'd go back to sleep. But her 'wwaaah-ing' only got louder, meaning she was done with sleeping. Shucks! So much for my morning routine.

So Sera and I started our day very early today. After we sharing a hearty breakfast of Cheerios with soya milk and kiwi, we headed for the pool, which was empty, of course. But it was very nice waddling in the pool with my duracell bunny, who was waving at the cleaners, gardeners and security guards. Yes, she is very thrilled that the pool area is walled with glass and not concrete.

It is only 10am now. Sera is taking her morning nap, which she hasn't for over two months now. That will only mean she'd be up ALL afternoon. Oh well, that's ok because Johan has his half day today. Hee hee. Over to you, babe!

p.s. By the way, with regards to my 'wake up at 5AM' resolution, it's still on ...

What is this????? Ok, I'm getting a bit morbid here but this morning, Sera grabbed this little elephant from my coffee table and whacked the life out of this little baby cockroach. And for sound effects, she went 'Ahhh ... ahhhh ... ahhhh'. Err, I think she was imitating Johan killing the bigger cockroaches. Opps!

At our front door, getting ready to walk to the pool. This morning, I did away with her swim suit (ok, I was lazy) but at least I didn't forget her swim diaper

In my opinion, contrary to what her swim teacher had advised, arm bands are a great necessity for easy enjoyment (for both mom and baby) in the pool. The arm bands gives Sera a sense of freedom in the pool. She'd hang on them and twirl and twirl herself in the water

Contentment ...