This morning : 8am

So there I am . . . drifting in and out of consciousness. And there Cayla is, presumably asleep. And suddenly I realize that the swishing I hear is really Collin's stage whisper, "Cayla, do you want to ride your bike or stay in bed?" Again and again and again. Cayla finally rouses herself and makes it as far as the couch in Collin's room.

Collin's then does everything in his power to get that sister of his dressed.
He encourages her, "Come on Cayla, you can get dressed!"
He helps her, "Let me put on your socks for you."
He gets sterns, "Cayla! If you don't get dressed, you can't ride your bike with me."
He starts yelling, "Cayla!!! Get your shirt on now!!!!"

That's when I stumble out of bed and step in, "Collin, you are not a parent yet . . . " (although perhaps he should be. In 3 minutes he covered all the routes it usually takes me 15 minutes to employ.

He then circles back around to the gentle encouragement and holds the shorts he picked out for his sister while she steps into them. Impressive. Once I get to the yelling stage, it takes me far more than 22 seconds to return to the positive encouragement stage.

Needless to say, my kids (and I, of course) were out riding bikes at 8:11am. I sit and write this as they suddenly realized that bike riding is more pleasant with breakfast in one's stomach. Collin has been memorised by the Tour de France riders eating lunch from bags mid-race. So, any day now, I fully expect Collin's morning bike ride to come with him requesting Cheerios in some sack around his neck. However, for now they are hungrily sucking down milk as I hungrily get my morning internet fix.