6:00 – 9:00 a.m.:
Wake-up. Sophie is next to me, her right leg somehow inside my pajama bottoms. Untangle. Start the day.
Start a load of laundry. Let the dog out. Start the coffee. Ask kids to get dressed.
Coffee is setting in. Ask kids to get dressed, but this time with feeling. Check email. Fish dirty jeans out of hamper for Zach to wear because it’s 48 degrees outside and even though he has 17 different kinds of shorts, he only has one pair of jeans that fits. Tweet about it (but a funnier version).
Give Zach breakfast (Fruity Pebbles DON’T YOU JUDGE ME) then he’s out the door with Daddy for school.
Feed Sophie and Eli breakfast (yogurt, then Fruity Pebbles cereal SEE ABOVE), ask them repeatedly to please put on the clothes THAT I HAVE LAID OUT FOR THEM ON THEIR BEDS.
Put on running clothes (optimism!), brush teeth (it’s the small victories, really, that feel so good), answer emails that have started coming in about school stuff and board meetings and pee-wee basketball. Stand at kitchen island and make appointments to have our carpets cleaned, my hair cut, the dog’s annual trip to the vet. Beg the children to put on their clothes.
Put Sophie’s clothes on her. Put Eli’s clothes on him. Murmur things under my breath like ” . . .6 year old who won’t dress himself . . . where have I gone wrong . . . it’s all my fault, it really is . . . “
Take them to school.
9:00 a.m. – Noon:
GO RUNNING. Does anyone really doubt that should be in all-caps? Especially given the 60 degree weather with not one cloud in the sky?
Go get new cleats for the boys (cut to me, eleven hours later, with the one old, dirty cleat that I took in to determine sizes still in my purse).
Buy jeans for Zach. Realize they all need clothes. Buy them all clothing (huge sale this week at Old Navy, people!).
Other random and bothersome errands that didn’t involve fun or interest of any kind.
Noon-2:00p.m.:
Go pick up Sophie from school. Make us lunch (vegetable soup, the alphabet kind but still, makes up just a BIT for the Fruity Pebbles). Spell out our names with the letters in the soup; general merriment ensues.
Tell Sophie it’s time for ballet. She flips out that she DOESN’T WANT TO GO TO BAWAY. I HATE BAWAY. PLEASE MOMMY PLEASE DON’T MAKE ME GO TO BAWAY. I fold like a wet noodle, too tired to put up the fight today. Maybe next week. But probably not.
2:00 – 6:00 p.m.:
Go pick up Eli. Take Eli and Sophie to my mom’s house for their weekly Yay We Get To Hang Out With Dammah time. More general merriment ensues (today involved coloring, raspberry sorbet and cartoons . . . I mean, seriously, it’s a wonder they were willing to come back home at all).
Go pick up Zach. Take him to Hip Hop Class. During the class, go get a cup of tea next door. Take my laptop in to work on a project due Wednesday. Instead, sit there with my laptop closed, drinking my tea and looking out the window. Almost fall asleep.
Go get Eli and Sophie. Go pick up Zach from class. Go home. Zach does his homework without being asked. Without being asked. GOOD BOY.
Feed them dinner in roughly 7 minutes (hot dogs and apple slices, meh, it could be worse) while changing Eli for his first basketball practice. Pile them in the car, take them to basketball practice. My husband meets us there. Eli loves the practice. LOVES it.
6:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.:
Home. Change laundry. Fold laundry. CURSE LAUNDRY. Wonder why in the world I thought the kids needed any new clothes with all these OTHER clothes all over the place. Start bath for kids. My husband finishes their bath while I look through backpacks and decide which art from today to keep and which to ditch. Pick up legos.
Read books to Sophie. Fall asleep in the chair with her on my lap. Take one of those annoying 17 minute naps.
SHOWER (really if that’s all I did today, it would have been a red-letter day).
All clean and cozy in my jammies. Then I remember my promise to myself to blog more this week.
10:00 p.m.:
And so here I am. And that was my day. There was stuff I didn’t include, like calls to friends and sitting in carpool lines and chatting with my mom in her driveway and getting the mail and on and on and now you see why I was leaving some of this stuff out because then it’d be even longer and more boring than it is right now.
So it wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t easy. And it wasn’t even one of my more busy days. I had a to-do list for today and about 20% of it got done, though 20% is actually pretty good for knocking stuff off a to-do list. It’s like batting averages. Even the best guys don’t even come close to hitting the ball half the time. What did happen was this: Laughing with Sophie over vegetable soup letters, being so proud of Zach for doing his homework without being asked and watching Eli try a sport he’s never played before with confidence and a sense of joy. Between those things and the 20% AND getting a shower? C’mon! I’m pinching myself over here.
Meanwhile, my husband just walked in here and asked me if I ate any dinner. After a long pause while I tried to remember, we figured I must not have. Now I think I’m too sleepy to eat . . . though Fruity Pebbles sound pretty good.
How was YOUR day? You know I’d love to hear about it.