Today was mentally, physically, and emotionally draining. I wish I could say that I'm good at this stay at home mom stuff....but I find myself being more inpatient than patient. I wake up around 6 and everything about the morning feels amazing! The house is clean, I'm getting organized, I'm drinking my coffee.....and then the cries begin. Usually I ignore Jackson's intense kicks on the back of his crib until the house feels like it may fall apart any minute, and I go get him. Lexi is pretty good about getting up and watching T.V. until I get her breakfast, or lately has been making it herself. I go about the morning packing lunches for the pool, getting clothes together, and I'm still feeling pretty good, and then just about when it's time to start getting in the car, the morning begins to crumble. Chipper starts barking like he is dying, so many things still aren't in the bag, Lexi is on the computer and not listening after I've told her 4 times to get her shoes on and get in the car, and Jackson is literally hanging from my legs whining about having a snack....it's been 20 minutes since he finished eating breakfast! Then all of a sudden, I realized I am not even dressed yet! (I'm not sure where my brain has gone lately.) So, like all loving moms, I FREAK out on my kids. So much for patience...
So we head off to the gym and I get my workout in after I have to go back downstairs twice, once because the upstairs bathroom was out of order, and twice because I realized that I left the ham and cheese sandwhiches in the lunchbox out in the car. I pick up the kids from the childcare and end up spending time watching Lexi perform in a play, and then talking to the very nice teacher about teaching in the inner city....all while Jackson is hanging on my legs, asking for a snack. On the way out of the gym, I had to stop by member services to cancel Darrell's membership because of his new job, and while I'm taking care of business, Lexi turns Jackson over in the stroller. I pick him up, still whining for a snack because he finished the one I gave him, and the lady says, "You have your hands full!" I told her that yes, I do, but really I should be able to handle it....I mean seriously, I only have 2 kids! Some people have 4 or 5...not sure how they don't run off to the looney bin though.
On the way out of the door, I set Jackson back in the stroller, and his bottom sinks right down to the floor. It turns out that the stroller is completely broken....the metal bar snapped right in half! So much for Chico....
We enjoyed a nice afternoon at the pool, which included lunch, swimming, meeting a lot of nice moms in the neighborhood, trying to keep Jackson away from the table with the lunchbox and other people's food, and 2 trips to the bathroom where Jackson insisted he had to go, then pushed for 1 second and exclaimed, "I did it!" The entire time Lexi just swam and swam. She's a little fish! Around 1:30, it was time to go get Jackson down for a nap, so I just threw everything into the pool bag and head out, hoping they will follow...they always do. It's the only way to get them to leave peacefully.
So of course, I think that my afternoon is going to be so wondering and relaxing, where I can just chill and get things done. Somehow, it's never quite like that. I spend half that time unpacking what we had packed for the morning, putting it all back where it goes, and then repacking for the afternoon of Lexi's dance and gymnastics classes. I woke Jax up from his nap, thew him in the car, and then fed him and chased him around to make it through Lexi's gymnastics class. We then headed home to get a quick healthy dinner of Dino chicken nuggets, peas and Mac and Cheese, and then took Lexi to Hip Hop class. I do start to feel bad for Jackson, being dragged to all of her extracurriculer activities, but what can I do? At least he has his bag full of guys, cars, and most importantly.....snacks! I chased him around the studio for an hour, and twice he snuck into the class to try some of new moves out with Mr. Will, Lexi's teacher.
Finally, the night was almost over! We went to Baskin Robbins for $1 scoop night, it's a Tuesday night tradition, and the kids were amazingly pretty good (I should have known something was coming), except for the fact that Jackson insisted he have the pink ice cream, and the flipped when Lexi had the green and purple kind and kept trying to sneak some from her cup until she finished it off. Usually, after the ice cream, I let the kids run in the spinklers in front of the movie theatre, but tonight I told them they could go get their free book at Half Price Books for the reading program. That was a big mistake. Lexi couldn't make up her mind, and Jackson would find a book and say he wanted it, then put it down and run off. I must have chased him down 5 to 10 times before we were out of there. The final straw was when I went after him full force and I reached out to grab him at full speed just as he decided to tear off the the right, and I smacked right into him and we both fell down. He also had a poopy diaper, which really did stink, (I shouldn't have given him so many grapes yesterday...) and some lady in the kid's section made a comment about someone needing to change their diaper....ugh! I was so done at this point. My whole body was aching and I was just dreaming of them in their beds. As I finished checking out, I looked down and Jackson wasn't there. He was down the aisle a little bit helping some man pick out a cd! Seriously, this kids needs a leash! (We actually have one, but he screams everytime he has it on and can't go in the direction he wants to.)
So we made it to the car, we made it home, and the kids somehow made it upstairs to get their pj's on. I thought I was home free! I got Lexi down easily...she was wiped! But Jackson was a whole nother story....(hmmmm....that's not really grammatically correct, but it sounds right, doesn't it?) Apparantly, he has figured out what the word scared means. Now, whether he is really scared, or just knows he will get cuddled and loved on when he says it, I will never know. But he is now scared of the dark, the fan, and the video monitor that is on his wall. He made me take it down, and now he has to have his lamp on all night. I put him down, but he screamed until the starting gagging, so of course I came in! Anyone that knows me, knows I can't handle that gagging...or anything to follow. I had to go in 2 to 3 times, take him to my bed, and rock him a few more, before he fell asleep in his crib. I've done this before....I know how to get my kids in bed and ignore the crying, so why am I struggling so much with this? Hopefully it's just a very short stage:-)
So now I am just mush. I tell myself I need to clean the kitchen, I need to get ready for tomorrow, I need to finish downloading and organizing all the pictures on my camera, I need to get up and brush my teeth and wash my face, but I just can't do it. I have so many visions for how my night to myself is going to go, but once those sweet little faces are peacefully asleep, all motivation is gone. I can't will myself to be productive. And so that is how another day like today happens the next and the next and the next....
I think I just did enough blogging to last a year at least!
