It’s been a busy few months, and I have tons of pictures to upload, but for now, here is today. Just a boring Summer Thursday.
Max plays Minecraft for hours on end.
Lily is her cheerful self.
Molly says, “Watch this, momma!” for the five thousandth time today.
And Gus is two and a half, potty trained, and smiles like a goofball.
Yesterday was such a day! I’ll take you on a ride through the busyness.
5:15am: drag myself out of bed, there’s never enough sleep around here. Coffee, prayer, bible study, plan my day.
6am: I wake up the kids and start trying to figure out what to make for lunches. Realize I need to go to the store. Homemade lunchables it is! Jay works on lunches while I grab a quick shower. Put Lily in the shower so I can put her hair in a bun for ballet tonight. There won’t be time later.
6:45am: Ben and Tessa leave for school, our carpool kids arrive, three girls aged 7, 9, and 11. Max and Lily go to play with their friends and I have to keep reminding them to get ready for school.
7:15am: Everybody in the car! Time to drive to school. They all sing Frozen songs the whole way.
7:45am: drop kids off at school, pray the rosary on the way home, Gus and Molly complain about not having Frozen songs to listen to anymore.
8:20am: Back at home. More coffee, a little breakfast, fold some laundry.
9-11am: Work on new layout for my Circling Jericho blog. Molly and Gus play and fight in the family room. Brief breaks for reading a book and fetching drinks and snacks.
11am: Slap some makeup on to try to look presentable, realize I forgot to moisturizer so it looks all blotchy. Oh well, it will have to do, James is watching the kids so I can go to Adoration for a little while! (20 minutes in Adoration.)
12pm: Pick up lunch on the way home. James has cleaned the kitchen! Yay! A good friend who is also a realtor comes over to catch up and talk about our moving plans. We had a very nice visit and resolve, like we always do, to not let it be so long before next time.
2:15pm: My friend leaves, I realize that I should have been packing some snacks, but now there is only time to change a diaper, send Molly to the bathroom, grab some granola bars, and run out the door to pick up kids.
2:45pm: Both kids sacked out in the car, I guess I’ll go through the pick up line to buy a few more moments peace.
3:20 Lily gets in the car just as Molly is starting to wake up. We drive to the other side of the parking lot and park, we have to wait for Max while he goes to tutoring. Gus stays asleep even after I move him out of the car. Lily and Molly okay in the grass.
3:40pm: Realize that we should be driving away right now instead of waking across the campus to pick up Max. Oops. Things are about to pick up speed.
4:00pm: Driving away from school, finally. I drill the kids on what will happen when the get home. Max will get himself a snack and get his boys choir folder, Lily will change into her ballet uniform while I make her snack, Molly and Gus will NOT take their shoes off.
4:25pm: I make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for everyone (gluten free bread for Molly, of course) and pack some coloring books and crayons while telling Max to pick up a couple of water bottles. I realize that Lily’s ballet uniform is filthy.
4:35pm: Out the door and back in the car.
5:05pm Arrive at boys choir 5 minutes late. Drop Max off. Drive towards ballet studio.
5:10pm: Construction zone.
5:25pm: Arrive at ballet in the nick of time! Lily goes to class, I try to coach Molly and Gus into eating their sandwiches as neatly as possible without the help of a table, with reasonable success.
5:45pm: Sandwiches are done, time to color.
6:00pm: Coloring is boring, time to climb on chairs and run in circles. A lot.
6:30pm: Lily is done, time to get back in the car. Drive to Tessa’s friend’s house to pick her up.
7:10pm: Arrive at Tessa’s friend’s house, Molly has to go to the bathroom, drag the whole crew into the house, then round them up again. Finally head for home.
7:20pm: Construction again! I told myself not to take this road, but apparently I’m too tired to override my autopilot.
7:40pm: Home at last. Now all I have to do is get the required bedtime snack (I hear that refusing a bedtime snack is some kind of child abuse.) give medicine, brush teeth, police the shower times, put pajamas on them, and get these hooligans to stay in bed. Ben and Tessa both are helpful.
8:10pm: They’re in bed at last, not asleep yet, but in bed. I work on the website a little more.
9:30pm: Let Ben use the computer, get ready for bed, set the coffee maker, read until…
10:30pm: Go and let the cat out and make sure the computer is off and locked. Finally time to sleep.
It was a two cart trip to Target today.
My cart:
And Paisley’s cart:
And for extra fun, this is what we sounded like:
A special family friend is in town this week. She provided the kids with a treat for being so good in Mass today. Sticky fingers everywhere!
I found Max all by himself while the rest of the kids were playing noisily in the other room. He’s almost to the end of The Goblet of Fire and can’t put the book down!
A crazy Sunday dinner with lots of laughs, a little crying, and messy mixed up taco plates.
And a bonus goof off shot:
And now I’m going to bed.
I felt guilty getting my phone out in church, but we arrived plenty early so we didn’t disrupt anyone. Well, we always disrupt people, but we didn’t disrupt any more than usual.
You can see by the blur that they were already a little bit squirrelly. So much so that one choir member asked Jay what on earth he had fed Gus for breakfast.
Today’s highlights include Molly picking her nose, Max stretching every two seconds, and Gus making his fingers into a gun and yelling, “Bang! Bang!” in the middle of the consecration.
They make me a little crazy, and I don’t get to really complete a thought when I pray, but it really is a privilege to get to bring these children to church every week. Molly pulled on my sleeve at one point and whispered (she actually whispered!) “I know what that picture says. It says Jesus, I trust in you.”
A bonus picture of the three littlest (Lily-6, Molly-4, and Gus-2) paying a little visit to baby Jesus before mass. It was a beautiful moment, but they all came back to the pew covered in straw.
7 Elements of Summer!
1. Dinosaur chicken nuggets and other simple Costco meals. This is made more difficult with our new dietary restraints, but I find ways to make cooking as simple as possible. Having to cook and clean up after the whole crew for both lunch and dinner can get tiresome, so we rely a lot more on paper plates. This year we have even indulged in paper cups! Whee!
2. Swimming
And as a corollary: lots and lots of wet towels, you really don’t need a picture of that.
3. Bare feet, and therefore there are shoes and socks all over the house. People wear their shoes outside and then can’t bear to have them on for even ONE MORE SECOND. Strangely, with all these shoes lying around, no one can find their own pair. (Or at least Lily can’t.)
4. Watermelon, Ice cream, and Popsicles. With the occasional trip to Sonic or Zoyo thrown in for good measure. My kitchen table is ALWAYS sticky.
5. Being stuck inside results in lots of tents and blanket forts.
6. Field trips to Cabela’s: Gus was afraid of the lion, but he couldn’t wait to see the bear!
and Ikea:
7. And I’d be lying if I didn’t list plenty of screen time. Video games, movies, kindle apps, Starfall or Lego games on the computer. We do even read on occasion. It’s nice that they often watch together.
The hours of Summer are so long, but the weeks are short! It will all be over in the blink of an eye and we will be back to the structure of the school year, happy to be moving on but missing our freedom.