Tired mama, happy babies.

I think that summarises us pretty well these days. Oh, and the dad is pretty tired, too. You see, Miss Two greets us early every morning with a loud and happy "godmodedu!" (her version of good morning), directly followed by "stå opp" (get up). And she doesn't show any mercy if I try to hide under my doona, just to spend just one more minute with my eyes closed trying to ignore the fact that getting out of bed is most definitely what will happen next. She pulls off my doona and if I don't jump out of bed immediately she drags it onto the floor at the foot end of the bed.

It is possibly one of the harshest ways to start the day when that warm cocoon is suddenly replaced by chilly air from the open bedroom window. Did I mention this happens well before six am? These days it seems nothing will make her sleep past six am. Today, she woke up at 5.15, and I was so tired when I got up I thought it took one look at the clock on the wall and saw it was 4.15 before I blinked five times and aligned my sleepy eyes enough to realise I was one hour off. Those seconds I believed I had to start my day at 4.15 made the actual time at 5.15 seem almost reasonable. So we got up, left baby and daddy (his turn to sleep in, lucky him) to sleep and went to the kitchen and got breakfast and made coffee. I sometimes wonder what I'd do without coffee.

These first years of motherhood are quite hard that way. Your body has to learn to cope with less sleep, more stress, more running around doing stuff for (little) people and fewer showers. I read somewhere recently that one pregnancy and baby puts the mother 450 hours behind on sleep. And it takes two years to recover from that sleep loss. Does the fact that I've had two babies (and hardly ever a full night's sleep in three years) mean that I am four years behind on sleep? It certainly feels like that sometimes. All mothers I believe will relate to this.

But our girls are growing, thriving. They are happy and little social butterflies, and people always tell us they are just like dolls, just so adorable. Miss Two shows so much affection and love for those around her, and her little sister is just the happiest little girl I have ever met, and so placid. No matter how sleep deprived, or how dark those raccoon patches under my eyes get, my babies always light up my day.

I thought some photos from one early morning would suit this post well. Miss two just pottering around, we have breakfast (if you notice choice of cereal - cheerios are not a standard feature in this house, this must have been a saturday when (some) sweet things are allowed) and she serves me grapes on her little tea set plates. Baby lays on the floor after getting her nappy changed, waiting for me to come pick her up.