On the verge...

Okay, so I am giving you fair warning that this is on the verge of whining..though truly its therapy for me, if not a little complainy. :)

Not that this new info for most of you, but I am amazed lately (like the last almost 4 years) that this mom thing is HARD!

Take this morning (and every morning) for instance ...my day starts at the demand of 4 others, usually right around 6am. The kids are half of these potential sleep interupters, with Canon enjoying waking up when its still dark and coming to bed with mommy, whispering sweetly "mommy, eat, eat." The other half of my wakeruppers are the pets..with the cat screaming at me dark and early to go outside, or the dog trying to break the closet door down trying to get out (yes, he sleeps in a comfy bed IN the closet) so he can get in bed with us. RIGHT about then, Adrian's alarm goes off and its all wakey wakey from there.

Then its breakfast for the pets, the kids (who have different preferences, of course), and the husband. Everyone needs different things, at different times, while simultaneously getting lunches ready for Adrian every day of the week, and Ty a couple of them. Oh, and think of dinner so that can come out of the freezer.

All the smoothness of this is determined by who woke up in a good mood. If someone didnt get enough sleep last night ..i.e., if someone had bad dreams, felt sick, wet the bed, had a leaky diaper, just wanted to get out of bed for the heck of it ..then they, and mommy, show the lack of rest in their moods. There is much crying, whining, unhappiness and general uncooperativeness for all involved.

Often when Adrian leaves in the morning, I gaze at him longingly as he turns to leave to get in a quiet enclosure where he gets to pick his own music, is free of the crying and chaos he is leaving behind for 8 hours.

Trying to get ready in the morning is interesting. In our house we have gotten in the habit of everyone piling in the shower with mommy, for the sake of our personal property which cannot be trusted to my little men while I am in the shower. Not that they would let me get in the shower by myself if I suggested the idea ...crying, abandonment, stress, fit-throwing...oh yes, fun times.

So we all do that as a group ...not what I envisioned when I thought ahead to my motherhood, but hey you do what you gotta do. Its not too easy, with both of them complaining that I am stealing the water, and not being able to move with both of them sitting on my feet, and pushing on me to try to get to the water. Ah, someday I will shower alone.

The good news about that, is that I usually can jump out, leaving them in the tub, buying me about 10 minutes of get ready time when they are occupied. This is good, because if I lose this window because the phone rings, or cause I get distracted otherwise ..its mass chaos.

You see, both of them feel the need to be in whatever room I am in at all times (unless they are occupied with mess-making). We usually hang out in the living/kitchen/dining room area so we all have room to move around independent of each other. Not so in the bathroom.

There, we are all crammed into a very small space, while mommy is trying to make herself beautiful. The other day, I had another little girl admist our chaos. She was sweet, but still feeling insecure since it was her first time at our house. She had only been there a little bit when I had to get ready for leaving the house in the next half hour. Getting all three of them out the door, would be a feat.

I was trying to blowdry my hair. I had Gracie on my leg, she was crying and hiding from the dog, who was trying to get to her and she didnt like it. Ty was sitting on the floor behind me, playing with his cars. Canon was standing on the toilet, trying to brush his teeth so he was leaning on the vanity. He knocked over my coffee, thankfully into the sink (yes, I have my coffee in the bathroom while I get ready..dont judge me.). Gracie is still fussing, wanting to be held. I am trying to blowdry my hair, with mass chaos surrounding me and list the length of my arm still to do before I leave the house. Then, my dryer brush breaks. Great!

Okay, forget the great hair.

We all exit the bathroom (she says, like it was that easy) to begin the clothing, finding shoes, everyone be sufficiently covered stage of our getting ready. We are looking under couches, in baskets, in closets (who would have thought of that) looking for tennis shoes cause Ty cant wear Crocs to school. Someone is most likely crying. The dog is whining at the door to go out, the cat is screaming from outside the front door to come in. The phone is ringing.

Finally, everyone is dressed, shoes one and we are ready to OPEN the door. This may sound easy, but ...you know.

Since we had an extra kid I had to strap in the extra car seat, while keeping them all from running into the street, putting the car in gear, finding the sucker stash, losing shoes, or otherwise putting themself into bodily harm. Success..everyone in, no one dead.

Finally we are all in the car, and moving. All are strapped in and practically on time. I am a LITTLE bit feeling stressed for some reason.

We get to the church/school ..unload all three kids (again, sounds easy right?). One kid runs ahead into the parking lot, almost gets hit ..has to be yelled at to stay with me, we all enter the building. This is the point at which Canon has a melt down. For some reason unbeknownst to me, we get in the door and Canon screams, throws the toy he has in his hand, and drops to the floor. I smile at all the moms standing in the hall waiting to go into the classroom. I pull him to his feet, which he is refusing to use. We get in line, and I put Canon in time out in the hall with all the moms and their staring children. I am holding on to Ty's shirt, and holding Gracie who has wrapped her little legs around me cause she is still feeling insecure.

Then the teacher opens the door, this is when Canon chooses to have another meltdown, as he doesnt want to leave brother here AND he wants to play in the kitchen center. So, I carry him by one arm out the door and to the car seats. Home again, home again...and we have only been gone a total of about 2o minutes, it sure seemed longer than that.

Or, take for instance the times when I am trying to get something done other than be with the kids. Heaven help me.

Just today, while I was working on the boys room ...I had run them out of the room because they were creating mass amounts of stress with the hammer, ladder...you get the picture.

After about 5 minutes I hear the phrase I have learned to dread, "MOM! Canon is doing something he's not supposed to!"

A $20 bottle of Arbonne facial toner, all over the bathroom floor (that worked well, because he had emptied the bottle of $30 face wash into the tub the same day I opened it about 4 months ago). Twenty minutes later, Ty admits to being part of emptying the bottle of odor eaters powder into the hole he had dug in the back yard. Of course. He is good at making the mess go farther though, because about 10 minutes later they found the half-lost bottle of powder I had put back in the bathroom and decorated my bedroom furniture with it. Nice.

We havent even begun talking about trying to make dinner with the scavenger dog at my feet, the 2 year old an hour from bedtime clutching my leg, the 4 year old wanting to help, the TV volume increasing with the noise level of the kitchen noise, the timer beeping, the phone ringing the door bell ringing cause the kids across the street think it is SOOO funny to ring the doorbell and run (seriously HOW OLD ARE YOU? ..oh, right). Geez.

Nor have we discussed how hard it is to go potty, exercise, eat right, be beautiful when the husband gets home, do the LAUNDRY ...whew.

Mother's DAY?! Seriously? Who was it that decided that was SOOO generous?!

Okay, I guess I have made my case and am crossing the line into whining ..as if I wasnt there already.

But, see. Its hard :)