There's a 6:40AM alarm that goes off, that I generally ignore. The smell of coffee wafting upstairs is disgusting. I grouch for a while, but get up and dressed and downstairs around 7:30. I'm a Zombie and probably unpleasant to interact with at this time of day. Hubs and his Dream Team are around my dining room table having coffee and discussing the day's work. I make him breakfast and pack his lunch, because if I don't, he'll chew off a part of his work truck by 10AM and end up making poor (and cheap) choices for lunch that include McDoubles. The crew is out the door by 8:20ish.
Kids are up and fed by then, so we start school. The 7th and 4th grader do their main subjects first while I work with the 5 yr old 1st grader, and try to prevent the 3.5 yr old from climbing on me for the 87th time.
I sip my coffee.
I hate all food, but I start to consider eating something, because I'm supposed to be eating. And because I get the feeling the baby likes food.
9:30 is a chore break, big kids do dishes, take out trash and recycling, and sweep various areas of the house that received a pound of dust, dirt, and concrete from the Dream Team this morning and from shoes in Youth Sizes tracking all sorts of nastiness in over the past 24 hours. Little kids do things like putting couch cushions back in place (for the 190th time) and emptying upstairs trashcans. I get to play Angry Workplace Manager and bark at the kids who are not following directions (as if we don't do this every day or something).
We get back into schoolwork, slowly and reluctantly, and sometimes by me picking up children by their clothing and putting them back into place. They all have something to work on so I might now get to go up to do officework for hubs' business. I get to the office, but get interrupted 6,735 times. They know better than to try to speak while I'm on the phone, so I receive tons of annoying, misspelled post-it notes with comments and questions ranging from "I'm hungrey" to "She hit me" to "Did dinnosaurs have musdashes?" They stare at me and poke me until I read their notes.
Noon is lunch. Then more school or errands around town, depending on our needs at the time (for instance, if I've been avoiding grocery shopping for more than 3 weeks and we just had honey-roasted peanuts and Craisins for lunch...).
We do our main lesson in science, social studies or grammar together with the 5 yr old so she can have exposure to the topics and big kids taking notes and gettin' serious about it.
Then 5 yr old is usually done, if she's been focusing, so she can go play now. The 3 yr old gets a nap around 2PM, sometimes... and those days, my friends, are pure Glory. 2PM for everyone else is chore check again, usually just dishes again and trash maybe at this time. I try to go back to the office and check in with hubs.
I yell from the office at kids who are nearly done school but deciding now to wander and make trouble. They get motivated to finish by dreaming of playing with friends who will be home soon.
The 5 yr old hasn't napped in years, and this has caused her to become very adept at being an Afternoon A-Hole, all whiny and demanding and completely resistant to any other activity beyond deliberately getting on the nerves of Some Other Sibling. And then crying, of course, when she subsequently gets punched, pushed, slapped or if God-Forbid, Someone Is Mean to her.
If the 3 yr old didn't nap (and therefore we are not in the middle of Glory), then he's probably playing trains somewhere by lying on the floor, quiet, with a stoned look on his face (the sure fire Mom-Sign that he should have been put down for a nap). This quietness will only last until he is Disturbed, by something, ANYTHING, including that leaf that just fell outside on the lawn, in which he will immediately transform into Disaster Boy, meaning he will need Consoling, or Handcuffs.
In spite of it all, dinner gets prepped starting around 5PM. Kids are either playing with friends making a giant mess in my house, playing outside making a giant mess in my yard, or possibly were directed (with lots of YELLING, maybe) to clean their rooms, which usually means things get jammed in baskets and under beds while children argue loudly with each other about Life and it's General Unfairness.
Hubs gets home at some point and since his ass is physically allergic to sitting still and relaxing, he starts on some random house project. I know, I shouldn't complain about his anti-laziness!
We eat. We clear the table and the poor dishwasher does a 3rd load. We feel sorry for it, really, we do.
By now, I'm ready for bed. But... it's only 6:30PM.
