Early to Bed and Early to Rise Saturday

[Indiana]

Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise. - Ben Franklin

"Waking up early is a productivity method of rising early and consistently so as to be able to accomplish more during the day. This method has been recommended since antiquity and is presently recommended by a number of personal development gurus. The philosopher Aristotle said, "It is well to be up before daybreak, for such habits contribute to health, wealth, and wisdom."" - Wikipedia

Both my maternal and paternal grandparents believed that getting up early means you are more productive. Both sets believed in getting all work out of the way to have the rest of the day to yourself. For my paternal grandparents it meant the beach fort swimming and sailing. For my maternal grandparents it meant relaxing after a hard morning of work.

My pattern is the same - to get up early and get it done.

What is your pattern?

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

I can't honestly say I notice a big difference in early rising.

When I get up, I hit the treadmill and that takes over an hour from start to finish, then 30 minutes for s2s and 40 minutes for tea & chocolate and then my fruit and cereal. By that time, I'm exhausted and don't have the energy to do anything.

If, when I get up, I go straight to housework/breakfast/s2s in whatever order works for the day, I hit mid-morning feeling a bit tired but energized from all I've accomplished.

So for me, skipping exercise seems to be the key to getting a productive day in.

Since I sweat so profusely when working out on the treadmill, if I want to get a good aerobic workout done, I have to do it first thing.

You can see my dilemma.

As for early to bed, I try but most days lights out aren't until after 10:30 because we like to watch at least the first 20 minutes of the tv news while getting ready for bed. If I'm writing, I find late night is the most productive for that with the predictable follow-on issues the next day. I really pushed myself on the polishing last night and had lights out by 11, but I honestly thought at 9:45 that it might be midnight. The service and bulletin are printed off for proof-reading this morning.

Dh makes sure I'm awoken by 6 a.m., he refuses to sleep in even though he often isn't out of bed until 6:45 or 7:15 (when he starts his 90 - 120 minutes of exercise/s2s.)

So at best, I can hope for 7.5 hours of sleep and another hour of dozing while the radio and light are on in the bedroom to wake me up.

You can see how today's topic hit a raw nerve with me!

(BTW: when dh is away and I'm home alone, I slowly shift to going to bed around 10:30 but up at 7:30, then 6:30 as my body catches up on rest. Eventually, I settle into 7.5 hours sleep. I let my body wake me when it is done since that's the best way to know if I have had enough sleep.)

Dh has this saying up in the office:

Early to bed and early to rise
Until you make enough money to do otherwise.

(BTW: he doesn't follow it, he still set the alarm for 6 or 6:30 even when we were on the ship and didn't finish dinner until 10 p.m. No wonder I get tired and cranky while on the ship!)

[bittersweet]

Indiana beat my starting post by two minutes! I was going to make it Silly Saturday.

Today is Pillow Fight Day Be sure to take some time to add some fun to your day, even if it's just a little smile.

I work up in the middle of the night again *sigh*. This is starting to get old I suspect that less napping, more exercise, and a little fresh air would probably go a long way towards helping this issue.

I don't really have a pattern - maybe I should. If there's nothing pushing me (like having to be at payroll at a certain time), I have an annoying tendency to sit around, do not much, and nap way too much!

Like Kathryn, though, if I get up and get started on things that need doing, then I usually have a much more productive day.

[OKay]

Good morning!

On most days, I am headed to bed by 9pm because that is the time LO's bath and bedtime routine are done. I read for a little while before dropping off to sleep around 10pm. I make myself stay in bed until 5 am so I can get a good solid 7 hours sleep.

I treasure my early morning quiet time before the house wakes up and find myself "out of sorts" when i don't have that time alone. I usually have the laundry done, kitchen set up for the day, my personal care done (s2s, hair, etc), Bible study/prayer done, calendar and PODA prepared for the day by 8am. Then I continue on strong following cards and trying my best to stay on schedule until 1pm when LO is put down for a nap. After that I tend to relax and have some fun.

[lucylee]

Oh well. Y'all KNOW my "routine" -- or rather, lack thereof. * sigh * I can say ditto ditto ditto to your post, bsweet.

less napping, more exercise, and a little fresh air would probably go a long way towards helping this issue.
I don't really have a pattern - maybe I should. If there's nothing pushing me (like having to be at payroll at a certain time), I have an annoying tendency to sit around, do not much, and nap way too much!

And dh's crazy sleep hours do NOT help AT ALL!!!

Today's PODA:
[x] dh's aunt's funeral
[x] CVS
[x] reception for dfriend going to Afghanistan
[ ] movie tonight w/dh

We'll see what else the day holds.

[Sadie]

Good morning dear ladies,

I've had different patterns though the years. When my children very young, I got up early in the morning and went to bed about 10:00.

After I got my job at WM which was in the evenings, I needed to unwind a bit before heading off to bed so I stayed up a little after coming home from work. Then as my Dmom's health declined and she needed my help in the night, I found it easier to just stay up until midnight, help her with a bathroom call and then head to bed. I would sleep good until around 4, get up with her again and then head back to bed until 8.

