pray for my soul and the souls of moms everywhere

sometimes i feel like going to Walmart is a part-time job because of how long it takes to get through it with two children hanging off the cart.

seriously, if there is a purgatory, i think it is probably one GIANT Walmart with a huge shopping list and borrowed children that number in the 100s. you would literally be there for 600 years unless enough people prayed for your poor soul and you could start scratching things off the list. and then you'd roll up to the gates of heaven looking all haggard in your yoga pants with pasty skin and a greasy ponytail and be like, "now?? can i come in now?" maybe all the time i spend in Walmart now will cut a few days off for me later.

anyway, meanwhile... in Walmart.
sometimes when we are shopping and N is helping me 'push' the cart he nearly maims innocent passersby so i keep him on a pretty tight leash (metaphorically speaking). yesterday was no exception and as i stopped to pick out eggs, he kept pushing. when i told him to "stop, stay here" he started to swing the cart around into a suspecting woman- i say suspecting, because she seemed to anticipate her demise by cart pretty accurately. so i took two steps, grabbed the cart and repeated "stop, stay here" followed by "N, you are going to knock someone out if you are not careful" and then i hunched up my shoulders and turned ready to receive the stink eye from the suspecting woman.
only she smiled at me.

and then she said, "you are a good momma"

and i had no words. for once, someone was not judging a tired mom in a store with her stir-crazy kids? every time i am at the store i see some old lady stare down a young mom whose child is crying or whose kid is singing their ABCs a bit too loud (exhibit B is us) and it always makes me frown. and now i think i might be jaded, because for a second, i thought she was joking.

i am convinced that motherhood is the only job that if given a compliment on your skills, you just think someone is messing with you...

but i think maybe she was serious, and she can't possible know how good that felt or how i thought about it all evening long. i hope God was watching- surely that was good for a few years off my purgatory total :)

maaaaaaaax

i was just sitting here in the chair watching A eat her lunch in a highchair in front of the tv. go ahead and judge me but sometimes when you have a shit-ton on your plate 490 tests to write and presentations to revamp, etc. etc. etc. you just gotta do what works. the show is max and ruby so i feel like that is probably penance enough for me. this show.
where is the momma rabbit?
ruby is 8 years old, tops, but she is always in charge. bathing max, feeding him breakfast, building dioramas. quite the precocious bunny i must say, even if her whiney voice makes me cringe.
anyway.
so i was sitting. then i heard the telltale sound of a pot boiling over on the stove- i was heating water over two measly eggs- so i jumped up to run to the kitchen. in doing so i stepped over a pile of dress-up jewelry and a stool, around a trunk set up as N's "desk", stepped on a dvd, tripped over the space heater and sorta fell/jumped up into the kitchen.
that's really all to the story- not very exciting but very illustrative. my house is trashed, i have patients after N gets home from school, i am behind in grading, prep and paperwork, i haven't eaten and my kid is watching cartoons. my husband has been gone almost every evening for the past 3 weeks and i am feeling overwhelmed as usual. and i just don't feel like doing anything but snuggle the kids and read... am i starting the annual hibernation?
maybe i should call ruby. she'd know what to do.

think inside the bun

i'm a bit of a lunatic when it comes to feeding my kids. i tend toward the healthy- sometimes to a fault. of course we eat crap every now and then, but in general i cook from scratch and avoid anything processed. we don't really do fast food and even snacks are usually good for them. the kids are fairly brave about trying new things and eating what i give them (though you'd think every day was a struggle based on the dinner time drama as of late- but i digress).

so it makes PERFECT sense that when the pediatrician asks what types of foods N 'usually' eats, he would reply "hot dogs and corn dogs." and when she asks what he likes to do, he would answer "go to mcdonald's"... well played N.




post script:
the little liar also said that he doesn't usually brush his teeth and now sleeps on the floor because he doesn't have a bed (i DID actually break his bed frame last week but he is at least sleeping on a mattress on the floor)