If I had to guess, Cinderella is probably Marlee's favorite princess. She can't tell me that, but I take her attraction to playing in the fireplace as a sign. Yep, for the second time I caught her playing in the fireplace, the only difference this time was that she decided to eat some of the ashes while she was at it.
Speaking of eating, and speaking of Marlee, she is a really good eater. With Kaylen I had to force down every mouthful, with Marlee, I have to cut her off for fear of her stomach exploding. When she was a baby I was afraid that she was born without the nerve ending that told her she was full. True story. Like most girls, she loves chocolate. Too bad she nearly choked herself to death by eating a Dove milk chocolate heart (from Jacob's stash that I never let him eat...ummm...yes, I'm that mom.) wrapper and all. Foil does not go down easily. It was a scary five minutes, let me tell you.
Speaking of THAT mom....sigh. Twice. I blogged about THAT mom here if you missed it and want to know what I am talking about. This morning I was putting shoes on Marlee, Jacob was brushing his teeth and Kaylen was sitting up on the counter doing something. Come to think of it, I have no idea what she was doing up there, or how she got there. But that's not the point. The point is, Kaylen was screaming her head off because Jacob was trying to spit his toothpaste on her hands. Her scream is piercing and shrill and I can't handle it. So I screamed at them. Literally. Then I apologized.
If that's not bad enough, Kaylen was screaming tonight as I was sitting on the front porch cutting everyone's finger nails and toe nails. I'm not really sure what she was screaming about, she screams so much that it's basically how she communicates. By this time, 7:15ish, I'm pretty well done, and my low tolerance for the screaming bottomed out and I told her to....oh, why do I have to be so transparent?!...I told her to shut up. Never have I done that in my life and I hope never to do that again. It just came out, my brain didn't even have time to stop the words, my mouth opened said it and closed before it even knew what happened. I had to eat two bowls of ice cream to help me through the guilt of that one. And now the carton of ice cream is gone. Boo.
Did I mention that I took the kids out for a walk after supper, intending to have Jacob and Kaylen walk out any remaining energy they had for the day so that the bedtime battle would be short and easy for me to win and I ended up pushing all three on our single passenger jogging stroller. This only after Jacob screamed and cried about his legs being tired (literally like eight steps from our house) and Kaylen stepped on one of Marlee's fat rolls on her legs and made her cry too.
This day of fishing things from Marlee's mouth - screw, rubber stopper, heart shaped sticker, mini marshmallow from who knows where, fireplace ashes and the rubber tip of an ear bud- of yelling at my kids at moments of high stress, of flinging Kaylen off the front of the jogging stroller because I stopped too quickly, of flinging Jacob off the front of the jogging stroller when he stuck his foot under the wheel, of Marlee playing in pee pee water, of going and doing and not sitting down all day and feeling like I have nothing to show for it...well this day is over.
The bad parts will be strained out and tossed into the deepest ocean, God promised that. And the good parts, there were good parts too if you can believe it, they will stick in the hearts of my little people and me too and they will carry me to tomorrow.
A day like today is only funny once it's over. But the best part of the whole thing is this, tomorrow I get a fresh start. A fresh, clear morning, opportunity rising with the sun.
Lamentations 3:22-23
New International Version (NIV)
22
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
23
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
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