Shake up the routine

Normally my husband is the unfortunate one to deal with getting the kids ready for school in the morning.  I say "unfortunate" because Cate does not like to get dressed normally and she definitely doesn't want to do it when the end result is going to school  Although I guess its hard to blame her, when in her mind there is a choice - getting told what to do all day at school or stay home to play and watch TV.  So the the morning routine post a two week Christmas break has not been a fun experience for poor daddy.  But today everything fell into place to shake up that bad routine that we'd all gotten into since vacation.  Lucy woke up at 5:30 because she had overflowed her pull-up, which resulted in her sitting in bed yelling "Mommyyy" until I dragged myself out of bed to help her.  Contrary to my normal habit of going back to bed, I got in the shower and dressed for work.  Cate woke up right at 6, wanting to crawl in bed with Ric but I forced her into the bathroom and got her ready for school.  She was too sleepy to really put up much of a fight but she was not a happy camper being forced to get dressed.  I felt bad so I decided to give her a "treat".  I asked her if she wanted to make her own lunch.  She just about ran down the stairs.  She did a great job and was all smiles when she went back upstairs to play while everyone else got ready.  I guess the lesson here is that everyone needs a change sometimes.  I doubt this will bring on long term change but at least for one morning we all left happy.

She is making a roast beef and cheese roll up to go with the green beans (her favorite lunch item is cold green beans - go figure), pretzels and pineapple.  The carrot is for the guinea pig at school - that was my other bribe, she loves the guinea pig.