Daylight Savings Update

We are still battling the consequences of the time change. Wednesday night all three girls were just exhausted and all three of them fell asleep around 6pm (their normal bedtime is 7). Well that was all good and and fine until yesterday morning. I was woken up to Miriam hollering "Mom come wipe my bottom." In my early morning fog, I misread the clock. I thought it was 5:45. So I helped Miriam finish going potty and then set her up on the couch to watch cartoons while I went back to bed. When I crawled back into bed I took a better look at the clock. It was 4:45. Yes, Miriam woke up at 4:45 yesterday morning.

Again today I had an early morning. Amanda and Miriam both woke up at 5:30. I was a mean, cruel mom, though, and made them both stay in bed until a more reasonable 6:15. Neither of them went back to sleep--Miriam was reading books and Amanda was playing with her feet.

Needless to say that my campaign against the time change is still on. In fact, a kind, "anonymous" reader emailed me a logo.

I have also done some preliminary research on the new President's stance on Daylight Savings. In 2005, Obama voted for extending Daylight Savings. So you can look at that two ways--he is pro time change (bad) or that he could possibly be persuaded to extend Daylight Savings year round (good). I also found various groups who are for and against Daylight Savings.

--The National Confectioner’s Association was among those that lobbied Congress unsuccessfully in 1986 to have it extended into November. There thought was that more kids could go out trick-or-treating if it wasn't so dark. I guess they were happy last year to see it extended out to November.

--Other lobbyists for this provision included the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association and the National Association of Convenience Stores.

--The National Parent Teacher Association lobbied against extending Daylight Savings. They knew that it would disrupt students schedules during the school year. Also, it is really hard to get kids to bed at 8 pm when it is dark out until 9 pm. Thus causing kids to get less sleep.

--Other lobbyists against the extension included the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism.