A DAY IN MY LIFE

It’s 1:00 a.m. and I was finally getting to bed, or so I thought. As soon as I turned off the lights, I heard my three-year-old running down the hall crying. Did I really think that after almost two hours of trying to get the one-year-old to sleep that I could have A MOMENT TO MYSELF? A fitting ending to another day in my life…

I guess I should start with the night before, when my husband announced he wouldn’t be going to church in the morning because this will be the only day he can go hunting. Sure, whatever. Fast forward to my alarm clock beeping at 7 a.m. Usually not a problem to get up, but since I was up most of the night with a stuffed up nose, I hit snooze a few times. Ok, about five times. Everyone was now up and getting ready, so I got in the shower. Amazingly, the three-year-old knocked on the shower door to show me she was completely dressed (which was shortly after the one-year-old came in the shower with me). I thought we might have a fighting chance to get to church on time. After finding a “I have nothing to wear” jean skirt for my oldest daughter that she didn’t end up wearing after all, I found my matching sock in the dryer. They couldn’t be in the same load of laundry! (Why can’t they mate for life anyway?)

My four kids and I made it to church about 20 minutes late. My mascara’s smudged, but I hoped no one noticed with my glasses on. I was just glad I got any make-up on at that point, since I usually put on my make-up while my husband drives. Church went fairly uneventful, aside from leaving the service once to take the baby to the nursery and once to blow my nose. No wait, three times. I forgot to drop off a diaper with the kid, so I had to take that back to the nursery, too. When church was over, I took all the kids to Papa Murphy’s to get pizza, cheesy bread, and cookie dough. At four o’clock, we were scheduled to pick up grandpa and grandma’s puppy from the pet boarding place, so we went to their house to eat and hang out.

Being the good friend I am, earlier in the week I helped a friend bid on an item on ebay, as she had never done it before and did not have an internet connection. I didn’t realize that I would be at my parent’s house when the auction ended, but I figured that shouldn’t be a problem. After I put the pizza in the oven, I returned to my parent’s newly started-up computer and found that it didn’t recognize an internet connection. Hmm. I tried to call my dad’s cell phone in hopes that they are not in the airplane when I called, but, you guessed it, they were! Since I knew we had only about an hour, I racked my brain for where I could find a computer with internet that I could use somewhere in the city of Hutchinson on a Sunday at 12:30 p.m. I proceeded to look for a phone book — and look, and look, then give up and tell the kids we would have to finish their pizza when we get back from finding a computer somewhere in town. Before we left, I had the brilliant idea to put the remaining pizza back in the now turned off oven to keep warm while we are out. We loaded up everyone “as is” into the van and started our quest. First, I tried the coffee shop that I knew from my cell phone, and found out they are closed Sundays. (I keep a phone book in my vehicle for this purpose.) The library would be closed on a Sunday, too. I tried a hotel nearby, and they suggested another hotel. The second hotel told me I could use the one in their lobby, but I would have to leave if a hotel guest wished to use it. (Let’s hope no one there was planning on checking their email!)

Called my friend, bid on the item again. I reluctantly agreed to call her back when the auction was almost over. Generally this would not be a problem, only I wasn’t going to hang out with four semi-hungry kids in a hotel lobby for forty minutes. I decided to take them to the dollar store to get some things I needed to make Christmas gifts. As we drove down Main Street, I saw the new coffee shop was open, so I ran in to see if they have any computers. Good, now I could come back after we pick up our things and check on the ebay item – and get a decaf turtle mocha. When we got to the store, the one-year-old was asleep. Perfect. I needed some dead weight to lug around. I suggested coming back another day, but my three girls wouldn’t have it. A short lecture on behavior and a restatement of our mission, and we braved the dollar store.

