A day in the life

I recently watched an episode of Oprah in which Nate Berkus gave a stay-home mom the day off and did her job for her.

At the end of the segment, they posted a checklist of the tasks that Nate had completed that day. While he seemed to think it was a lot, it looked to me like the kind of day I might have if two of the boys were staying with my parents and I didn't really have anything going on. The woman had two school-aged children who were gone all day and a two-year-old.

Now, I'm not claiming to be the busiest mom out there, and I'm not ashamed to admit that I sometimes turn on the T.V. to get a little down time, but I made a list today of the things I did. Just took about one minute every 30 minutes or so and jotted down what happened in that time period.

Let's just say that I call the red parts "Why Nate Berkus ain't got nothin' on me" and the blue parts "Why I have the most wonderful job on the face of the earth."


6-6:30 - Jack, after waking us up by talking too loudly in his room to PJ at 5:45, came bursting into our bedroom at 6 to start the day. Patrick took them downstairs while I fed Thomas and came down by 6:30. (I got about four broken hours of sleep last night.)

6:30-7 - Change diapers/put underpants on boys, pay two bills, drink some coffee while Jack plays in the basement and PJ watches Caillou and holds Thomas a little.

7-7:30 - Teach PJ and Jack how to draw and color flowers. Make oatmeal for breakfast. While breakfast cooks, Pj says he has to do a tinkle (he does), then a poopy (he doesn't), then another tinkle attempt, then another poopy attempt. Underpants are off and on between each one of these and every time I say anything to PJ, Jack screams, "What?!" from the basement despite my repeated explanation that I am talking to PJ. Jack asks if breakfast is ready three times. Thomas screams in his swing during much of this since I can't hold him while cooking or helping PJ on the potty.

7:30-8 - Boys eat breakfast at the table, but only after deliberating (and arguing) about which train they want to bring to the table to "share" breakfast with them. I feed Thomas again and put on a Thomas the Tank Engine DVD for them to watch while they eat.

8-8:30 - Shower, dress, make bed, straighten boys' room, start a load of laundry, load dishwasher, put Thomas up for a nap.

8:30-9 - Help older boys get dressed, watch the end of DVD with them and do activities together learning about shapes and how the trains are alike and different.

9-9:30 - Clean up kids' breakfast, make and eat my breakfast, load dishwasher again (where did all these other dishes come from?), set boys up with Play-Doh and juice at the dining room table.

9:30-10 - Give boys haircuts while they play with Play-Doh, vacuum, and, while vacuuming, help PJ with two poopy false alarms by reading him books while he sits on the potty. Jack made a "hotdog" with green mustard and red ketchup out of Play-Doh and asked PJ and me if we wanted a bite. It looked a lot like a real one!

10-10:30 - Clean up Play-Doh, help PJ tinkle, wipe down the bathroom sink and toilet with Clorox wipes, get Thomas up from his nap, change his diaper, get him dressed and nurse him. Post a funny Mother's Day video on Facebook. Kiss boo-boos on both Jack and PJ. Tell PJ about Jesus on the cross of his rosary beads and what He did for us. PJ thanks Jesus and gives him a kiss.

10:30-11 - Change Thomas's poopy diaper, change and clean up after PJ's pooping in his underpants because he didn't make it to the potty, move laundry to dryer. While putting new underpants on PJ, Patrick sends me an email saying, "Jack is banging on my door HELP" because his office is in the basement, his door is locked, and he's on the phone for work. When I go down to play trains in the basement with the older boys and ask Jack to stop banging on Daddy's door, he says, "But I just wanted to tell Daddy that some little kids don't have any toys and we're lucky because we have all these!" I help Thomas work on learning to roll over and we all sing the Itsy Bitsy Spider to him.

11-11:30 - Bring Thomas and PJ upstairs, get a snack for PJ, feed fish, water plants. Patrick leaves for a lunch meeting. Jack stops him before he leaves and says, "Daddy wait! I'll miss you!" Then when PJ, who is in time-out for hitting, cries because Patrick is leaving, Jack comforts him by saying, "Daddy is going to a meeting that is just for Daddies. Some other meetings are little kid meetings and another time, you can go to one of those."

11:30-12 - Make grilled cheese for lunch while holding a fussy Thomas and giving PJ two time-outs for disobeying. Boys eat at the table while watching Bob the Builder and I cuddle Thomas on the couch. Love these coos and giggles! Jack, who's just getting the knack of knock-knock jokes, tells me this one: Knock-knock. Who's there? Bob. Bob who? Uh...Bob cup. PJ bumps his head while running around the table and needs kisses. Help PJ use the potty.

12-12:30 - Bring boys upstairs, help them use the potty, put pull-ups on them and put them in bed for naps. Jack tells me, as he does each day, that he has to poop, so I read books to him while he sits on the potty for ten minutes, at which time, because I suspect he's playing games with me since he does this at each and every bedtime and I have no idea how to handle it, I put his pull-up back on and tell him to stay in his bed. I have a feeling he's going to poop in his pull-up during his nap.

