My Day 12/21/06

8am- Kids up, shower, mad rush to get kids dressed and fed and Leah to Gymboree
9am- Leah and I play, run, and jump at Gymbo
10am- Home to pick up Logan and Anthony, off to Swansons to see the reindeer
11am- Running around Swansons, trying to find kids and husband, go to cafe for lunch and hot cocoa, watch the trains, carry crying kids to car (both wanted to stay and play)
12pm- Yard work outside- clean up from the storm last week, dealing with Leah who insists on taking her shoes and socks off and Logan who is playing in the puddles and "river" flowing down the street, inside for lunch, ignore Leah's 15 minute tantrum b/c I forgot to give her ketchup with her hot dog, put kids laundry away only to have Leah take the clothes back out of her drawer. So, take 2 with putting clothes away.
1pm- Put Leah in for nap, spend the next hour putting Leah back into her crib, convincing her that a nap is in her future! At the same time, trying to keep L-Man quiet and occupied as he is running around in circles singing Christmas songs and exclaiming, "I'm so excited, I'm so excited."
2pm- Straightened up the house, vacuumed up the never-ending pine needles for the second time today, put all the coats and shoes away, watered the tree, put the ornaments that the kids took off back on the tree, put Leah back in her crib and convinved her to take a nap... again!
3pm- Leah finally sleeping! Whoo-hooo. Play blocks and dinosaurs with Logan, make Christmas cookies with Logan, clean the kitchen again, sweep up the pine-needled again, folded laundry and put a new load in the washer, cleaned up the 1/2 bottle of baby powder that Logan emptied onto the bathroom floor and put him in the shower. (There is still a cloud of baby powder dust in our house as I write this blog.)
4pm- A grumpy Leah woke up, went in to get her but she screamed and said she wanted to go back night-night, left her room and debated weather or not to just take her out of crib and have her scream or let her continue to whine in her bed. Finally, took her out. Called Logan's neighbor friends to come over to play, cracked open a beer! Began to think about dinner. Dinner? Who has time for dinner???
5pm- Do the dishes from the day, man, how do we manage to go through 8 cups and 5 sippy cups in less than 8 hours? And about 12 bowls?!?! Put clothes into the dryer and put more clothes away! Sat down to write this blog while kids are building block towers with Ben and Gabe. Dinner? Hhmmmm... take out? Mexican? Thai? OK- need to take a break now, will be back after bedtime.
6pm- Jumping for Joy! A just came home and went grocery shopping... AND got us crab legs for dinner!! So, did a quick clean up game with the kids (again, I am amazed at how many toys are all over the place since we last cleaned up a few hours ago), put them in the tub, help A unload groceries and make dinner. Get kids in pajama's, clean up the flood in the bathroom, and all sit down for a nice dinner. Leah ate everything in sight, Logan threw the crab across the table, time-out for him and then he spent the next 20 minutes cleaning up his mess. Listened to Christmas carols and danced around the house with the family.
7pm- Dinner clean up, more laundry, and everyone into the car for a drive to see Christmas lights. Fold the rest of the laundry, attempt for kids to watch bedtime show, but Logan preferred to dump my newly folded clothes on the floor and dress himself in as many things as possible, and Leah decided to dump out all of the toy bins! Oh joy!!! Here comes the clean up crew, yet again!
8pm- Bed time!! Leah is down in crib. Let's hope she doesn't get out a million times. Lo is up with Anthony. Let's hope he won't need my assistance and here I am! Blogging away with my last load of laundry in the washer, towels in the dryer and more, yes, more presents to wrap.

So, guess what?? After all this, my house is still a mess with pine needles all over, dishes to be done, and more laundry to fold. And today was a somewhat "calm" day.