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I know the day has gone awry when I find myself standing in the food storage closet and crying because I am out of brown sugar. The lack of brown sugar was obvious evidence that I’ve not been keeping track of the food stores that we have in stock. This is itself evidence that I am a failure and that everything is going to fall apart. Worst of all the lack of brown sugar means that I can not make the cookies that I wanted to feed the kids for snack (And to eat for my own comfort) so now I have to think up something else to feed them, but I know that they won’t like any of the other options that I might suggest. And whatever I decide, I will have to go for yet another round of “May-I-have-chocolate-chips no-you-may-not” with Patch. At least with the cookies I could deny the chocolate chips on the basis that they were needed for the cookies.

The morning went great. I loved the morning. Then it was 1 pm and I had not even started the necessary business tasks for the day.

I expect too much of me. It is hard not to when I know what I am capable of accomplishing. So I build my schedules around my capabilities on a good day. But not all days are good. I can not always be working at full capacity. No one can. But I’m afraid to budge an inch on this schedule I’ve created. I’m afraid that if I start being flexible, then it will all get bent out of shape and not be a schedule at all. And if the schedule falls apart I won’t be able to get everything done that needs doing. …only I’m already not getting everything done which implies that this schedule I’ve constructed may already be dysfunctional. …but it has only been two days, maybe I haven’t got the hang of it yet.

I just wish my shoulders would unknot. My stress makes no logical sense. There is no catastrophe. No emergency. All is well.

Howard asked me if I’d missed my thyroid medication. I assured him I had not, but then I counted. 10 days ago was Kiki’s party. I may have missed a dose back then. Maybe that would explain this emotional tailspin. The tailspin hit pretty suddenly around noon. That is consistent with a single missed dose. If I pull back out around noon tomorrow, that would fit the pattern perfectly. I think I’ve stopped hating being chemically dependent and moved on to loving my medicine because it keeps me stable.

Right now I feel like the wreckage of a boat that has washed up on a peaceful beach after a storm. The kids are all in bed. I hope the only storms tomorrow are the ones that drop rain from the sky.

The first day of a new schedule is never easy. I’ve reminded myself of this several times today. Add to that the fact that it can hardly be called a normal schedule at all when I’ve acquired Nephew for a week and Link’s Bestfriend for the night. I’m glad that Link gets to spend time with these two boys. It is good for them all. I particularly enjoyed the hour they spent out in the backyard pelting each other with floral snowballs plucked from our neighbor’s giant snowball bush that grows over the fence. No really. There’s a plant that grows clumps of white flowers that look like snowballs. Every year my kids will strip off all the snowballs in reach and throw the hundreds of flowers at each other. It is a spring ritual. Today was the day for it.

The kids had a great day all day long. I was the only one who felt a little harried and stressed. I’m accustomed to having long stretches of quiet house in which to get my work done. Instead I had to hurriedly do work in all the little spaces between the other activities. I did not get all the work done, but by afternoon I was burned out. The shouting laughter of boys playing video games chased me out of the house and I went out into the yard.

“Yard” is such an ugly word. I wish American English used the word “Garden” the way the British English does. In America “garden” implies a small space in which you are actively growing plants, usually food plants; “Yard” is the entire outdoor space that belongs to the house. But I’ve spent so much time cultivating the entire space surrounding my house that it all feels like garden to me. Besides, “yard” feels impersonal while “garden” implies loving care.

Out in the garden I meandered and let the penned-in feeling drop away. I toured all the various beds. Some have seeds. Some have flowers. Some have plants. Most have weeds. I surveyed all the work to be done and then I sat on the hill. You know you’re gardener when you stare at a long list of garden chores and are glad that you won’t run out of things to do. Sometimes looking is all that I do, but usually some bit of work peaks my interest. Then I get out my gloves and set to work. Today I cleared out the weed patch under the spruce tree. As I pulled weeds, Gleek and Patch came over. They pulled a few weeds each. Then the became to preoccupied with jumping across some stepping stones to climb on the back of our garden gargoyle, Winston. Winston is knee-high, made of fiberglass, and has lived in our garden ever since Howard shipped him home from a trip to Chicago. We’ve never regretted the purchase. Winston is marvelous. Today Winston had teleportation powers. Gleek and Patch both climbed onto his back and were whisked off to lands that I could not see. Gleeks narration of the event was strongly reminiscent of the Magic Tree House books. She’s currently reading #2 and I expect she’ll make her way through all of them before the summer is over. By the time I was done weeding, their adventure was over as well and we all went back into the house.

All the excitement and running around must have tired them out. They all read quietly for awhile and now the lights are out. My house is quiet again. Tomorrow I get to do the new schedule again, but it will go better because the second time usually does.

