Mornings: Something's gotta give

To say that I am not a morning person is an understatement.  Mornings are the bane of my existence.  My bed and I are really good friends.  And I always have a hard time leaving her all alone for the day.

I had a revelation this morning.  Part of why I struggle so badly in the morning, is because upstairs,  there are 3 sleeping angels, that as soon as they wake up and combine forces, become very familiar with 3 very awake little devils.  We have Gavin, who is always in a near coma state in the morning and is rather difficult to wake up.  Breckyn, who always wants "5 more minutes" in bed, and will literally run from me while I'm trying to comb her hair.  And Ashlynne, who does pretty well in the morning, minus the occasional changing of clothes because she looks like she got dressed in the dark.

The Cossel clan, doing our best to get along!

While driving them to their morning destinations, school and daycare, I realized something.  There is so much negativity coming out of their "sweet" little mouths.  We have one child poking the other in the back seat, which provokes screaming from the toddler, which provokes mutterings under the breath from the 12 year old, which in turn causes the three year old to start calling names, which causes the nine year old to antagonize her even more, which causes me to raise my voice, which causes everyone to either pout or cry, provoking more mubblings... It's a vicious circle.

And I'm going to put an end to it... one way or another.

One of my vices is that I sometimes have a bit of a potty mouth.  Ashlynne is pretty good about trying to keep me in check with it, always pointing it out while I have my usual fits of road rage.  She came up with the fantastic idea of making a swear jar for our home, where I have to drop some silver change into the jar each time I have a slip up.  Ashlynne would raid the change out of it from time to time to take to the school vending machines.  I however, feel that this swear jar should not only have to serve one purpose.  In an effort to make our entire house a more positive environment, and to preserve my sanity, I am going to make the little boogers/angels drop a quarter in the jar each time they are mean to each other.  And rather than let them raid the jar for change, and reward them for negativity, the money in the jar will "disappear" into our savings account to go towards a bathroom remodel.  I get the feeling that either the jar will fill up rather quickly, or the attitudes will change rather quickly.  I haven't quite figured out which way the wind will blow on that yet!

But I do know something, either I will be sane, or a few dollars richer!