"Train Wreck" kind of moments

I've joked with my sister about my new life and how it will be... I think I've used the words "train wreck" on occasion to describe what I anticipated that it would be like with 4 kids with the oldest being barely 5.

I was pretty spot on with my description. Today, I had a "train wreck" moment for sure.

First of all, it's Tuesday. Tuesday is going to be the hard day for us this fall. I know this because we don't have preschool or gymnastics or anything else scheduled on this day. Anyone with any number of kids knows that a day without much planned generally results in bored children... bored children fight, whine, and tend to be mischievous.

Hmmm... maybe I ought to just make this a weekly blog post called "Train Wreck Tuesdays".

On top of it being a Tuesday, we have painters redoing our back patio doors in our walkout basement as well as our mantle and rock fireplace down there today... they are also staining the front door again. They arrived bright and early this morning (unbeknownst to me) and are currently still here at 5pm. There is sanding and vacuuming and a whole lot of banging going on down there. Our front door has no hardware, therefore my 16 month old is taking every opportunity to escape since it is really easy to do so right now.

It was all fairly uneventful until 1pm (the hardware didn't come off the front door until this afternoon) and I felt like I had a handle on the day. Kanyon was to be going down for a nap... Cohen was sleeping already, Kelan was asleep but stirring and overdue for a feeding, and Scarlett had been to a friend's house for the last 2 hours and was due home at any moment. Suddenly, Cohen wakes up screaming bloody murder after sleeping only 30 minutes (bad, bad news)... so I gave him milk, rocked him, sang to him, and gave him some motrin because we're pretty certain that he's teething again. Nothing worked. He was still screaming bloody murder. I left him to scream because Kelan started crying too. Kanyon refused to go down to his room to nap until Scarlett arrived home... and all this with the loudest sanding tools going to town in my house.

I burst into tears and called Steve. Scarlett arrives home at the same time. She's bawling because she doesn't know who the people are working in the basement (where her bedroom is) and it's really loud. I manage to get her and Kanyon in their rooms for naps and I'm just praying that they somehow are able to sleep. Kelan has worked up to a scream by this time and Cohen is still screaming. I go in one last time to try and get Cohen to lay down (to no avail) before I sit down to feed Kelan.

Someone must have said a prayer for me because about 5 minutes later, Cohen is quiet... I can't see the monitor to know if he's sleeping or just quiet (but I didn't really care in that moment) and the sanding/banging etc. stopped. They must have decided to help this frazzled lady out or get some lunch. Whatever the reasons, I had about 30 minutes of peace... enough time to feed Kelan and pull out some Ben and Jerry's from the freezer while I watched a little Bachelor Pad off my DVR.

I needed that selfish moment because it was over far too quickly. Kanyon came upstairs... pretty sure he never fell asleep and after being insanely loud in the bathroom in my hallway (thanks, bud) - Cohen was up too. I had a paint fume induced headache and Kelan wasn't happy unless he was being held.

Back to the grind.

You wonder how I managed to type this? Well, it's taken a while (read: a couple hours) coming back to it between other things, but currently Kanyon and Scarlett are cleaning their playroom after a threat to take their favorite toys and put it in the DI bin (kind of like the salvation army), Kelan is strapped to me in the sling, and Cohen is watching Elmo. Bless you, Elmo.

Steve... where are you?? Thank goodness he's bringing dinner home.