To paraphrase Neil Gaiman: “Events are cowards. They don’t occur singly, but instead they run in packs and leap out at you all at once.”

I’ve noticed this tendency. There will be stretches of empty followed by three or four things needing my attention at once. This pattern holds true within a single day, or within a week, month, or year. When I read that quote, I just about laughed out loud. Then I had to come and put it here so I can find it again.

Last Friday we had a joyous “School is out, let’s celebrate!” kind of a day. Today the reality of Summer Schedule has begun to sink in. I’m going to have to feed my children three meals per day instead of two (with the third being school lunch.) Oh and then there are all the snacks. and the guilt. If I let the kids play video games or watch movies all day, then I have to feel guilty about not providing enriching experiences. If I make them turn the TV off, then I am inundated with a chorus of bored and hungry children. The hungry is what really drives me crazy. I spend creative energy making food, then I have to argue about how much they eat. Then they’re hungry again because I couldn’t get them to eat enough.

I’m hoping that we’ll find a new rhythm quickly. I’m hoping we’ll find ways to keep us all occupied and get the necessary work done. Yesterday I was sure it would all work out. Today is a pessimistic day. Hopefully tomorrow will bring a fresh influx of optimism.

First there was breakfast where I had to stand guard over three children to make sure that they ate all of their eggs. This was necessary since Gleek has been wild and sugar-shocked ever since field day. It seems that the last week of school was an unending stream of exciting things, most of which were coated in sugar. Today begins the detox where I feed the kids no treats and instead insist that they eat foods containing protein and vitamins. They didn’t like the switch. Poor lambs. But they did eat all of their eggs.

Next came the declaration of chores to be done. The influx of sugar over the past week was accompanied by an influx of candy wrappers which the children cheerfully strewed throughout the entire house. Also Gleek expressed her love of nature by bringing some of it in the house. I like plants. They are pretty. But I don’t like them so much when they’ve lain on my floor drying out and then been stomped into confetti. For variety the kids decided to pull out piles of toys and throw them about at random. They were a bit dismayed to discover that I expected them to clean up the mess.

At first I had hopes that I could motivate them with the promise of extra stars on their “we are working together to earn a cool thing” chart. No dice. In the end I had to stand over each child in turn saying “Now pick up the cars and put them in the bucket.” “Now put all the laundry in the basket.” “Now wipe the sink.” Etc. Link had the hardest time of it. He had to vacuum. I’m the meanest mom ever. Even worse, his dad came along and showed him how to vacuum efficiently rather than just wandering the vacuum around the room at random.

By the time we finished the work, we were overdue for lunch. Again I had to stand over Gleek and Patch to make sure that they ate appropriate amounts of their burritos. Link and Kiki both love burritos and had two each. I told the kids that they were going to have to take turns hating the foods because there are so few foods that everyone likes.

At lunch I announced that the hour after lunch would be a quiet time. This siesta is something that is going to be increasingly necessary as the weather heats up. Mid-summer the best time to be outside is between 7-9 pm. That means that bedtime will be late. But we still need to be up early because the best business get-stuff-done hours are in the morning. Hence the necessity of a quiet space in the middle of the day when both Gleek and Patch are required to stay quietly in their beds. I don’t know how often they will nap, but by creating the habitual space for it I’m improving the chances. If nothing else we’ll all be more cheerful for having a quiet alone time midday. That’s the theory. The reality today is that I’m siting here typing on my laptop while guarding to make sure that everyone stays put and stays quiet.

Hopefully when quiet time is done there will be a lot less enforcement required of me. Maybe I’ll even get to start on the list of things that I’d assigned to myself for today.

It amazes me that I can have a child come up to me asking for a drink of water and one look at the child tells me that what the child really needs is a pot to vomit in even though the child has been fine all day. I gave Patch both the water and the pot. Within ten minutes my instinct was proved correct. I’ve learned to listen to that inner voice which tells me these things. I can know that Gleek needs a quiet time, that Link needs to go to bed early, that Kiki’s emotional upset will be greatly alleviated by eating, that the neighbor’s child really needs to go potty now. This instinct is slowly gained over years of experience with children and my kids in particular. I know I did not start this parenting adventure with that instinctive voice. I was constantly stressed and mystified about whether something was a normal stage or cause for panic. Unfortunately for new-mom Sandra, the mother’s instinct can’t be learned from reading books. Instead I had to rely on the instinct of friends with more (or at lease different) experience than me. Today I am glad for knowledge born of accumulated experience, because I only had a pot to wash instead of a floor to mop.

