Best Laid Plans

A week ago I got a super nice email from my friend Beverly. Some people email me just to let me know they are reading- how thoughtful! I'm always grateful to hear from those who are reading, either by email or comments, hint, hint! She was offering suggestions and commiseration on the whole nap issue I was having with Ella. She closed her message with, "I love your blog and keeping up on the girls, I still don’t see how you do it all. You seem so incredibly together." The gist of my emailed response was that the nicest thing about blogging is I decide what I want to write about, and I just generally leave out all the bad stuff. However, in the interest of 'keepin' it real', I have decided to write about our last 36 or so hours... this is for you Bev.

A little background info is necessary.

All last week the high's here were in the mid 70's- unseasonably warm for December. The girls enjoyed several hours of great outside time playing every single day... in the sand box, on the swing set, running up and down the driveway. You get the picture...

Well, starting yesterday the weather was supposed to begin cooling and high's were only supposed to be around 65 at mid-day. In anticipation of having to be couped up again for the weekend where the highs are expected to be in the 40s and lows in the 20s, I decided it would be a great idea to take them all to a park. Ella and I visited a great one for the first time back in the summer. The park is completely awesome! Ella loved it, and I promised her that when she taught all her sisters to walk we'd bring them along with us. So yesterday morning Mimi, Kelli, and I packed all the gals up, and we headed out. It was very damp out, and much cooler than it had been all week. I remember thinking to myself, I hope it doesn't rain on us. It didn't.... instead, we got all the way to the park that is located 25 minutes away, mostly in the shade, and got everyone out of their car seats. As we approached the amazing play structures (with all four girls squealing with delight) I noticed that there was about an inch of moisture covering absolutely everything there. I can't think of any time in the 15+ months that I've been a mother of four that I have felt half as guilty as I did yesterday morning. They tried their best to convince us that they could go ahead and play, but when Maggie poured about a gallon of water on herself trying to look at the very neat dolphin swing I knew we had to go! Every single one of them was crying as we buckled them all back in the car and drove away from the most magical place they had ever laid eyes on. Mimi, Kelli, and I all felt like joining them.

Having to play inside after they woke up from their naps, they decided that dress up was their most fun option. Maggie was okay with it, but

Ella was clearly not thrilled.

Fast forward to last night...

After cleaning up my entire house, as I do every evening because the foursome makes the place look like a huge tornado has just blown through, I went to bed at 10pm. At 11pm I heard the pitter patter of little feet. This meant that my very best sleeper, the one who only troubles me sleepwise by boycotting daytime sleep and waking too early in the mornings on occasion, was up. Ella came in to my room and requested my help in the bathroom. Whew, I thought, so glad she's not sick. She went, I helped her back to bed, and I jumped back in bed... easy enough. Then at 11:30, I hear that same little pitter patter coming my way. She is clutching lamb, her blanket, and sucking on her paci... she's "just wanting to sleep in your bed now, momma". Again, I help her back to bed. This same little game goes on again at midnight, 12:30, and finally at 1am when I heard the all too familiar pitter patter, I sent her back to bed all by herself. (Of course, I then had to wait and sneak down there to be sure she was, in fact, in her own room, in her own bed.) I was completely exhausted and exasperated at 1:45 when I heard the pitter patter again. I put her back in bed in exactly the same manner I had already 4 out of the 5 times previous. I'm not sure why she wasn't able to sleep or why the last time worked, but I was very thankful for the sleep I got from then until 3am when Sarah woke up. She had just lost her paci, but I could tell she wasn't going back to sleep without it so I got up, found it for her, and put her back to sleep. Imagine how thrilled I was when Kate started the day for the trio at 6am by loosing her paci. I quickly replaced it and went back to bed myself, even though all three of the girls were awake at that point. By 6:45am they were all fussing a good bit, so I finally dragged my tired self out of bed and officially started their day.

After the night we had I felt sure that Ella would take a good nap this afternoon, but she didn't even fall for the "rest on the couch and watch a movie" trick. She was actually in a very decent mood, so when DoDah offered to sit with the girls while they napped, I decided to take Ella to see the Chipmunks movie. It came out yesterday at the nearest theater. It was 44 degrees outside and raining today, so a movie sounded like a great idea... to us and lots of other parents of young children too, apparently. We talked all the way there about what great fun going to the movies is... the last one Ella saw at the theater was Charlotte's Web, and I think that was over a year ago. She's almost 3 for goodness sakes... she is ready to see a movie at the theater again! We were running just a little late due to weather and poor planning on my part, and when we got close enough to the box office I saw a little sign that read CHIPMUNKS 2:50PM SOLD OUT. Can you even believe the disappointment I've set this child up for in the last 36 hours?!? She cried about it, and then needed to call Kari and ended up leaving a long message about all the other kids that didn't leave room for her in the theater... she described in detail the tears that her sadness was creating. Then, because of the massive amount of guilt I was feeling, I let her choose the back-up plan, and we picked up milkshakes from the DQ on our way to Babyland. We ended up having a pretty good time, and now she can still look forward to seeing the movie another day, soon, during the week, when all the other kids will be in school.

My long, long, story ends with this evening, but it gets pretty gross so if you have a weak stomach you may just want to stop reading right here.

After all the girls had been bathed and fed this evening, I remembered that my good friend Dena's church was hosting a live, drive-thru nativity/ story of Jesus. I thought it would be fun to load the girls in the car in their jammies and take them to see some Christmas lights and end up at this nativity. Never mind that it is raining outside and cold, or that their bedtime is 6:30pm and we were leaving the driveway at 6:35pm... That was not the part that made me feel like a bad mom. When we arrived at the church and started looking for the drive way where we were supposed to turn in I heard directly behind me the sound of Kate throwing up what sounded like two gallons worth of stomach contents. I pulled off to the side in the parking lot so that I wouldn't be in the way of the cars behind us trying to get a glimpse of the live nativity scene. She looked fine... no more vomiting, but she was sitting in her car seat covered in puke and there was nothing that I could do about it. I hadn't brought a change of clothes... I had wipes, diapers, and three little lovies that normally stay in the car. I was utterly unprepared for this type of emergency- Bad Mom Award Winner, that's me! We soaked up a couple of diapers worth, covered the poor child in the lovies, wiped her face with the wipes... AND DROVE ON THROUGH! I headed straight home thereafter. Mimi took care of the other two babies while Ella "helped" me bathe Kate again. We had everyone settled and in bed by 7:35pm and so far I haven't heard a peep out of any of them. I did make a little bed on the floor in the nursery before I put them down just in case I end up sleeping in there later on, but right now I'm just praying that she was overfull from supper.... Please, Lord, don't let it be a stomach bug!!

Okay, I know by now there have been too many words and too few pictures (except for the last part) for one post, but what I really should have photographed was the complete and total disaster that my house and car were at 8pm tonight, and I could have then compared those with the after photos of the house now, or when I sat down to start blogging over an hour ago. The car seat has been removed, dumped out, and rinsed, but it will require hosing down in the daylight when I can see how to completely remove the cover to put it in the washer. The windows are rolled down on my car. I've sprayed Lysol on every possible surface both in the house and car. Now, I'm going to bed!