how do the rest of you do it??

After homeschooling for the last year and a half, Liam (7 1/2 yrs) and Simon (4 yrs) just started school here in Bogota. I have to get up around 5:45am in order to have them ready for the 6:30am bus pick up. IT. IS. KILLING. ME.

Prior to this the routine was that Peter would be up when the boys woke around 7am, he'd get their breakfast ready before leaving for work, the boys would eat around 7:30 or 8am (Liam would pour the milk if necessary), then they'd play until I rolled out of bed around 8:30am. Several times a week they'd wait until I got up and we'd make oatmeal or pancakes. All nice and relaxed! 

So waking up almost THREE HOURS earlier every day has been HARD!

Liam in his "formal" uniform (minus the tie which the shop was out of)

Sleeping in a bit was about the only thing I'd found to help with the awful morning sickness I've experience this pregnancy. Losing three hours of sleep each night means by the end of each school week I'll have lost almost TWO FULL DAYS of sleep! Having a nap in the afternoon with Andrew is great, but doesn't help with how extremely crummy and sick I feel all morning.

Do I just have to get used to this?? How do you all function when you have to get up so early? AM I GOING TO HAVE TO START DRINKING COFFEE?!

Simon in the sweatsuit that the "nursery" and "reception" kids wear

Today is day three of school and I think it's just really caught up with me. My stomach has hurt all morning, I'm so tired I can't see straight and all I've done is lie on the couch throwing random toys at Andrew (thankfully he found this hilarious) or getting the Nerf guns ready for him to shoot me at point-blank range in the face. 

Then add to this a general sort-of-down feeling about Liam and Simon being gone all day...

rolling down a hill on the playground

As I said, the bus picks them up at 6:30am and doesn't drop them off until sometime around 3:40pm... that's over nine hours! And I think about them all day long. While Andrew and I eat breakfast I wonder if they were able to find friends on the playground before school started... I wonder how their lessons are going and what they're studying... I wonder if they're actually eating anything for lunch and what they're eating... I wonder if the kids they're meeting are nice... if they're having fun... if they're happy. 

It might just be the control freak in me, but I really hate not knowing what they're doing and how their day is going.

Liam (in his P.E. uniform) and Andrew at the end of the first day 

(think someone might have missed his brothers??)

I know it's all going to take some adjustment -for them and for me- but so far I'm not loving this. They seem happy, but so tired at the end of the day. And, as I feared, I feel like we're getting "the worst" of them. Last night neither of them really liked the supper I made which lead to a battle of wills and harsh words and some tears... so that was how we spend the majority of our time together... upset, angry, glaring at each other from across the table. 

So tonight I'm making something I know everyone will eat and I'll try to have it mostly prepped before they even get home so it will only take a few minutes to throw together. Hopefully that will leave us enough time to play a few rounds of Uno together before bed and to read together before lights out.

I need to find ways to make this work. Because even if we're getting the worst of them each night, I want to make sure that they're getting the best of me. They're worth it.