Today was field day at my kid’s school. This is the day that all the students are herded by harried teachers through a series of outdoor games and activities until they are sunburned, sweaty, and tired. Then they pause for lunch where the PTA obligingly sells various forms of colored and flavored sugar, which the children then ingest or apply in a sticky layer all over themselves. I did not send any money with my kids, but somehow they acquired piles of sugar anyway. I suspect charitable friends with too much money to spend. Thus the kids come home wired and tired, but having had a marvelous time. Many years I’ve been present at the school for most of the events. This year I had work to do, so Patch and I stayed home. This had the advantage that Patch was not cranky and tired the way that Gleek was. This afternoon Gleek had the attention span of a fruit fly, the stubbornness of a goat, and the cooperativeness of a cat.

Usually I just let the kids crash and have a slow afternoon on field day. This year that wasn’t an option, since this evening featured both Patch’s preschool graduation and Link’s cub scout boat race. Gleek was marvelously well behaved for the graduation. This is probably because the graduation was mostly a musical program performed by the kids. Gleek loves music. Also the graduation was outdoors and she found a pile of seed pods to carefully pick apart. The program went well. The little kids all sang loud and did motions to a variety of cutesy kid songs such as “In the good old summer time,” “You are my sunshine,” and “Daisy.” Well, most of the kids sang loud. Patch did not sing at all. I was prepared for this since weeks ago he was complaining to me about singing practice and how he didn’t sing the words, but just did all the motions. I suspect he would have been more enthusiastic about the whole idea of singing if there had been a cool pirate or space ship song in there. Ah well. It was still adorable and I took the requisite number of pictures. Then there were treats.

We dashed straight from the graduation to see Link’s boat race. His boat did well, winning about half of its races. Link had a great time, Patch got to watch a movie, and Gleek ran in laps around the building. I had hopes that she was burning off the last of the sugar, but then they handed out Popsicles as a post-race treat. Is it any wonder that Americans tend to be over weight, when even our healthy events feature a large sprinkling of sugar?

The last event was a quick drive down to dragon’s keep to deliver Howard’s asthma inhaler to him. He’d had an allergy attack. Gleek and Patch went on that trip. Amazingly it did not feature any extra treat food. We returned home and it was late. We still have school tomorrow. I gave them each a single cookie as a bedtime snack. This is probably awful of me considering the amount of treat food they’d eaten today. At least these cookies had some flour, butter, and egg in them along with the sugar. It was probably one of the healthier things they’d eaten during the day. Then I tumbled them all into pajamas and into bed. I’m too tired to bathe them tonight. Tomorrow we’ll see what we can do to remove the caked-on layers of sunscreen, sweaty, sticky, dirty, and tangled. For now I look at my grubby children in their beds and know that for them today was the Best! Day! Ever!

Right at this moment Link is working to paint his model boat. This boat will be used tomorrow for the cub scout “rain gutter regatta.” These are races where the boys propel their little sailboats by blowing on them. At first Link was not excited to make a boat. “I always lose!” He wailed. This is true. Both his rocket ship and his pinewood derby car performed poorly against the work of other boys. This is because I did not have the knowledge to help him make a good model and Howard did not have the time. Link has warmed up to this boat project. He did extra sanding in hopes of making his boat go faster. Now he his happily applying layers of paint. In a few minutes I need to go down and have a conversation with him in which I emphasize how much fun he is having making his boat. Hopefully I can help him focus on the process rather than the results. Tomorrow is the race. I’d love for him to do well, but I’m prepared for the opposite.

After the boat is all painted, Link will be heading to bed. Tonight painting supplants his normal reading time. Usually he reads in bed for 30 minutes or more. This reading is a recent development which delights me. After years of arguing with him about reading, we’ve finally found books where he pleads to read just a little bit more. Unfortunately these books are manga titles, which are not readily available from our local libraries. The junior high school has a small selection, but Kiki has already brought all of those home. I wish there was a Netflix for manga titles. As it is, we just need to buy books as the books and the funds become available through either amazon.com or the local comic book store. Link loves these books. Looking at a page full of nothing but text is daunting for him. The manga offer complex vocabulary and storylines that are visually tempered by images. So far he’s collected the first of a Pokemon series and the first two Full Metal Alchemist books. Kiki has focused her attention on Fruits Basket. I’m eyeing the Naruto series, but the kids have seen all the TV episodes already, so I’m not sure I’ll invest in those. Any other suggestions for Manga appropriate to kids would be appreciated. (The kids prefer manga that reads backward. It makes the books cooler.) I can tell I’m going to need to clear some shelf space to house this particular enthusiasm.