Again, I thought I can do this; we were in and out of the store with only one blow pop per kid not on the list. Back in the van, with baby still asleep, I tried to get back to coffee shop in 7 minutes. At the lights I managed to get behind an old lady in her nice new car that must be reading the kilometers per hour instead of the miles per hour, because she was only going 15 mph. Main Street didn’t offer any opportunities to pass, so I kept telling her to hurry up, hoping that would help. She must have heard me, because now we were down to almost 10 mph, yes 10. (I basically had to tap the gas pedal every so often to keep moving.) She turned only a block before me and I raced to the coffee shop. I clicked the internet icon and waited while it was connecting. At least it told me it was connecting. I decided to order my drink while I waited, thinking then it would be up by the time I am done. Since turtle mocha was not on their menu, I tried to find something similar and then asked if they could just make one like that. I went back to check on the computer and then another gal said to me, “Ma’am, I’m sorry but our internet is down today.” (What!? Nice, well, my $4 coffee better be worth it.) I was now thinking of how to apologize to my friend that I missed the end of the auction, while the coffee girls were doing two drive-thru orders now instead of mine. I thought it was about time to check on my brood awaiting me in the van. I could see them through the window, but they couldn’t see me. Yep, I needed to get out there, mayhem was ensuing. But, I couldn’t leave without my coffee!!!

At least the coffee smelled good. The natives in the vehicle wanted to go back to grandma’s and finish eating and make the cookies we got. Sounded good to me! As soon as I took a sip of my coffee, I realized that I had forgotten to say DECAF when I ordered, so I basically threw away $4.26. (Can you tell I don’t order coffee that often?) The trip back to grandma’s wouldn’t have been complete without narrowly (emphasis on narrowly) missing a black lab running away from his kids and crossing the highway in front of us. Not only did the dog almost go to heaven, we almost hit the kid who wasn’t even close to catching the dog, but also still thought running out onto the highway in front of a moving vehicle was a good idea. I know now our seatbelts work pretty well, since we tested them twice within sixty seconds. We all were fine, except my purse that landed on the floor, along with all of its contents. It had to be sitting open on the seat next to me, because it wouldn’t be funny to just have to pick up the bag and not the one hundred and two things inside!

We got back in the house, I opened the oven to take out the pizza that I was hoping was still warm after we were gone a lot longer than I thought. It was still warm. Slightly burnt, but warm. I was not sure how an oven on the off position could stay so hot for so long, but I now know not to do that again. Because the pizza cheese wasn’t as appealing as before we left, the girls didn’t want it. Well, at least we could make cookies. (We each had to eat some dough, first.) I loaded up the pan with spoonfuls of dough, put them in the oven, and set a timer. Apparently, grandma needs a new timer, because no one heard it go off. Oh well, we didn’t really want to eat the cookies.

It wasn’t long until it was time to go pick up the puppy from the boarding place. We were all excited to go see the new puppy. On the way, I decided to get hot chocolate at Super America to make up for the disappointing coffee trip. One buck for the same size drink, nice. We got to the dog place a full five minutes early. For once! I saw the lights were on and I heard dogs barking, so I figured someone was inside. We all got out for the big event and walked up to the front door. Had the doors been unlocked, we could have actually gone inside. My kids were soon starting to get cold waiting outside, so we headed back to the vehicle. By now someone else had arrived to pick up their dog, so I was hoping to watch them and see where they went. But, they never got out of their car. Fifteen minutes after we arrived, a lady with a dog in her back seat pulled in the next driveway, so we thought this was it! A lady from the other car got out and started to go across the lot to the other side of the building. She told me to wait in front with my kids. (I assumed they would come around to the front to let us in.) So we waited. And waited. I finally gathered the troops and decided to go in this other building, too. We went in one door, and nobody was in there. So, we came back to the front and then saw the same lady coming out with her two dogs and the dog lady was with her. She asked if we were there to pick up a dog and we said “YES!” Now we are getting somewhere! Once we were in correct building (through a different door nonetheless), the lady assumed I owned the dog so she plopped him in my arms. I held him like a new dad holds a baby, only the puppy was crazy, scratching and licking me everywhere. I just wanted to get the dog and leave!

