New morning ritual?

I have been feeling very tired and stressed out lately (can anyone say moved to a new house?). I feel like this tiredness and stress has made me a less enjoyable person to be around, especially for my children (Mommy's grumpy and doesn't want to do anything). On top of this, I haven't exactly been doing well with Weight Watchers lately.

Interestingly enough, last week at WW, we were tasked with trying to find the free time in our days in which we could exercise. I think she really meant where can you get a few minutes like while on hold on the telephone or stopped at a red light, but I really took that to heart and actually sat down and drew out a schedule of my week to see when I could actually get some real exercise in. Now, I've never been an early riser and usually stay in bed until the last possible second, but I decided that if I got up an hour earlier than the kids, I could get in a bit of a workout as well as the hard sought after shower.

I'm a superb planner. I have lists and schedules for everything! When I start feeling stressed or overwhelmed, I get out the pen and paper and start planning a way to minimize that stress. So coming up with a "plan" for how I'll do things is nothing new. And usually I say I'll implement the plan at the beginning of the week or have another reason to put off starting. But last night, when I came up with the early morning exercise plan, I went online and found a workout video on NetFlix (we haven't yet hooked up our DVD player so I can't do one of my own videos) and had it all set up for myself this morning. And then I got up this morning and actually followed through with my exercise plan.

I didn't quite make it to the shower before Noah got up, but he watched Sesame Street while I showered and Liam played in his crib. It was awesome. I feel great, I've already gotten my exercise in for the day, and I'm hopeful that this will help me stay in a more positive frame of mind throughout the day. Besides that, my shoulders no longer feel so tight. =-) It is my goal to continue doing this every day, but we'll have to see how it goes on a day when there's preschool.