12:30-1 - Clean up from lunch, watch Ahmadinejad on Charlie Rose (that man is crazy), run upstairs to put Thomas's binkie back in.

1-1:30 - Fold laundry, boil water for tea, watch Todd English

1:30-2 - Praise the Lord - the boys are still all napping! Tea with Barefoot Contessa! Run upstairs again to put Thomas's binkie back in. Back up once more to get him because enough is enough already. Nurse him a little while I finish my tea.

2-2:30 - Give Thomas some time on the floor mat, Jack gets up (clean pull-up!), we both play with Thomas.

2:30-3 - Jack and I thin and water his tomato and watermelon seedlings on the deck. We planted the seeds about six weeks ago and they all sprouted on the windowsill in their little red and blue pots. He's so excited they're growing. I teach him a little about roots, leaves, and stems and what they do.

3-3:30 - Thomas eats again, PJ wakes up. Jack offers to go and tell him that I'll be right up and I get to hear them talking together in the monitor (one of my favorite things). Get PJ, help him go to the potty, get snacks and juice for both boys , finish nursing Thomas.

3:30-4 - Give boys some window crayons and let them draw on the outside of the slider. Take funny pictures of them looking through Groucho Marx-type glasses/mustache drawn on the glass. Give them Windex and paper towels and let them clean it up, but it's not so great, so I go out and wash them myself because, heck, they needed to be cleaned anyway. (Let's call that my spring cleaning, shall we?) Boys build sandcastles in the sandbox. I change Thomas's poopy diaper.

4-4:30 - Put Thomas up for another nap, but he's gassy so I bring him back down and let him sleep while I pat his back and he's lying across my lap. Boys race their trains for a while and then fight about who won, so I put on Team Umizoomi for them to watch while Thomas snoozes and I'm feeling a bit icky in the tummy.

4:30-5 - Put Thomas up again and he stays asleep for a little while longer. Fix dinner, which tonight happens to be leftovers since we have a fridge full of them. Thomas starts crying again so I go up and put his binkie back in and stay with him for a few minutes until he falls back to sleep. Boys play in basement for a while and I straighten up the living room.

5-5:30 - Serve dinner for Patrick, Jack and PJ, but I'm not feeling great so I don't eat. Patrick sits with boys at dinner table while I go lie down for 10 minutes upstairs. Tired and sore right now. Clean up from dinner.

5:30-6 - PJ has another poopy false alarm. Patrick helps the boys go to the potty and I help get them ready so that he can take Jack and PJ to the carwash with the van and then to ride their bikes at the park. I put my achy feet up for a little while, have a diet coke, and work on this post.

6-6:30 - Lay out jammies and overnight diapers, fill humidifiers and straighten blankets to get boys' beds ready for sleeping.

6:30-7 - Put away all the sandbox and water table toys on the deck and close them up for the night. Put on Thomas's jammies, feed him, and put him to bed. He fusses, rebink him. He fusses, rebink him. He fusses, rebink him. (This is going to bite me in the backside in a few months.)

7-7:30 - Patrick gives the boys a bath, helps them brush their teeth, puts their jammies on.
7:30-8 - Patrick reads boys a story and puts them to bed.

Tomorrow, after having slept in comfortable beds, in a safe home, we will,
Lord willing, wake healthy and
able to do it all again.

And I wouldn't change a single thing!

Sugar detox

It's day four of implementing my one dessert per day rule, and I think I'm going through withdrawal. I have a wicked case of the munchies, and a piece of cheese just does not do for me what a piece of chocolate does. But I'm hanging in there. We have a wedding at the end of the summer and I'd like to lose some weight before then - so it's walks with the boys and sticking to the one dessert rule. So far, so good.

Of course, there was a double entendre with that title because my love for desserts is what has me in the wardrobe pickle I'm in - so that's my just desserts. And then, as we all know, I'd like to eat just desserts, so you see...it's a little play on words. Get it? Is this thing on? You guys are like my accountability group. Except I have no idea who reads this thing. What's a girl have to do to get a little comment love around here? Come on, now - don't be shy.

Okay, on to some pictures and a funny story. You deserve that much if you're still here because I'm feeling extra silly tonight.

Going to Aunt Tori's house was like Christmas around these parts, since she gave us some really great things that her kids have outgrown. We're experiencing the fun that is the Little People collection - so cute. Jack just loves them. And we also got something Patrick has been dying for: a bike trailer for the kids. Well, for now, it's just for the kid, but eventually, they'll both be in there. Patrick loves riding his bike for exercise, so we've been talking about getting one, but there's just no room in the budget right now. Then, lo and behold, we're walking around the zoo and Tori asks me if I know anyone who could use a bike trailer since her kids are too heavy for her to pull. Cue the choirs of angels, "AAAAHHHHHH!" Thankful, once again, for our minivan, we brought that baby home and it's been used every day since.

We literally laugh out loud every time we see Jack in his helmet. I guess this is not a good thing because it might make him too self conscious to want to wear his helmet, but when you see him in it, you'll understand:


See?

