Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!
The house is on fire!
I elbow John’s sleeping figure.
He doesn’t move.
Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!
….No, that’s not the smoke detector…
It’s the alarm going off- we’re late!
I poke John.
He doesn’t move.
Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!
…I peer closely at the alarm clock, 4:23, alarms do not alarm at that time in this house…
It’s the cell phone!
I poke John.
He doesn’t move.
Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!
…It’s not the phone…
THERE IS A PERSON IN OUR ROOM!
I poke John.
He doesn’t move.
Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!
…Oh – It’s Jane…
She wants breakfast.
I poke John.
He doesn’t move.
Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!
She tells me she needs yogurt.
I look at John… give up, and get up.
Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!
I follow Jane, toward both the yogurt and the beeping.
It’s the refrigerator door alarm.
Jane appears to have been up for sometime.
Sadly for her I do not serve breakfast at 4:30AM.
The next twenty minutes crawl by in a sleepy, horrible, tangle of whining, crying, and waking of sisters only ending after a terrible game of musicale beds.
Finally, Bee-Beeping silenced, kids settled, I find my way back to my own bed.
I poke John.
He lifts up his arm to make a space and I scoot back under the covers with the sudden, suspicious anger that he was feigning sleep earlier.
But John is warm and his arm is heavy over my chest. I snuggle in, sigh and barely have time to mentally forgive him before I drop headlong into sleep.
And that is an unfortunately true story of my wee hours of the morning this week. Clearly my brain has absolutely no idea how to function at that time. Grabbing my camera as I walked through the house was a minor miracle! I am again linking up with Northwest Frame of Mind and her 1 Day 1 World project. Check out who else was up between Four and Five this week.
Behind the Willows 
Ha! We were up at 4:50 am this morning thinking our house was on fire as well. Turns out the smoke detector in our girls room ( which is hardwired to all the other smoke detectors in the whole house causing them all to go off at the same time) decided it’s battery was low and needed to be changed! For the love of all that is holy, WTF! 🙂
Oh my goodness what a rude, rude awaking that must have been! Any beeping in the middle of the night causes me to jump to worst case scenario, even if it’s just the fridge…
beautifully written, Jessie!
Thanks Jenny. 🙂
[…] Behind The Willows […]
Oh yes, any beeping in the middle of the night sends me straight into panic mode. Great job capturing the moment with your camera!
Thanks- it was a fluke for sure- still working on being up with a camera at 5… so not a morning person! 🙂
That’s funny! And such a sweet picture 🙂
Thank you!
So familiar except the fridge noice
The fridge came with the house, I’ve never had a fridge with an alarm on it before this. Probably why I was extra confused in the night!
In this case It s better I guess…. School s time is back…. We ll get a normal rythme again hopegully
I love this 🙂
And I didn’t know fridges had alarms now. Maybe I need to buy one to keep me from eating ice cream.
Sadly it has never kept me from the ice cream, only from my sleep! 🙂
Ah parenting. This great piece is a subtle reminder that grand-parenting is better in so many ways. 🙂
Ah- grand-parenting… it sounds lovely… maybe one day….
So been there! Husbands are very good at playing sleeping beauty! 😉
Indeed! 🙂
Lol! Kids want the weirdest things at the weirdest times. Look at it this way, at least your house wasn’t actually on fire 😝
Which is ALWAYS a good thing! 🙂
Oh man! Alarms have been my nemesis this week! I woke up so angry at my husband for not shutting his alarm off, only to find out it was my own alarm…everyday; ) Nice post!
I hate alarms. They wake me up angry. Luckily much of the time I don’t need to use one, but I still hate them!
Yay! To be awakened at such hour. Good thing you were able to go back to sleep. On the other hand, you were alert enough to get a photo and I’d say that the photo has a movie-quality to it. 😉
P.S. Sometimes, I think my husband feigns sleep, too, to avoid dealing with stuff. 🙂
Going back to sleep early in the morning is hardly ever an issue- going to bed in the first place that’s the challenge! 🙂
oh my gosh, that is hilarious! Er, sorry. And I thought I had it rough with the dogs getting us up every night. You write so well!
Anything waking you up in the night is rotten, but I think it is a bit worse when they talk back! 😉