I'm still on that midnight to 8 schedule most days, sometimes I do get to bed about 11.

I used to do all my housework in the mornings, and then come afternoon I was too tired to exercise. Now I do exercises in the morning, followed by housework, seems to be working better but not all housework gets done. On work days I rest before heading into work.

Need to help Dbrother with his morning routine.

Have a great day all!

[Harriet]

Nice openings, both Indiana and bittersweet!

Sillyness speaks for itself - always appropriate. I'm not sure I could manage without my annual pillow fight day.

Franklin and Aristotle - Good advice stands the test of time, doesn't it? Many people today don't realize that Franklin knew full well he was writing to folks who either knew he was paraphrasing Aristotle, or at least knew the old quote came first. His cleverness was only to put it into rhyme for easy, amusing memory. Turned out it was so popular, most people today believe Franklin's poem was the original thought, and some are so surprised when they find out Aristotle said it first, they think Franklin "stole" it!

Kathryn opened the door to talk about early morning scheduling quandaries - you guys saw her do it! So nobody blame me that this post is a mile long!

Exercise sure can become a quandary for good scheduling of a day. I certainly wrestle with it. That's probably the reason for the popularity of the 15-20 minute versions of the program I do. After those I don't feel that I must run to the shower afterward, like I do with the longer versions of 45 or 55. But I also wrestle with exercise scheduling because of feeling more limber later in the day, and because I want to exercise at a time of day I'm sure my ddad is asleep and won't suddenly need anything. I dress a certain way to exercise, too, and just don't let visitors or my ddad know about that, so it requires discretion! Now add in the recent research that says exercising before breakfast is more efficient, etc., etc., etc.

My early-to-bed is disrupted by both HRH and dd's tendencies toward night owl habits. I make announcements at night that I am going to bed! Now! Goodnight! Sometimes it makes a difference and they hurry along, lol. Another problem is that I have a thousand things to do before bed and can't seem to get it into my own head how long they truly take. But generally I have from 11:30 to 7:30 to sleep, although some of that is disrupted sleep.

When school starts next year, our household will be challenged by a 2-hour advance in the morning school bell schedule, from 9:15 to 7:15, and the new time will last for the next 4 years. Since arising at 7:30 seems best for us now, I hate to consider 5:30 and am pretty certain HRH just wont follow. I think we'll need to streamline mornings instead. I believe there can be no such thing as morning showers for dd on that new schedule, either. I remember dd32 used to use mornings for additional homework time for all her work, thinking she would be "fresh". But she didn't have to be there until 8. I fear on this schedule the word might be "bleary".

In the midst of all this pondering, HRH took my ddad with him on errands, yay, and I got in 25 min of exercise.

Jeans washing is in the washer, including a new pair of HRH's, which is probably infusing the rest with blue dye! That's acceptable.

Cantaloupe-apple fruit breakfast. - Oh, that's another morning quandary. Like several in our village, I have a morning med that limits my choices for eating. I'm not supposed to eat for at least 30 minutes afterward. Lots of times that keeps me from eating with family, or following other smart health ideas that come along, like protein early. I also must schedule my multi-vitamin for at least 4 hours after the med, which greatly ups my chances of forgetting it.

Okay, I'll stop talking now.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

I'm progressing on prep for tomorrow but every time I realize tomorrow is Easter, my heart sinks.

The bulletins and children's activity sheets are printed, along with the prayers for the main service. Now to read my sunrise service through again and see if I still like it.

In between all this printing, I've installed Turbotax on my computer.

[Twins' Mom]

Kathryn, why does your heart sink over Easter? You'll be ready!

I am at work today - with a bad case of donwannas - but I am here. We went to seder last night at friends - we have been with them for many, many year at Pesach.

Tonight another seder - bit, noisy, lots of visiting and little ceremony, from the one other time we've attended this one. Maybe we can slip out on the early side 'cause I certainly am not fit to be around people.

[Kally]

I understand the concept of "early to bed and early to rise", but somehow I've never successfully put it into practice. When I was working, my waking & bedtime hours were much more consistent, but left to my own devices, I've pretty much abandoned any pretense of rising early. Not proud of it, it is what it is...... Indiana, my ddad had the same philosophy as your grandparents. We always butted heads over that. Even if I get up "early", I'm not very productive until later in the day. Maybe I could change if I really wanted to.....

((Twins' Mom)) It will soon be over. When I went in to ask my daccountant to file an extension, she and her staff looked like you describe feeling. I worked for her briefly, so have some idea of the workload and pressure involved.

((Kathryn)) You are so organized, I'm sure everything will go well.

Harriet, will your dd's school start at 7:15 am? That does seem early. Yeah, I can relate to "bleary" in the morning. It probably will take some "trial and error" and tweaking for your new schedule to work. Not very encouraging, am I?

Waving to everyone, have a great day!