Our adventures were only half over at this point, but I didn’t know that yet. My parents returned from their trip, we ate supper, and went back to church for the evening service. Since I didn’t have a pen to take notes (because it was still on the floor of my van), I had to borrow one. Good thing I had remembered to bring something for the kids to do at grandma’s (not that we actually could have), because they needed something to keep them occupied during church. Well, the two older kids did anyway. The younger two went to their classes. And though both went into their classrooms, only one was willing to come out.

So, in order to get out of church with minimal on-lookers, I have to pass off the one-year-old baby boy to my eight-year-old so that I can carry my three-year-old girl out of her classroom and all the way to the van. Since there could be no better time to go grocery shopping, I decided to just get it over with. I chose the local grocery store instead of WalMart for the gas coupon I would get at the end of my shopping trip. Plus, the natural food section has better supplements which I needed more of to fight the cold I felt coming on. We found ourselves in the bulk foods, right next to the natural food section. After a couple bags of various snacks, I saw dried banana chips, put some in a bag and put them on the scale. Nothing happened. I tried a couple more times, still nothing. A stock boy happened in my direction and asked if I needed help with the machine and I said I did. He said the machine doesn’t register anything on the scale unless it weighs a certain amount. I guess my only option then was to dump some more in. Success. Or so I thought. All the time I was trying to get this figured out, my little guy was digging his grubby paws in every bin he felt like. Did I say he, too, had a cold? Yeah, I ran out of that section. After a few trips to the bathroom and criss-crossing the store trying to find stuff, the last thing we had to get was some cheese. Here, while we were trying to decide on which string cheese to get, we saw our pastor. Following a brief conversation, I noticed that the kids were just staring at him like, “You grocery shop?” Funny. (I just hoped at that point I didn’t look like the day I was having.)

We went to check out and forgot that we didn’t get the free item. I sent my eight year old to fetch the coupon again (we managed to lose the first time around), and the item. She brought it, but it was the wrong size, so the checkout lady offered to go get the correct one for me. Bless her heart! In the meantime, the cashier behind us offered the kids suckers, and at 8:30 p.m. I said, “I’ll put them in my pocket, thank you.” I packed up the groceries, paper cut my finger on one of the bags, and completely ignored the four kids who are now playing in the carts (the kind you “drive”).

I looked at the receipt and realized I was pretty close as far as the budget went for this trip, so I better make this stuff last. I loaded up the back end of the van, got everyone in and headed for home. Then I remembered that I got out the receipt not to see if I was on budget or not, I got it out to get the gas coupon because I needed to get gas! Oops. We were only about three miles or so out of town, so we turned around. There was some screaming and crying involved at this point, but mostly from me.

I got to the station, pulled out my card to swipe, but realized that I couldn’t use the gas coupon unless I went into the store and paid for the gas. Ugh. (I guess we need rules. But, why can’t they have a scanner out at the pump, so one could scan the coupon and not have to go in?)

The way home was rather quiet. Most of them fell asleep, although I wanted to be. When we got home, I brought in a few things from the front seat and went back for the bags of groceries in the back. At least that was what I thought I was going back for. But, since someone had woken up the little boy sound asleep in his carseat, he was now screaming. I decided that nothing in the van was worth a crying child (and my patience), so I tried to get him to go back to sleep and left the stuff out there.

Turned out that my oldest daughter brought in all the groceries, shut the back door of the van, and put away all of the food, too. Whoa! I was floored. The baby didn’t go back to sleep, but at least I didn’t have to do the groceries after all. Hallelujah!

I sat down on the couch and saw that I had missed the Extreme Makeover Home Edition show that was taped in MN, and was the 100th episode. Bummer. Maybe if I hadn’t gotten groceries, I could have been home to watch it. (Maybe I can still catch it on the internet?) I just knew there was something I wanted to get home for, but I couldn’t recall what it was. Maybe it was because I had Milk Duds for breakfast.