Mom's Day Off

Monday I had the day off from work and so did the brothers. It doesn’t really matter to the baby because he goes with me to work everyday. Home, work, wherever as long as he’s with mommy he probably thinks it’s a day off.

It started out great, the baby was up on and off throughout the night but I wasn’t required to actually get out of bed until almost ten. I was so grateful and happy. The plan for the day was get to the mall so I could finally buy myself new sneakers. I’ve been stuck between seasons, switching between a pair of sandals and boots. The other goal was to get pumpkins for the kids. Well, the baby wasn’t having the whole put him down so I could shower thing. After two hours of coaxing, I successfully was showered and we were leaving for Massena. I was so excited to have a stroller at the mall. Up to this point I’ve been carrying him in a wrap on outings and to be honest he’s getting too heavy for me. So yeah, mommy was excited to bust out the new stroller and stroll through the mall. Big brother and little brother got haircuts before I went looking for shoes. It was a total bust. Nothing I liked was available in my size. But the brothers found shoes they ‘needed’. Big Brother came running up to me with a pair that looked like the pair he already had for school in his hand and said, “Mom I need outdoors! Can I get these?” My reply was, “Oh ok then.” Then I turned around and Little Brother is running up to me with a box of shoes in his hands and said, “Mommy, Mommy I need indoors for school!”

So I bought them each a pair. I continued to check a few other stores but no luck. I threw in the towel and took the kids to the arcade. They spent their entire allowances there. But were they ever happy. The baby was good there too, must have been all the lights and sounds. Next stop was BJ’s for supplies. We browsed all their Halloween things before getting what we went in for. That’s when it happened. Little Brother was trying to tell me something. I just couldn’t get it though. We haven’t had a problem with me understanding what he tells me in a long time. I kept guessing and guessing wrong. With each wrong guess on my part he got more frustrated until his eyes got tears and he slumped to the floor. It was so sad. It was heartbreaking. So there we were in the aisle, him sobbing, me starting to cry because I couldn’t ‘get it’ and the baby crying in the stroller because it had stopped moving. Then I had to tell him to rewind what he was trying to tell me. What does it sound like? Look like? He was asking me to count by tens but it sounded like he said don’t buy guns. We wiped our tears and got going with a sigh and a big bear hug. I drove us over to Aldi’s for some snacks. We were about to check out when Little Brother announced he had to use the bathroom. I figured the store was about to close and I was right outside the bathroom doors so I took a chance and let him go alone. A few minutes later he came back out with a big smile on his face. That’s when he told me, “Mommy I dropped my money on the floor and my hands got all wet!” Horror is what I felt. Then panic. I asked, “Did you wash your hands?” after seeing they were still wet… It was pee! Someone peed on the bathroom floor and then my son dropped his three quarters in it! Oh my god! If motherhood had a defcon five this was it. We burst into the bathroom where I scrubbed and washed his hands four times. The money? That went in the garbage after. We got to the checkout and as I was about to pay it seemed that I left my wallet in the car. I was just about to take the kids to the car to get it when I spotted it had fallen under the baby’s car seat. Whew! After everyone was in the car and seat belts on I took a deep breath. A supposed to be easy trip to Massena turned into a manic Monday. I put the car into drive and that’s when we heard it. The baby was putting in work. I put the car back in park and got out. It was nice enough out so I thought I’ll just change the baby in the car instead of lugging all the kids back into the store with me. But it wasn’t going to be so simple. The baby had pooped all the way up to his neck. As he smiled up at me with a “Isn’t it great mom” look I realized I left the baby wipes at the last place I changed him. I did have to lug them all into the store so I could MacGyver some baby wipes out of paper towels and water. How could this happen? He’s the third baby and I never forgot the others’ wipes anywhere, like ever! So that was the beginning of this mom’s day off!