Diary of an Anniversary

Late last night I thought I'd jot down a not so quick look at our day, for anyone who's like me, and enjoys reading these things (the pictures are not from today, since it was so busy I hardly snapped any):

6:05 am- "Mommy, me and Maggie are awake!" The words echo through the house.  I lay very still and glance at my watch.  It's time to start the day and any time after six is now considered "sleeping in."

6:10 am- I'm about to begin my early morning writing session when I remember that it's our anniversary and yell Happy Anniversary down the stairs to Paul.  I hear him call back that he knew I'd forget.  I'm not sure remembering before 7 am counts as forgetting.  My brain just isn't totally firing on all cylinders immediately upon waking, especially after nursing the baby at least six times during the night.

7:10 am- I should have started getting ready for the day five minutes ago, but I was so, so close to hitting 80,000 words in my story that I kept going.  I do a little dance (okay, in my head, it's still too early for actual dancing) and close the computer and then attempt to wash my hair and get ready in five minutes.

7:23 am- I wander downstairs with my computer, which now has a dead battery.  I leave it on the stairs and find my calendar, flipping it open to see if Patch has speech this morning.  My calendar informs me that Maggie has therapy at nine, Patch has his dairy challenge at 1:30 and Maggie has OT at 2.  The dairy challenge and OT session are a half hour drive apart.  Getting everyone where they need to be is going to be tricky.

8:00 am- I'm upstairs getting Maggie out of a bubble bath when I hear Sadie say that there was a knock at the door.  I call Paul and ask him to help Maggie get out of the tub and race downstairs to meet Patch's speech therapist while still in the yoga pants and t-shirt that I put on the paint the play room the night before, and lazily decided to wear to bed.  Apparently my initial thought that he had speech today was correct and I'd only written it down on the wrong spot.

8:04 am- The girls are settled in their room, and I've gotten Patch dressed.  He has therapy and I read over the evaluation done by his therapist and one of the special education teachers who evaluated him at playgroup last week. I read about how he played with blocks, puppets and said hi to another little boy, and the only real concern anyone has is that his words are still unclear about half the time when he speaks.   I sign the papers that I need to sign and double check the spot when I write in his next session.

8:40 am- I race upstairs and wake up Paul so that he can take Maggie to therapy.  He worked until around 1:30 and then came home and spackled a wall, but he gets up and takes her to her therapy session while I finish Patch's session.

9:03 am- Paul comes home and collapses into bed, while I start school with Sadie.

9:10 am- While Sadie makes a half dozen trips to the kitchen to ask me questions about what she's reading, I make pineapple strawberry spinach smoothies for Paul, Sadie and I.  Sadie and I drink ours and put Paul's in the refrigerator.  Then I settle in to help her with her school work.

9:13 am- James is starving.  It doesn't matter that he just ate an entire container of baby food, he's ready for his nap and that means nursing.  I multitask, helping Sadie and nursing him, until he falls asleep. During moments when Sadie doesn't need my help I read the Book of James in the Douay Rheims Bible on my Kindle.  Our pastor has challenged us to try to read more scripture, starting with James and I'm trying to make sure I make time in my day.

9:25 am- I sneak across the room and manage to successfully put James down on the floor and sneak back over to the dining room table so that I can help Sadie with her schoolwork when she needs help.

11:29 am- While Sadie works on some big subtraction problems I go upstairs and tell Paul that it's 11:30.  He doesn't believe me.  I show him my watch.  Then I explain that we have a lot to do and lay out the schedule for the day.

11:50am- Paul picks up Maggie from therapy while I quickly throw together lunch.  We won't have much time for eating once they get home.

12:10 pm- Paul and Maggie arrive home.  Maggie is clutching a small pink crown that someone brought and gave her for at therapy.  Paul explains that it's a "ballerina crown" and that she's been repeating the word ballerina since he's picked her up.

12:12 pm- Paul tells me that Maggie got away from her therapist while they were walking out of the office for the second time in a week and dashed into the parking lot (next to a giant busy road).  My heart feels like it's stopped.  I repeat "but her plan says there's supposed to be hands on her at all time" in my head at least fifty times.  I ask a dozen questions and none of the answers make me feel any better.

12:40 pm- We load all the kids into the car.  We drive to Burger King and pick up the very first milk shake that Patch will ever taste in his whole, entire life.  It's a moment he's been waiting for, for a very long time.  His allergy began to show up when he was around a month old (through nursing) and he has never in his life had anything with dairy products in it.  After passing his allergy skin prick test last week he has a dairy challenge today.  I'm really nervous about the idea of giving him the thing we've spent almost three years avoiding.  I'm also really excited for him.

