What Did You Do All Day?

Today, I read where a woman who had no children wrote a question to an answer column in a paper basically asking, "Why can't my friend who has children find time to call me? What does she do all day? Don't tell me she has laundry, cooking, chores, etc. because I have to do that too. Why can't she manage her time as well as I can?"

The columnist answered her nicely, but told her pretty much, that it takes twice as long to get anything done when you have kids.

I thought I could illustrate this point. Here's what happened today. This is not an isolated incident. This is pretty much what happens every day in my fun-filled life.

On my agenda for today was cleaning (because my house always gets trashed over the weekend), paying bills (groan), doing laundry (I had 8 loads to do because I let it slide over the weekend), writing up 4 reviews that I committed to last month, and a little Tae Bo (because I'm sick and tired of looking like I'm pregnant when my youngest child is almost 3).

I grabbed a cup of stupid tea because I decided to try and give up coffee. My reasoning behind this stupid plan was that I generally drink a cup of cream with a teaspoon of coffee for flavor and I decided it would be a good plan to cut out those calories. Yeah, I don't know. It seemed like a good idea when I came up with it last night around 2:00 in the morning. Note to self: never come up with ideas past midnight. They're never good.

So I sat down with my stupid tea after getting kids off to school. I'm in flannel pants and t-shirt, no make-up, and unshowered at this point. The little kids are eating the wonderful, nutritious breakfast I prepared for them - granola bars. I checked my mail and started writing up a review. Before I could finish this ONE review, I had to get up because the little kids were pushing the kitchen chairs over to the pantry so they could grab some fruit snacks. Their plans foiled, I sat back down to write. A few minutes passed and I was interrupted with,
"Mom! Mom, can you get this toy for me?"

"Sure, honey," I said while still sitting on my butt writing, hoping they would forget about the elusive toy. No dice.

"Mom, please can you get this toy?" they pleaded.

I got up and got them the requested toy. Then they asked me to grab the Snoopy Snow Cone maker off the top shelf of the closet for them. Know why they have a Snoopy Snow Cone maker? Because evil people without children got it for them.

OK, back to my review. By the time I figured out what the heck I'd been writing before the interruption, my dryer buzzed indicating my laundry was done.

I got up and switched loads and folded laundry. As I was folding laundry, I noticed about 4000 toys on my bedroom floor. Sidetracked, I picked them up and put them away. While putting the stray toys away, Clay called to me, "Mom, come listen to my song!"

As Clay called me to listen to his song, Brooklyn asked me to help her put some Barbie dolls in an airplane with no seats. I tossed the Barbies in the plane.

"No, they have to be sitting down!" she corrected me.

"But there aren't any seats. Go find the chairs, Brooklyn."

"No! I don't want chairs. Make them sit here," she instructed me. After 10 minutes of playing Barbie and trying to figure out just where exactly they were supposed to sit in the empty plane, I gave up and went to listen to Clay's song.

Clay, however, had completely forgotten about the song and was crouching in the corner of my room inhaling fruit snacks. Well, duh, I had left him alone for 10 minutes. What else would he be doing?

I sent Clay to his room to get dressed and clean up, then I grabbed some more lacking-in-caffeine-tea and sat back down to write. I looked through my notes to research some information about Campbell's soup for the review. Before I'd written a single sentence, my dryer buzzed again. Back to the clothes. Switched loads, folded clothes and started back to my computer. I was sidetracked because the kids were neglected and wasting away and starved.

"Will you make us some macaroni and cheese, Mom?"

After telling Clay to get his butt dressed (again), I made some macaroni. While the macaroni was cooking, I opened some mail and went through some paperwork. The kids were off playing. When the macaroni was done, I went to find the kids to tell them lunch was ready. Where did I find them? In the bathroom, of course. Note exhibit A.

EXHIBIT A

Know how much water a roll of toilet paper can hold? A stinkin' LOT! I picked the toothpaste off the floor, tossed out 2 water-logged rolls of toilet paper, picked up 4 damp towels from off the floor, grabbed a toothbrush that was stuck to the wall with a suction cup and put it away, and cleaned the mystery purple goo from off the lid of the toilet seat.

Meanwhile, were the kids eating their macaroni and cheese? Oh no. That would make my life much too simple. Nope, they were rearranging the kitchen furniture and had somehow managed to move the kitchen table almost into the family room.

At this point, I nicely told them to sit down and eat, "SIT DOWN AND EAT ALREADY!!! OHMYGOSH YOU GUYS ARE DRIVING ME LOOPY!!!"

I switched loads of laundry once more and dared to take a minute to go to the bathroom. Note Exhibit B.


EXHIBIT B

Apparently I didn't get the memo regarding "Fun With Toilet Paper Day".

This, my friends, is why when lunchtime rolls around, the only thing we've done is a few loads of laundry and a paragraph worth of writing. It's called DAMAGE CONTROL!

(Know how many times I was interrupted while writing this post? Neither do I! It was THAT many times!)

P.S. I did finally finish one review. You can see it HERE. Watch Chef Tom make chicken soup!

And, as long as I stay up until 2:00, I'll have another review/giveaway for an HP printer up tomorrow. Check back.