My Three Ring Circus

Alright kids, you win.  You outnumber, out-energy, out-chaos me.  Clearly I had no chance tonight.  Daddy is out of town and Mommy’s autopilot function is out of commission until a minimum of 4 hours of consecutive sleep happens.  We cruised through the day with such success!  I was so pleased to accomplish all that I intended!  I brought Molli to school on time and even remembered to pick her up, got the car washed, did some grocery shopping, started thank you notes, cleaned the kitchen, did a few loads of laundry from start to finish, fed everyone at all the appropriate eating times and even remembered to distribute vitamins. A winner of a day!

Then came dinner, which was delicious.  Molli loved each thing included in her dinner but had me pulling out my hair with her refusal to eat it.  All the usual distractions and excuses such as “standing is more fun than sitting,” “I want to touch everything in a 10’ radius,” or, my personal favorite, “the baby is too cute, I need to look.” Plus some meal specific ones; “forks are too hard with bowls,” “it’s getting cold,” “I need help.” I don’t know how many times I had to say something along the lines of “Eat, Molli. Sit down. Put a bite in your mouth. Etc.”  I even pulled out the meanest mommy in the world card and Gavin and I had a delicious piece of chocolate, chocolate chip cake right there at the table with her.  It made her cry, but alas, it did not make her finish eating.  Eventually, an hour and a half later, she decided her arms were too tired for dinner or cake and she declared it bath time.  Fine by me. 

I got everyone all washed up, teeth brushed and jammies on while Baylor napped happily in the bouncer.  Alrighty, off to bed!  Never mind that it’s only 7:15.  I cheated and turned their “OK to wake” clock blue prematurely and they’re none the wiser.  This was when I was still pretty confident that I was winning the day.  It wasn’t long until I was proven wrong. You see, I’m human and make mistakes from time to time.  I had a temporary lapse in judgment and deemed this moment an appropriate one to trim my hair.  It’s growing out and looking a bit like a mullet in the back, so it needed to happen.  Immediately, apparently. 

Rule #1 in parenthood: be leery of impulsivity- it often backfires.

And backfire, it did.  I stripped down to my hair cutting outfit, which isn’t much. Got my hair wet and made the first snip. As if on queue, Baylor started to cry.  Uh-oh… Let’s see if I can get some of the way done before helping him.  Snip, snip, snip.  Each time the scissors closed, the crying got progressively louder and more frantic.  Ok fine, you win, baby.  It wasn’t my finest moment, but I rescued Baylor and nursed him sitting on the closed toilet in all my haircutting outfit glory, covered in pieces of trimmed off hair.  We sat there, he and I, doing our thing when a terrible THUD interrupted the giggles from the big kid’s room and reverberated through the floors. Then the crying came through the monitor and walls.  It was Molli.  Falling off the bed.  Oh, did I mention her bed is the top bunk? Well it is, and she fell off it.  I was unavoidably detained and had to debrief with her through the monitor speaker function.  She was fine but angry with Gavin for “making her fall off the bed.” I didn’t get the full story, but enough to send her back to bed, a little bit in trouble for messing around.

I put a sleepy Baylor back to bed and left to check on the big kids who were not even pretending to be asleep. The little turds were running around, wearing Gavin’s swimming gear over their pajamas with everything strewn about the bedroom.  Laundry basket emptied, a brand new container of wipes also emptied, all the pillows, blankets, stuffed animals and books on the floor.  Just a mess.  

I let them know I meant business, made them both cry and put them back in their beds. (Which is another whole issue as Gavin is barricaded in his bed with a rail and gates. Apparently he can squeeze between the rail and top bunk and plop himself to the floor.) I made threats and left. Not long later I walked back in and about flipped out at them.  I watched Gavin nosedive back into his bed shouting “NOOO MOMMY!” and Molli threw herself backwards onto her bed, pulling the covers over her entire body.  As though that would make me believe she’s sleeping???

I pulled out the big guns because at this point, it’s going on ten and I’m over the shenanigans. I stayed true to my threats and sent Molli to bed in a tent in the play-room and put a gate up in the doorway where Gavin remained.  I’m not interested in him coming in and destroying my precious sleep before “clock is lellow.”

So now, if you’ll excuse me, tonight’s chicken pot pie dinner is cementing itself to the dishes. I may not win the whole day, but at least the dishes don’t talk back.