Monday

Shake up and shake out, a new routine has arrived and I like it ,like it, yes I do!

6am BBC wake up program to I have no idea what as my ears were barely open before I realized it was 6:26am and time to get the coffee into the blood stream. The new term began today and my husband had to leave the house at 8am for his class at 9am. A half hour is like a day gone away when you  shake up the morning routine in our home. I was on call and jumped into the shower by 6:35. I dressed. The puppet in my closet helped Zelda get dressed and then we went downstairs to make lunch for the daddy and our breakfast.

Since the routine was different, so was breakfast. I made us a bagel with butter and a smidgen of cinnamon and sugar on top. An old comfort food favorite of mine and Zelda enjoyed too. The time now read 745 and we were all done with breakfast and onto brushing teeth and getting our boots on to leave the house for 8am. The carrot at the end of the stick was that we would walk together and then be early enough to go to the park beside the school and play for a while before having to actually go to the school. It worked like a charm.

Zelda felt special. I felt special. We had the park to ourselves and enjoyed it as the morning went to bed and the day awoke with sunshine and warm air. The walk down into town at 8am was glorious. The sky was still a bit dusky, there were a few students on their way to classes, less cars and lots of animal sounds to enjoy.

I truly am a morning person. Give me an early sunrise to get up and out to and I am happy as a lark. I just find it so calming and equalizing to start the day when the day really does start. To awake when everything else awakes. To be in sync with the streets, the sidewalks, the birds, the dew, the sun and the moon as it is in this case. Zelda must have also been feeling it too as she pulled me down the hill and we ran into town in almost 10 minutes.

The husband went to work, we played for about 20 minutes until we saw all her friends going into the school yard. It felt great to be early. ( This evening there was a note in her bag saying that chronic lateness by some students needs to stop as it is disruptive-so good timing!) I stood outside in the school yard yakking away with one of the mothers, who also just moved here, from Ireland. A perfect end to the mornings new routine.

A trip to the Tesco to do the weekly shop and then to Monsoon to do the final sale for myself. Two dresses and one pair of leggings all for a total of 24pounds! Do the math...Eight pounds an item. Lipstick cost more than that. I walked home up the hill and down the hill and up the hill pulling my two wheelie trolley full of groceries and goodies. Work out complete.

I feel it in my bones that I will be working soon at a gallery or museum and need to look appropriately funky once again. To lay the Nice attire to rest, may it rest in pieces at the bottom of a garbage bag and not on me any longer. My hunting and gathering should be gaining some momentum this week and perhaps I will have bagged a job and a house. Now that would be too perfect!

Picked Zelda up from school as normal and we went to play in the park for a half hour and then walked home. We snuggled, she ate and got ready for bed. After I read to her and put the lights out, it seemed to take forever for her to fall a sleep. 7:30 and I was now getting antsy. I told her that she was a big girl and could read now and could also go to sleep on her own if she wanted to. I called upon the night time fairy to tell her so and that if she could do it, the fairy would visit her with a small present the next day. Bribery does have its place, and it's in the home.

Time check-8:02- I am happy. I am the night fairy. I have just received a chat message from the hubby who has now arrived home and is waiting down stairs. Off I go to greet him with Prosecco in hand. Pretty perfect.