Mother Of The Year...

...will not be awarded to me this year. 
Yesterday was one of those days where I had a huge lists of things to get done.  Nothing really could be crossed off so I rolled up my sleeves and got to work.  I hardly stopped.  I thought I could do it all, but as you will see, I could not.

5:45
 Up and at em' for my turbo kick class.  I love that class and I hated that I had to leave early, but I knew that if I didn't I would make it through the day. (maybe I should have stayed those last 15 minutes)

6:50
Shower and get ready.

7:05-7:50
Wake the kids up and encourage them to get ready.  Make breakfast, lunches and do hair.  

8:00
Made it to school.  Head to the school library to help with hearing tests.

9:00-10:00
Greg drops Callie off.  She struggles to be quiet the last 10 minutes of my shift but overall did great.

10:00-11:30
Grocery shopping.  We were out of the basics and I needed to get just enough stuff to last us until our big vacation.  Plus some pricey sugary snacks to keep the kids happy in long lines at Disneyland.

11:45-12:30
 Get Callie fed, and myself, while talking to my sister.  I love talking to my sisters and just can't pass up opportunities.  Especially to tell her a funny conversation with Callie.
Callie: (on new play phone) I am calling Violet.
Mom: What are you going to tell her?
Callie: Guess what? Chicken butt! (Ahh, big brothers)

12:30-2:00
Clean up the house.  The day before had been crazy and it had just piled up.  I could have waited for the kids to come home and help, but I didn't want to wait and I wanted it done fast.  I was able to get my 5 chapters of reading done since technology is awesome and I could listen to the Book of Mormon while I cleaned.

2:00-2:30
My one space of time where I was able to sit on the computer and figure out what I would talk about at Roundtable.  Balance the checkbook.  And probably relax a little and look at blogs. 

2:30-3:40
Got the after school snack ready and made sure I was ready for the kids.  I have to take a big breath for this one because I like to be in a good mood when the kids come home.  They came home and we ate and chatted.  Then we started on homework-reading, spelling, writing, math.  Nathan just gets to work and does it.  Ryan is a little slower and Annabelle struggles.  She has to write 2 sentences in a journal and she likes to spell everything right but she wants to write big words, and I am not allowed to help her much.  It is a challenge that I hope will get easier.

3:40
Take Annabelle over to her first piano lesson.  It was a group lesson so it was not at the regular time we will have lessons.  She was excited to start something the boys have been doing.

3:55-5:00
Send Nathan to scouts and head over to scouts myself.  We had 9 8-year-olds and were trying to teach them flag football.  Some totally knew what they were doing and others did not.  It was interesting.  My Ryan had been so good all day and then snapped.  He just started disobeying and running around with the ball and pulling flags when we needed him to not.  After asking him to stop multiple times (both me and the other leader) I sent him to the sidelines.  When he came back in and did it again I told him he was out and wouldn't get a snack.  He of course was VERY unhappy with me. 

5:00-5:20
I dropped Callie and Ryan off with Nathan at home and ran over to sign Annabelle up for ballet.  Luckily it was a quick process. 

5:30-5:45
I headed over to get Annabelle at gymnastics.  Before I got there I called Greg to lament to him about my crazy day.  He couldn't really talk so I went up to the door to get Annie.  When the opened the door and saw me they gave me a really weird look and said, "Annabelle isn't here."  Instantly I remember that I was supposed to pick her up from piano at 4:30 and bring her to gymnastics.  Somehow my mind had not remembered that during scouts and then driving to gymnastics I still didn't even remember that I had never taken her there.  Obviously I am losing my mind.  My one defense is that normally she is at a friends' house before gymnastics and she walks Annabelle over to gymnastics.  The piano thing, combined with Ryan's misbehaving and my crazy schedule of the day let me completely forget and look like a fool.  I can laugh about it today, but yesterday I cried.
I raced over to piano and got Annabelle.  Luckily it is Tomie, a good friend of mine.  She didn't call me when I was late because she figured I had realized it was a busy day and purposely skipped gymnastics and just let the girls play.   That is maybe what I should have done.  We laughed and I cried and after a couple hugs headed home to start dinner.

5:45-6:45
Making dinner-meatball subs.  I was going to make rolls but while at the store I decided I needed to cut something out.  I am SO glad I did.   The kids all sill had some homework that wasn't finished and chores that needed to get done.  I made a list for Greg of what was left to do and as soon as he pulled in, I headed out to roundtable.

7:00-8:50
I barely made it to Roundtable on time.  Roundtable is a cub scout thing.  Every month they have meeting for the district cub scout leaders.  I get to teach a class there to all the wolf and bear leaders.  I have been doing it for the last year and while it isn't hard, it isn't my favorite thing to stand up in front of people and talk for 20 minutes.  Near the end of my class someone came in to tell me all the teachers needed to meet afterwards (we have never done that).  After a long day that was the last thing I wanted to do.  But I stayed and listened and participated.  I found out I get to teach for at least another year and we are going to start having meetings after each one.  GOODY!  As I drove home, listening to really loud music (it helps) one more thing just had to happen to make the day even better.  A light came on the dashboard.  The same one that came on during my summer trip.  So now I get to take the car in (not until Monday) and hope that it can get fixed for our trip on Friday.

Luckily when I got home Greg had cleaned up and got the kids to bed.  He listened to my rant about my day and made me feel a whole lot better.  I love being married to that guy.  He laughs and is sensitive to my feelings at the same time.  So far today has been much calmer.  I hope that it can stay that way:)  Thank goodness I have no aspirations to be mother of the year.  I just like when I am occasionally Mother of the Moment.  That does happen at least once a day for at least one of my children.  It is those moments that I will cherish and these other ones that I will look back on and laugh!