My Actual Tuesday

Kiss on the forehead from daddy, at who knows what time this morning. It was still dark out, but he had a final today, so I was lucky to even have had him come home at all last night.

6:08 Jack comes barreling in ready for the day, and breakfast, and to play with the puppy we played with yesterday. (Not happening!) In having this conversation, he woke up the baby. (The kid is so loud. It astonishes me daily at his wide range of noise making skills.)

Afton now awake as well, demanding to watch a "wormaid" (mermaids) show and eat breakfast, but decides it's best to wait until I'm done feeding the baby. (Thank you for recognizing that my dear child.)

By 7:30, everyone is fed, dressed, happy and "Still alive," to quote The Croods.
As I discuss the needs of our day, I try and remember to be the "fun mom - the 'yes' mom - easy going mom." I just read an article about that last week, so I'm feeling pretty guilty.

"Can we bring our stuffed animals (whale and dog) and pretend we're their owners?" Being the fun, "yes mom" that I am trying to be, I allow it, but with a reminder to be on their best behavior in all places we venture off to.

First stop was the post office. I hate the post office. Despise is a better word. No wait, loath the post office. I never pick the right envelope or right mailing address label. It's frustrating. Every time.

But what is even more frustrating?  Oh, I'll tell you. Dealing with the joys of the post office along with my babies. (Well 2 out of 3 of my babies. My baby slept nicely at my feet in her car seat the whole time.)

While in line to mail 4 packages, I reminded my children at least 7, seriously probably more than 7, to not climb on the table, not crawl on the floor, not swing the dangling pens at each other, not pull out all the different size mailing boxes just to see what they look like then leave them out on the floor, not to play with aisle dividers that snap back in place that just happen to be at perfect eye level to seriously injure one of my little stinker children, not to hit each other, not to lick, I said it, LICK each other, and oh yeah, not to throw the stuffed animals up in the air. (I was in line for maybe 8 minutes, mind you.)

Finally it's our turn, and my babies are sitting in time out on the floor next to me, where they should be. They sit nice and obey while I discuss the right sizes, tape up envelopes, compare costs and stamps and blah, blah, blah. I'm almost done and my babies seem as though they have learned from their time out experience, so I let them arise from the ground/torture.

The next 17 seconds were like slow motion.  As I release my children from the clutches of timeout, I see a sweet elderly Asian lady rolling her eyes in my direction. I ignore it, having no reason to think that she's rolling her eyes at me.  I turn to tell the post man thank you, but out of the corner of my eye, I see a flying stuffed whale heading directly into the face of the post office worker. With my lightning fast ninja skills, I knocked the whale out of the sky, saving the man's life, I'd like to add. But in doing so, my arm knocked into the gigantic tape dispenser. This then caused it to fall off the edge of the counter. The Asian lady gasped and screamed something in her native tongue, as the dispenser just barely missed crashing into my sweet, innocent, sleeping baby in her car seat at my feet. I'm now very aware that this lady was rolling her eyes at me before, along with now berating me in a foreign language.

I LOVE the post office.

Second stop was Smith's. We needed only a few items. I discussed with my children their behavior at the post office, explaining to them that the "yes mom" was GONE for the day and they were stuck with the "nut bag drill sergeant mom" that they've come to know quite well, sadly. I explained my expectations, our very simple objective, our goal of trouble free grocery shopping, and of course, had them repeat it back to me. (I went ALL TEACHER mode on them!)

Things were good. The fun grocery cart that has a little blue car attached to the front was available and so we used it. (I'm not Hitler. I wouldn't NOT get this cart just to continue to punish them even more. Come on. You think I'm that harsh?) I reminded them of my expectations in the store and in the cart. "No screaming, yes laughing. No fighting, yes driving. No hands out, yes hands on the wheel." Everything was understood.

We're driving around the store, getting the things we need. Having an enjoyable time, all the while sticking to our objective. I was feeling like a "Yes mom." We were all happy.

Until one child decided to go rogue. She decided to stop following the rules and stick her hands out of the cart. Within 17 seconds, while I'm busy checking on the baby, but still pushing the cart, this child got her hand stuck in a giant display of Hormel Pepperoni. The tower of pepperoni on this display came crashing down to the ground, breaking each of the cardboard layers of the tower as it fell. Jack's laughing and Afton is seriously terrified.

A sweet worker came and helped us put away the mess and assured Afton that it was okay. I was thankful to that sweet worker, because at that moment after having the morning I'd had, I could not be very assuring. (Go ahead and judge me.)

Last stop, home! (Did you seriously think I  would go anywhere else with these crazies?) I pull in the garage and quietly tell my babies to go straight to their rooms until I ask them to come down. They oblige. (When I get quiet, they know they're in big trouble.)

But now as my older two are finally quiet and secure away from me, my baby girl decides that she's going to scream like a wild monkey. Why? Well, she's hungry, so I rush to put the groceries away, and hurry to feed her. This should be a relaxing time to my ridiculously stressful day, but instead, it's not. She won't eat. She won't latch. Instead she just screams, arches her back, looks up at me, then smiles. Argh. She's been a butt the last few days refusing at certain feedings to eat from me on one side, but now, she refuses both sides. Both freaking sides. Kind of hard to breastfeed when you only have 2 options, left or right, and you choose neither.

I gave up on the day.

Seeing how it was only 9:56 am. A! M!