Two Hours in the Life of Me

Alarm goes off at 6:30. Paul is long gone. I'm reluctant to get out of bed as last night we discovered that our furnace was not working. Too late for a repair person to come. So we borrowed space heaters and we slept fine, but the rest of the house is going to be cold. It takes 15 minutes, but I do get up. Bundle up and head to the kitchen with the space heater. I start some hot chocolate and mix up some buttermilk pancakes. 7am now. Get the kids up. Take their space heater downstairs so it'll be warm when my preschool kids come at 9:30. Start the pancakes. Get the kids up again. Kiara goes and gets dressed. Kegan goes and spends 10 minutes in the bathroom. Tell him to get dressed and take his bedding downstairs as his bed wetting alarm is broken AGAIN and I have to do a batch or more of laundry EVERY day. Fix Payton and Zander's pancakes and pour hot chocolate. Yell at Kiara and Kegan that if they don't hurry their food will be cold. Kegan finally goes and gets dressed. Kiara arrives and starts eating. Kegan comes. Takes a few bites and then goes back to the bathroom. After fixing Payton and Kegan seconds I wolf down a few pancakes. Now time to cattle prod Kiara and Kegan into making their lunches. They ask me to make them, I politely refuse, I have the kitchen to clean and preschool to get ready for. I realize that it's trash day and due to the furnace issues last night we forgot to do it then. I take the garbage out in my jammies and socks. Discover the can is in the backyard. The gate won't open from the outside. I go through the house to the backyard and open the gate and get the garbage out. Back inside. After hemmming and hawwing and many suggestions from me Kiara gets done with her lunch and I almost have the kitchen clean. And I put together little boxes with kisses in them for my Valentines to the preschoolers. Kegan has only got a pudding out for his lunch. I suggest getting a baggie of chips. He does. Then starts complaining that he doesn't feel good and he doesn't want to go to school (just part of the daily ritual). But he informs me he has diarrhea. I actually believe him and get him some Immodium. Coach him on how to swallow a pill. With helpful hints from Kiara (who still can't do this) he finally gets it done. Now it's 5 minutes to 8. Knowing it will take Kegan 15 minutes to find and put on his shoes I send him to that and I finish his lunch. Phone call. Paul needs me to find some pictures for a presentation he is giving to day. If I can find a moment. Ha! I'll have to MAKE a moment. While talking to him I am filling up water bottles and putting them in the fridge. As I close the fridge the sugar cookies for preschool fall off the fridge onto the floor. (Yes I swore - which I'm sorry about. It was unwarranted. Now if the tray had shattered, well then swearing would have been fine.) Say a terse goodbye to Paul. Most of the cookies landed on the plastic wrap so were fine. Not pretty anymore, but edible. Do 3-year-old's care anyway? It sugar, that's all that matters. Now Kegan begins his full-out 'I hate school, I'm not going, you can't make me.' I ignore him and tie his shoes. Tell him he's going to be late and to get his coat. "Where's my sweatshirt. I hate my coat. I'm looking for my sweatshirt." Me-it's still dirty. Kegan goes and looks for it anyway and can't find it. I hand him his coat. He hates that one. So I search for his other one. Finally they are out the door, and only 10 minutes later than usual. They'll make it. I finish setting stuff out for preschool and turn on cartoons for Payton and Zander. I discover that Kegan did not take his bedding downstairs after all. So I do it. Did I mention our furnace was out? So he had extra blankets. All of which are wet. I start laundry, making sure his sweatshirt is put through too. Although he'll just find something else to complain about tomorrow.... Now get Zander dressed. He has been wearing the same thing for about 36 hours because he didn't want to get dressed yesterday (Superman jammies are awesome!) and I chose not to fight that battle. Now time to find pictures for Paul. Done. Phew! Now time to vent on my blog for 30 minutes before the preschoolers come. Only so I am somewhat normal for them. And that was just the first two hours. I won't mention my extensive to do list for the rest of the day......

I love being a MOM! (and that is not sarcastic - well, only a little)