Thursday, November 10, 2011

Confessions of a Sometimes-Overly-Frazzled Mom (#2)

Sometimes on school mornings (and particularly on mornings when Dale is out of town), our house is a bit chaotic. Rarely, but sometimes, I allow the circumstances to bring out the worst in me. Like this morning. So here are my confessions from a morning that I, the adult in the house, let get out-of-control to the point that I need to apologize to all three of my kids.

Ivie, I know I apologized to you already for taking it out on you when the black Sharpie (with its very permanent ink) went through the piece of paper on which you were writing and left little black dots ALL OVER the nice white side table in Bryce's room. I'm a little protective of that table because it's the only piece of furniture in the nursery, besides the rocking chair, that wasn't a free hand-me-down from friends. So I was a little extra upset at the mistake. But, Ivie, I was the one that should have thought to have you use extra paper beneath the Thank You note that you were writing. I was the one that should have asked you to use a regular pen instead of a Sharpie. And I was the one that should have asked you not to put the little dots on the corners of your letters like you love to do, since that clearly could cause ink blotches to go through the paper onto the table.

Instead, I was the one who, after seeing the now-black-spotted top on the table, got frazzled and expressed my frustration verbally. While I was mostly upset at myself, it's easy to understand why you, at only 5 years of age, would think that I was mad at YOU. And that's probably why your attitude was poor for the rest of our morning time together. So I'm sorry for losing my cool over something as silly as a table.

Macie, I'm sorry I "forgot" to make your pancakes for the car ride. When you remembered them halfway through our trip to school, I told you that I had forgotten to make them, but that's not exactly the truth. The truth is that I remembered your request as I was climbing into the car. But, since we were running really late, I took the chance that you would forget you'd asked for them. I was wrong. When I remembered, I should have jumped out of the car, run inside, and taken the 21 seconds it takes to heat up 3 mini pancakes. In my haste to not be a minute later than I already was, your frazzled Mommy made a bad choice.

Bryce, you come from a long (3-deep, now) line of spitting Herman kids. For the past 6 months, I've known this, and have come to embrace (term used lightly) it. I know, as with the girls, that the day will come when I won't be able to remember the last time you spit up. On me or elsewhere. But we haven't gotten to that point yet, so it should have come to no surprise to me, as I carried you (fully dressed with your face freshly-cleaned) out the door to load up the van, that you would feel the need to regurgitate some of your morning bottle. Since I should have predicted this (it seems to always happen just after I dress you), I also should have been better prepared to thrust you away from me to protect my at-the-time-freshly-ironed work outfit. But it did (come as a surprise), and I didn't (predict it), so I wasn't (better prepared), and I failed (to protect the clothes). So to you, B, I owe my third apology of the morning. I shouldn't have said, "Ohhhhhh, Bryce!!!!!" in a tone that was a bit too loud for your liking, while simultaneously trying to wipe the spit from my pants to salvage them. It was my fault for not being quick enough, not yours for doing "what you do".

To top it off, when I arrived at our friends' house for carpool and apologized to him for being late, he said, "First of all, you're the most amazing woman on this planet. Second of all, you're not late.". After having the sort of morning I'd just had, those words stung a bit. I knew, at least on this day, that I hadn't earned them.

Kiddos, when you read this someday, I know that you will already know that I was far from amazing this morning. But, God-willing, I'm going to have many more chances to get it right. I intend to keep trying to do just that.

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