Pants, Pukes and Panic

I will never learn. My days should start with Starbucks...when I try to avoid this pattern the fabric that holds my world together begins to unravel!

This morning started late at 6am. I slept in thinking I had earned it after the last few crazy days dealing with A's school chaos. At 6 I jumped out of bed, got ready, joined my insomniac 5 year old downstairs and spent 20 minutes trying to get him to try on his new uniform for school. At 9 minutes in I realized THIS is what I should have done the night before. We reached a standoff when I refused to rip tags off before he tried the clothes and he refused to try anything on with tags.  Fast forward a few tense minutes and my non-negotiating with anyone under 4ft tall rule won the morning. So clothes were on for a total of 4.2 seconds before the inevitable freak out complaints started about how the clothes didn't fit.

So what's a mom to do but throw her kid in the car, grabbing everything he needed for his first day at a new school on the way out and hightail it to the only store smart enough to be open and taking money at 6:45am.  We looked at every pair of pants, every pair of shorts, any possible options (including those in the girls department -don't tell my husband I even considered it :)).  It's not like the school is overly picky. Any navy or kahki pants that are not cargo style will do. However that left me zero, zip, zilch as an option. I finally in desperation grabbed our 3rd and final attempt from the dressy section (if this didn't work we were headed home to have a play hooky day) and rushed Alex over to the dressing room.

Did I mention that he was eating fast food pancakes in the shopping cart since we hadn't had time for breakfast yet? No, well ignore that bit of slacker momminess then. :)

Luckily the size 4 dress slacks were soft enough, loose enough, almost long enough, and the waistband was forgiving enough for my size 6 wearing kiddo. I didn't even bother to check the price tag as I grabbed them, a lunchable for the lunch I hadn't had time to pack and softer, larger white socks and rushed to the checkout.  We made it to school with literally a minute to spare. Just in time for the bell to sound and scare the crap out of A.   I spent 20 minutes getting him settled and adjusted in his new room and headed out the door thinking I was doing good (the day before I would still be in traffic trying to get home from his old school) and I had brought my work computer with me! Since the baby had a sitter for the day I was off to Starbucks for coffee and a morning of powering through the task list taking over my droid.

At least that was the plan until I got in my car, turned it on and answered the ringing phone to find out the baby had puked everywhere. So I rushed home, spent 30 minutes cleaning the bed, the floor, the kid and starting a load of laundry...the first of many today apparently.  We kept her on fluids until lunch and her sneaky, happy self convinced me that maybe it was a one time thing. I was off to Target to locate more appropriate clothes than the fancy pants I sent A in today and her good mood and lack of any subsequent stomach issues convinced me that the time was right to try a few saltines. That lasted us exactly 15 minutes which was how long it took to get to the gas station.   As we pulled in she showered my car.  This is why I have leather!

I handed her off to the sitter after stripping her outfit and they played in the back of the van while I attempted to clean the car seat with minimal supplies.   The day got better after that, it was just another trip home, stripping the car seat and another load of  laundry, about half a dozen pedialyte popsicles and then a screaming fight at bedtime as she banged on the pantry like a kid deprived of food for weeks. So against my better judgement I gave her three more crackers.

Say a prayer for me, lets hope tonight goes better...and you can bet tomorrow morning will find me at Starbucks righting the wrong I have done the universe today.