No snow, but enjoying a growl free morning

I drug myself out of bed at 6 a.m. this morning, peeking out the window hoping to find 12 inches of fresh snowfall, only to see a dark drizzly rainfall and wet, but otherwise clear roads. Drat, no snow day for me. I suddenly was too tired to jump in the shower just yet and crawled back into bed, pushing the snoring six-year-old that had invaded my sleeping space over to the proper side of the bed.

For the most part Declan has adapted to sleeping in his own bed fairly well, but he is still in the habit of waking up at around 5 a.m. and stumbling into my bedroom. I don't mind it in the winter, he is like a heated teddy bear that snuggles up against my back each morning, but in the summer he turns into a territorial Kung-Fu specialist, repeatedly kicking at me in his sleep whenever I come within range.

I lay in bed today, knowing that this is usually the part of the morning where I tell him its time to get up and try to get him excited about a new flavor of cereal, or the Spiderman shirt we bought the night before. This is also the part of the morning where he grumpily responds by burying his head in the pillow and telling me with much gusto how much he hates everything.

There is a strange disconnect between this moment each morning and the moment that his feet hit the playground sidewalk. Once he is at the school and his friends are within sight, everything is grand, but the couple of hours prior to then, it seems like it is his duty to grumble and growl at me as much as possible.

This morning I had an ace in the hole though. "Declan, time to wake up buddy," I whispered in his ear. He began his well practiced growl and shifted his face so that it was buried in the pillow he lay on.

Knowing that they announced on the radio last night that McCook schools would be closed in anticipation of the snowstorm that had not yet arrived, I followed up with, "there is no school today, it's a snow day."

Declan's head immediately shot up from the pillow, "No school?" He sprung to his feet with lightning speed, wobbling on the mattress as he attempted to keep his balance while gyrating his hips and clenching his fists over his head in some strange celebratory dance.

You would have thought it was Christmas morning, "Yes! This is going to the be the best day ever!" he cheered.

I chuckled and couldn't help but let his cheerfulness rub off on me a little. Even if I wasn't able to partake in my own snow day, at least I could enjoy the growl free morning.