1:00 pm- We stop by Paul's old work place so he can pick up his last paycheck.  We wait in the car while the manager complains that he doesn't work there anymore and is rather nasty about it.  I mentally write a post about what a horrible, horrible place to work this particular business was (10 management changes in 14 months, many walking off the job in the middle of a shift... because it was apparently that bad for the managers too) and give thanks that he got a job offer from one of those managers who left last month.  I barely manage, with all the self control in my entire body, not to write that particular rant and I try to make myself promise not to write it ever.

1:15 pm- We drop Paul and Patch off at the allergists office.  As we drive to the hospital for occupational therapy I realize that Maggie's session is supposed to be in the pool.  I take a side road that takes us away from the busy part of campus and manage to cut a few minutes off the time it takes us to get home.

1:29 pm- I park in front of the house, unload the kids, run down to the basement, find Maggie's bathing suit, get her dressed, make sure I have a change of clothes and a towel in her backpack and then load all the kids back into the car.  There's a very good chance we're going to be late.

1:59 pm- We make it to the office with less than thirty seconds to spare.  Maggie is thrilled that she gets to go in the pool.

3:00 pm- OT is over and I load everyone back into the car.  We take the back way again and drive back over to the allergists office.

3:20 pm- We make it to the allergists office in record time.  Paul brings out Patch and tells me that I need to call the allergist and give the nurse updates, first when we get home, then again in the morning.

3:27 pm- Patch says:  "Mommy.  Tummy hurts.  Tummy!  Tummy hurts!"  He tells me at least our times over the course of the coming hour.  He also tells me no one gave him his milk shake.  Paul explains that they took it and gave him tiny amounts in increasing sizes, so he never realized that he got to drink it, because he didn't get to have it out of the cup.

3:29pm- We drop of Paul's paycheck at the bank and then head over to Meijer to pick up a huge box of diapers.

4:34 pm- We've made it home.  We unload the car.  I go inside and realize that the Pope has arrived.  After a few tips from friends I find the Mass when it comes on and put it on the computer.

4:36 pm- Paul reminds me that we need to call the allergists office.  I tell the receptionist why I'm calling and she asks how he is.  I explain that he seems great, but has complained that his tummy hurts four times, although he's running around and playing.  She transfers me to the nurse, who isn't thrilled with the tummy ache news.  She relays it to the doctor and I'm instructed to call back tomorrow with another update.

4:48 pm-  Sadie comes over to the kitchen door.  I tell her the Pope is in the US.  She tells me she's really excited to meet him.  I freeze.  Do you remember the invitation from earlier this year that was basically an advertisement to buy something, but was placed in the form of an invitation to "meet the Pope?"  No?  Well Sadie does.  And she was certain that it was real.

4:49 pm- I deliver some disappointing news.

5:21 pm- Paul returns with burritos for our special anniversary dinner.  Sadie tells Patch that sometimes people in Michigan enjoy eating Mexican food, possibly because she notices him not eating his.  Patch, who is not a fan of 99% of foods, and refuses to touch his dinner 90% of the time, sips his almond milk.

5:55 pm- Maggie asks to go up to sleep.  Paul takes her upstairs and tucks her in bed.

6:04 pm- I start scrubbing one of the walls in the playroom to get it ready for primer and suddenly I have all the help I could possibly ask for.  Both Sadie and Patch are scrubbing alongside me and James is trying to open a container of wipes to join in the fun. The house is cleaned in record time.  I'm rather impressed.

6:30 pm- Paul takes a sleepy Patch up to bed.  I set James up with some toys (and his sister) in the living room and try to discreetly paint the wall around the corner in the playroom.  I'm halfway through when James comes over and repeatedly tries to steal the paint can from me.

7:32 pm- I finish adding a second coat of paint to one part of the room and a first coat to another.  I calculate that at the current rate I will be finished in exactly one week before the dark plum and peach paint in the play room (really the dining room) will be covered.  Even with just the primer painted on half of the room our downstairs already feels much brighter.

8:00 pm- Paul leaves for work.  He sneaks out the back door so that James doesn't see him leave and have a complete meltdown, the way he does when any person, family member or therapist, leaves the house without taking him outside to play.

8:01 pm- I take Sadie up to bed and try to get James, who's attacking the walls trying to find wet paint (thankfully I did the lower part while he was asleep, so he only manages to find one little section that was damp) to go to sleep.  He resists, rolling around the bed at high speeds while I keep him from falling off and laughing maniacally.

9:10 pm- James is asleep.  Finally.  I very quietly sneak downstairs and grab my computer and turn off the lights.

9:11 pm- I start writing this post.

10:15 pm- It's time to close the computer and drift off to sleep.