No Cocoa At Bedtime -- Today

You know how they say children thrive on routine? Consistent, predictable routine?

Yeah, not so much with us.

Today we fed the animals and had school in the morning. Quick! Who can finish their math first?

Then Laura and Grace went to stay at the neighbor's house while Sarah and Madeleine joined me in a drive to town.

Sarah had a clay class and Madeleine has been doing a writing group. Gee, I like their lives.

I had to fight with a dinosaur bookkeeping program in a somewhat lame attempt to be helpful at the EGE's work. It's sort of like wearing flip-flops to a softball game. You know, so no one asks you to fill out the team roster. What I'm trying to say is... I am uniquely ill-equipped to perform bookkeeping tasks. This is how I know God has a sense of humor.

Then I ran errands while the girls played on the computers at the office. Bank, post office, bagel shop. I excel at errands.

CRUD! In the middle of lifting a 50-pound dog food sack into my cart I remembered: VOLLEYBALL.

I called my husband, the Eng-Gen-Eer, also known as The World's Most Organized Person, and asked him to please push the girls out the office door as the Suburban careened past.

Twenty-five minutes of driving like a maniac, or mom-on-a-mission, and we then threw Madeleine out at the gym. In a great arcing move I also picked up Grace and Laura, heated up leftover pork fried rice and wrapped it in tortillas (multicultural too), called the EGE to remind him that he needed to drive home in a hurry, loaded everyone back in the Suburban fully fed, picked up Madeleine, allowed the EGE to enter the Suburban while we slowed down for a split second, and

then

arrived

at

friends'

house

for. social. visit.

I'm not sure I breathed today. I do know that Sarah asked me whether she could have cocoa at bedtime, and I answered that the sugar wasn't a good idea right before sleep.

It's entirely unclear where that parenting moment came from.