Wake me up!

If getting my five year old to bed is a challenge, getting him out of it in the morning is a whole new ball game!   After over two weeks of vacation, Abhay is reluctant to get back to his routine of waking up at around 6.45 Am only to snooze off in his school bus an hour later!  I have tried everything from stories to incentives to threats to actual implementation of threats…..but each morning he simply refuses to stir out of his bed!  Frankly, this whole waking-up- in-time-to-catch-the-school-bus is new to me too. In the US, more than Abhay, I was used to dropping him off to school as and when he was ready, but in Bangalore, I would rather have him miss school than face the prospect of driving him myself to his school! Of course, Abhay is only too happy to miss school to spend another day at home that keeps his grandparents on their toes! So in the interest of everyone at home….I have to get him out the bed! 

So today I read “Get out of Bed” by Robert Munsch and illustrated by Alan & Lea Daniel. This is the story of Amy who in the middle of the night, instead of sleeping, walks into her living room to watch the late show, the late late show and then the very early show, the early show until she passes out! The next morning, as her parents and her brother get ready to start their day, Amy refuses to get out of bed in the morning. So her brother comes up with a crazy but effective solution to this problem – they drag Amy to school along with her bed on which she sleeps soundly as they carry her bed down their street, round the corner, through the schoolyard and into the school! They put the bed in Amy’s classroom and leave when everyone in school tries their luck at waking up Amy. But Amy snores on blissfully through the English class, Arithmetic class, art class, gym, and through recess. Finally as it is time to go when her parents and brother carry Amy back who still seems to be in a surfeit of sleep! Amy is brought back home and promptly taken to her room when she continues to zzzzzzzz! The next morning, she wakes up at the crack of dawn all fresh and hungry! When her mother and later her teacher ask her if she has had a good sleep, she replies in the affirmative but complains of being haunted by strange dreams! When Amy walks into her classroom, she is shocked to find all her classmates in deep slumber on their respective beds! So if you little one doesn’t  get out of bed……you know what to say!!!