Monday started like most. The baby couldn’t find her backpack. I saw her wearing it outside on Sunday, but nonetheless it was gone, and I didn’t have time to look for it. It’s preschool, so I just rolled with it. Monday afternoon the middle child’s teacher texted me to remind me that he was the groom in a wedding between Q and U at 7:30 the next morning. This was the first I had heard of this! But not because she hadn’t communicated it. There was a note…in the backpack. Oh the papers, oh the backpacks!
Tuesday started with dressing my son for the wedding. The other son was supposed to dress up as well. He wanted to wear a neck tie that we found in the bottom of a sock drawer. It was wrinkled. There was no time to iron. I actually attempted to iron it using my flat iron. Note: I was not fixing my hair. The flat iron was just nearby. Hair fixing, shoe tying, backpacks -all except for the babies which we still haven’t found- and climbing in the car. I pawned the preschooler (with a toy pet carrier in tow) off on a neighbor to get to school because there is no way to get her there and myself and the groom to the wedding on time.
Midday, I received a text from the preschool teacher that she is putting the school papers to come home in the pet carrier. I couldn’t help but chuckle at the absurdity of this. Bless that teacher’s sweet heart.
Luckily, I have acquired a precious yet tough sitter to help out on Tuesday afternoons. At 3, she took the kids so I could have a tutoring session. While tutoring, I received a phone call from a co-worker in the parking lot. She thought I had been abducted. My car door was standing wide open and obviously had been all day long. I rush out at 4:15 to get to the yoga class I teach at 4:30. I try to focus and teach until 5:15, when my husband brings the baby to the gym because the boys have baseball practice.
The baby and I went home and she sat with her hand down my shirt and talked to me while I listened to my professor for my online Master’s class. Boys got home, ate, and went to bed all while I was in an interactive course. Once class was over, I had to wrap the oldest child’s birthday gifts. Due to a lack of materials (because anyone with children knows that one can buy all of the tape in the world and it will be gone in 11 days), I wrapped his gifts with Christmas paper turned inside out, gorilla glue, and neon bandaids.
At this point in the week I was feeling particularly creative and ingenious.
Well, happy birthday to my oldest! Pancakes for breakfast. Wait, he couldn’t find his homework. He was rolling around in the floor screaming like a dying cat because he was going to be in trouble at school. I begged and pleaded and coaxed him off of the ledge and into the car. I tried to explain to him that it is one assignment. This kiddo struggles to regulate-he doesn’t really have a middle. I convinced him that when we make mistakes we accept the consequences and move forward and do better. That he is in control of whether or not it ruins his day–his only birthday for 364 more days. This was not what he heard.
Spent the day having tests run on the middle and rush back to work to do “stuff.” Middle dumped entire milkshake in car in route. Received email from teacher–my son has told all of his teachers that he doesn’t care if he gets in trouble, no one can touch him, cause it’s his birthday. Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness. OH MY GOODNESS.
I called her to explain that it was my fault and what I was trying to teach him. She was sweet and understanding, thankfully.
I rushed home. The plumbers and contractor were there. My mom was there with the kids. There was a new hole in my kitchen ceiling. Wait, what? A hole in the ceiling? I looked at the contractor, shrugged my shoulders and said, “well, it could be much worse.”
I returned to the main floor of the house and ran into my mom. She said something about the neighbor and a bird and my basement. I followed her into the basement trying to understand what was happening. The neighbor was mowing a field behind my house and could see a very large bird in my glass basement doors. At the moment she got the story out, I heard the bird flapping and hit my knees. I am terrified of birds.
At this moment I was ready to throw in the towel for the day. But it was my son’s birthday, and I couldn’t. I was ready to shut the door and pretend like that wasn’t happening, but my mom and contractor chased the bird out of the house for me. It would be fun if this is where the story stops, except… it isn’t.
It was amnesty week, and I needed to drag all of our trash to the road to be picked up. Well, I did. And some interesting young men came by and wanted some of the things. We talked. Former student. The conversation led to him telling me he has three felonies. During this time, my dad pulled up. He was coming to see B for his birthday. Fast forward 10 minutes, my dads 70 pound dog pooped in my house. My son took him outside and tied him to a bike. Bike fell. Scared dog. Dog ran back into house afraid and urinated all over the place. He was afraid and wouldn’t stop urinating or go outside. We drug and pulled and he kicked and slung urine all the way out of the house.
My in laws were coming in 15 minutes. My dad felt awful, which made me feel awful for him.
In laws came. We had cake. We opened presents. Kids went to bed. I did a homework assignment and washed veggies for a tray for school the next day.
Where is it? Where is the bird? The backpack? The homework? The workers to pick up the mattresses in my yard? The necktie? The hidden camera?
So thankful none of these things were tragic. So thankful that the chaos means that my life is full. Prayers that I can keep some perspective in these times. Thank goodness I wasn’t searching to find the joy along everything thing else, or I would have fallen completely apart. Don’t get me wrong, there have been and are times when my perspective is off, and I let the small things get me down. I think we all do. Prayers for peace, laughter and a little less chaos for all of you!
❤️Shalom