If the 3 yr old didn't nap, he's now morphed from Disaster Boy into Captain Psycho, whipping and tearing, crashing and bashing through the house, running into people and walls, chucking the couch cushions back off the couches and bawling his eyes out when (not if, folks, WHEN) he runs into something and gets hurt. The girls are going at each other in a way only sisters and best friends can do. They are loud and obnoxious and annoying. My oldest son has retreated to the safety of his room to play alone and probably just Exist, away from the chaos.
My husband doesn't understand that this is what Evening becomes after our Busy Day and that the rest of the day was actually quite productive and lovely and not at all so LOUD, and so his eyes are bugging out of his head and there's a wild look about him and he considers running out of the house and never coming back.
Somehow though, Zombie Mom makes it through another hour, usually involving lots of groaning noises, some funny faces, stopping to sit on my Big, Green Exercise Ball whenever possible, and leaning on countertops. I do this all to manage the fact that my hips are no longer attached to my body and because every damn thing I needed today was WAAY down there on the floor probably just so it could laugh at my lack of ability to lean over the basketball in my belly and pick it up. Let's not forget, also, that there is the head of a cute little baby girl jammed down in my pelvic bone, twisting and turning and therefore crushing things that only exist on the inside of my body and were not ever meant to be crushed.
At 7:30PM the little kids are instructed to Flush and Brush.... they may go and do it, they may cry and whine about it, they may collapse to the floor into tears about it. Bedtime is like Forrest's box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get. If they go immediately, it means they raced, and someone got bumped, smashed, knocked down the stairs or ran over. With the intervention of Zombie Mom, tears are wiped, Boo-Boo's kissed, bad behavior Pooh-Pooh'd on, and they get on the pot, wash their hands and brush their teeth. Pajamas happen, and bed. Zombie Mom reads each little kid a book, then Dad comes and reads each kid a book. G'Nite, Love You, See You In The Morning.
Now it's the Big Kids' turn to Flush and Brush. Being older and wiser does not necessarily mean being faster at generic tasks, especially if you are a 10 yr old girl. You suddenly have questions about Physics, The Meaning of Life, whether or not we can Make Our Sister Stop Snoring, and Can we have a Sippy Cup in bed tonight (No!).
Eventually, big kids are in bed and reading and G'Nites have been completed.
It's 8:30PM. I'm even more of a Zombie than I was before, and my husband is inquiring as to why I'm not painting the playroom, putting the floor down, or tiling the shower. I'd like to physically injure him in some unique and terribly fun manner, but I have no energy left, so I send Air Daggers from my eyes and scowl at him instead. I sit and watch him work for another 20 minutes, but only because getting up is such a freakin task, and then I throw in the towel and head upstairs. Slooowly, and not without noise...
Someone hears me on the hardwood passing by, and it's the 10 yr old of course because everyone else is asleep! She accosts me in the doorway to say that she thinks creepy eyes are staring at her from the yard, and when she closes her eyes dark shapes turn into skeletons. I sit down again, because her talking goes on longer than 10 seconds. I give her the shortest plausible answer I can come up with, praying that it's not actually scarier than whatever she just said to me. I shoo at her with floppy, tired hands, like she's a fly on my sandwich, and tell her that I NEED to go to bed. She at least gets it, and retreats to her room after another hug.
I make it up the next flight of steps, and don't be fooled... it's a split-level house. There are 7 steps, and I was sitting on the 2nd one up already. I'm huffing and puffing and all kinds of out of breath. I get Flush'd and Brush'd myself, and change into a tank top and boxer shorts in the middle of winter, because the temperature of Me will vary from 32 to 107 multiple times throughout the night.
I arrange my pillows just wrong, and lie down. Shortly after, I arrange my pillows again. And again. I get up to pee. I come back, and arrange my pillows.
3 hours later, after hammering and sawing and screw-gunning and firing off 200-year-old cannons the entire time, my husband comes up to bed. I'm still arranging pillows (what else would I be doing??) and he puts on the TV. I want to watch the show, too, but I totally fail and fall asleep instead.
And all of a sudden..... it's 6:40AM again....
