I hate mornings.

Actually, I don't. If I had to characterize myself as a morning or night person, I definitely fall on the morning side of the fence. So does my son. For sure.

So, to clarify, I hate WORK mornings. In order to be at work near the 8 am target, we need to be out the door as close to 7 as possible. No, my commute is not an hour, but the sitter is 10 minutes away in the opposite direction, add in a stop at McDonald's and my 30 minute commute—you get the picture.

It shouldn't be a big deal, I tell myself, because Sam gets up at 6:15 on a Saturday anyway. Murphy's rule applied to children: The child who wakes up at 6 am on Saturday will always want to sleep late on work days.

I remember mornings B.C. (before children). I'd take my time getting ready, stop and watch the news a little bit on my way out the door, grab a leisurely breakfast and read a little before heading out the door. Now, I didn't give myself as much grace in the desired time of arrival, but in general, it was relaxing and a great way to start a day.

Now, mornings are filled with terror, prodding, and frustration. The kids have to be woken to cries of "it's too sunny in here" and "leave me alone" (both from my 2-year-old) and a constant battle with Sam about watching "just one more cartoon" and taking a Wii game to the sitter. I have to look over the banister about every 5 minutes or so while making breakfast, monitoring morning potty stops, and trying to remember all the things we need to take with us for that evening's activities. I look over and yell: "How can you not be dressed by now?" or "We need to leave in 5 minutes! Eat up!" Then, when the clock strikes 7, it's mush, mush, get out to the car, what have we forgotten today?, and is the garage door closed? Heaven forbid that I failed to see the morning forecast, because my drive to the sitter may include a quick U-turn to put the dog back in the house if clouds look menacing.

Does all that exhaust you? It does me too. And it honestly makes me rethink the entire parenting ordeal. Was I this difficult to get out the door? It takes me the entire drive to work just to calm down from the frenetic pace of it all.

I'm doing a Bible study about the thoughts we carry and how they affect our lives. Let me just tell you, the thoughts that are generated between 6:30 and 7:30 each morning are not helpful. God is not being honored. Even our traveling prayer team (i.e. circus) inspires little positive thought.

I'm not sure if I'm alone in all this, but I doubt it. I'm just thankful that it isn't a 5-day-a-week occurrence. For that, I consider myself blessed.