Before...

Here’s what happened before we made it to church on Sunday…

Yesterday, I told you about our visit to Holy Cross. Please allow me to tell you what it was like getting there. I arose around 6:00 AM so as to have a little time to myself before the marathon began. Jim and I had decided we would leave the house around 9:00 AM in order to have to take the kids over to his parents house and then proceed to the church. I thought if I got up around 6:00, I’d beat the kids to waking up and be able to write a bit so I would have that need fulfilled.

Of course it was time change Sunday, and even though I had kept Ana up until nearly 9:00 the night before, she decided to wake up at 5:30. I bribed her with juice and got her back into bed and collapsed back in bed myself. I did get back up at 6:00 and wrote a short entry about a dream I had that morning. Then the fun began. Ana woke up before 7:00 and refused to go back to sleep. After 16 trips up and down the stairs telling her it wasn’t time for her to wake up I decided to just let her lay on the couch until I was finished with “my time.” Of course, “my time” was then punctuated with, “Hey Mommy” and cow noises. Finally, I gave up, served the cheerios, went to get David out of bed…

After everyone had eaten breakfast with the usual amount of screaming, etc, I decided it was time to start getting everyone dressed. It was around 7:45 or so…I decided to dress David first as Ana was happily occupying herself with markers on the kitchen table. Big mistake, huge. Just as I was finishing up with David, I heard Ana whining at the bottom of the steps. She wanted to wear her pink bunny slippers. Every girl must have a pair of pink bunny slippers at some point in life…it’s in the manual. Anyway, I finished up with David and ran down the stairs to find that Ana had abandoned paper and begun to draw on herself…all over herself. It’s now about 8:00 and my husband is still sleeping.

I attempted to clean Ana up and finally resorted to throwing her in the bath tub. The water turned a lovely shade of green. I ran down to the basement where our bedroom is and informed Jim it was now after 8:00 am. Oh, he said and rolled back over. I shrugged and ran back upstairs to try and put a little make up on. I have to wear concealer under my eyes to hide the valleys that motherhood has carved! It’s at this point that David realizes he must be held, “RIGHT NOW.” He proceeded to scream the entire time I was putting make up on…pulling on my pajama bottoms and coming close to undressing me.

Jim was downstairs trying to figure out why the computer wouldn’t publish my latest entry and why my blog page looked completely different. I kept telling him to wait…it was no big deal and we’d fix it later. He kept wanting to figure it out (MB afficionados…I’m the “p” and he’s the “j”). I ran back upstairs and proceeded to lift Ana from the tub so she could get dressed. She pretty much protested everything as is her way right now…the tao of the two year old! But, once she saw the “Pooh” overalls, she relented. We put the bunny slippers back on…she was just going to grandma’s after all. Sometime in there I comforted David to the point where he stopped crying…I don’t remember that part but he did stop screaming so I must’ve succeeded somehow.

At this point, I’m wondering if the Orthodox have special prayers for harried mothers trying to get their kids and themselves out the door….

Jim finally left the computer to get dressed. So did I. Ana kept saying, “Pretty dress, Mommy,” and David kept trying to go up the basement steps as I was getting dressed. One leg in the panty hose, retrieve Dave, two legs in the hose, retrieve Dave, hose up over hips, retrieve Dave…that’s how it went and then,

“Oh Crap,” Jim said. “What if the iron still doesn’t work. It took 40 minutes for it to heat up last time.”

“Fire it up and see what happens,” I said. Dressed but no shoes.

I went back upstairs to the dark recesses of David’s closet where my “dress shoe” collection resides. I pulled out a pair…that looked like the could be black. I was wearing a black belt so it was very important that the shoes be black. However, I was also slightly concerned about the husband wearing a wrinkled shirt to church and was distracted,

“Laura!”

“Yes,” I replied.

“Can we leave before 9:00? I’ll have to iron my shirt at Mom and Dad’s.”

“We’re all ready to go.”

“OK. Crap. I need to eat breakfast. I have to finish getting ready,” he said.

“I’ll start the eggs for you.”

I was nervous about his as Jim likes things “just so” and I knew the eggs wouldn’t be “just so.” We did make it out the door at about 8:55 but not before I discovered I was actually wearing blue shoes. Blue shoes and black belt will not do. I ran upstairs and found the right shoes…the backs had been chewed by one of our dogs. I hoped the church was rather dim so no one would notice! Off we went to Jim’s parent’s house…where his Aunt Joan was using the iron. Long story…Aunt Joan is staying there for a while. Jim refused to be rushed…we all remained calm. Eventually the shirt was ironed and we pulled out of the driveway as I watched my son attempt to climb up the sliding board…with no one behind him. I closed my eyes and thought…”It’s going to be OK…”

and it was….