Ok, now on to the funny story. Do you see the small stuffed Dalmatian dog in there with the yellow vest that's "sitting" next to Jack? Here's the story of how he came to acquire that little gem.

Monday morning, Memorial Day, I was sitting in the living room talking to my sister on the phone. Patrick was going to take Jack somewhere - I forget where - in the minivan. He went outside, and about two minutes later, he came in and said "Eileen, I need help." Well, we all know he needs help (ba-dum bum), but I could tell this was serious, so I hung up with Devon. "I just locked the keys in the van, and Jack's buckled in there," says he. Ok, not to worry - I'll call the police. I didn't want to call 911 because this wasn't really an emergency, it wasn't like we were in Arizona with 110 degree temperatures or anything. So I called 411 and asked for the non-emergency number for the local police station. When I got the dispatcher, I told her what happened and where we live. "How old is your son?" she asked. 18 months. "And is he in any immediate danger?" Not at all. She says she'll send someone out. I leave it in Patrick's capable hands and come inside to nurse PJ. Well, about 4 minutes later, I hear them - the trucks, plural, that pull up outside - and I know that there are probably 10 service people outside our home all working to get my son out of the car. Did I mention the non-emergency, no immediate danger thing? Well, if I weren't nursing PJ, I'd have been out there with my camera, but it turns out there was a fire truck, an ambulance, a police car, and three other volunteers who came in their own cars, blue lights a-flashing. Shocked and slightly embarrassed (at the sight of Larry in a towel...Veggie Tales?....anyone?) at the number of people who showed up, Patrick was out there assuring all the neighbors, who were now coming outside to see what was going on, that everything was just fine. After they got Jack - who thought all this hubbub on his behalf was quite amusing and who was thrilled beyond belief to see a firetruck - out of the van safely, one of the firemen went to the truck to retrieve that cute little stuffed dog and give it to Jack.

The end.

I'm hurting for a segue here, but can't come up with one. Firetruck, hose. Hose, water. Water, bath. There it is! PJ had his first big boy bath this week. He doesn't get bathed quite as often as he maybe should, and I've been doing the sponge bath thing with him until now, trying to put off the screaming as long as possible (Jack hated the bath at this age). I was pleasantly surprised, though, to see his reaction...

Not sure what to make of it here.

I had him in there with Jack, who was sharing his bath toys, so that may have helped.


And then....enough. Jack's like "Uh, Mom - could you do something about this?"

I'm sure that was the first of many shared baths to come. It's always more fun to play bathketball when someone's blocking the net, right?

And this just in...dare I make this post longer? While I was typing this, Jack walked up to me, holding his crotch, and said, in Jackspeak, "Help, Mom," which really sounds like "Ha, Mum." I asked, "You need help? Do you want to go tinkles on the potty?" (Just yesterday I brought the potty, which I had put away a few months ago, out again and thought we might try sitting on it a few times this week.) "Uh-huh," he said, running over to his little potty. Patrick went over, took his diaper off (Jack's, not Patrick's), and he sat down and tinkled! Holy cow!! Granted, none of the tinkle actually ended up in the potty, since that guard in the front is just a little too small, but still! We just cleaned up the carpet and went crazy clapping and dancing around. Yay, Jack!

Sixteen days!

Sixteen, people!

I'm so excited. Last Friday, I thought I might actually be starting labor - I had cramps and pressure and pain at the tops of my legs for hours. I had such a hard time getting comfortable in bed and thought for sure I'd wake in the middle of the night with contractions, or from my water breaking. But no - I woke up the next morning at 7am. Still pregnant. Oh well. Maybe I dilated some, as if that means anything really (it doesn't).

Jack has just been learning in leaps and bounds. Here are a few of the words he's started saying lately: "bubble", "mama" (finally!), "tinkle", "treat", "baby", "bee", "ball", "blocks", "apple", "circle". If I write the letters ABC on his little Magnadoodle, and point to them one by one, he can name them (this blows me away). If I draw shapes on there, he can point out a circle, a square, a triangle, and a star. If I draw a big square and a little square, he can show me which is which. If I ask him how old he is, he holds up one little Bugle finger. (I call it his Bugle finger because it's shaped just like those little Bugle snacks - fatter at the bottom than the top and I just want to eat it, it's so cute). He can show me where his eye, ear, knee, elbow, feet, fingers, hands, arms, hair, chin, teeth, cheeks (the face ones), belly, thumb, nose, mouth, and tongue are. It is just so fun to teach him new things and to watch him making connections and learning things!

We've also been gradually introducing the idea of the potty to him. I figure since I'm going 100 times a day lately, I might as well tell him about tinkling on the potty. We got him a little one that he sits on while I'm sitting on "Mommy's potty". He loves it, though he has yet to actually DO anything in it other than drop his toys in there. Here are a few potty pictures to make you laugh:

That's what's been going on around here recently. Now if you'll excuse me, my handsome husband just came home from a three-day conference in Connecticut and, well, I really missed him!