So my mom emailed me...

Okay! My mom sent me an email letting me know how sick and tired everyone is of my hideous bald picture. I get it! I have 6 different posts drafted, but nothing truly "blog-worthy" in my opinion, so I've put off adding anything new and exciting... I've been a little busy. But my mom's email requested new photos of the kids and asked (jokingly) what I do with all my spare time... Hmmmmm.

So I took a quick look at my calendar. It is so ugly, I closed it without even reviewing what is happening tomorrow. I'm sure I'll miss something critical, but I'm actually afraid of my calendar. I don't want to know what is SUPPOSED to happen...inevitiably, only part of it happens or more than what is there happens, and it's really more confusing than helpful. But here's what's happening in my unbelievable life.

After a year and a half on hiatus from any and all extra-curricular activities for children, we decided to add a couple of things back into their schedules this fall. HA! Try adding only a couple of things when there are five kids, plus two adults all wanting something more...

I have NO spare time, no life at all, I do nothing but go from one activity to the next, with each one adding little or no value to MY life. I do laundry load after laundry load, and it continues to multiply while I'm asleep.

My 9th grader is BURIED in work at the private high school. Not sure if it's the school or what, but we hear that even the kids not taking honors classes are having the same problem. She has spent no fewer than 2-3 hours a night in schoolwork, and rarely finishes it all. I don't know how much longer she can continue to stay up til 11 or 12 doing homework and get up at 5:30 to go to school again. She's had to quit the church choir, give up her weekly babysitting job and she's not even going to be able to participate in any extracurricular stuff that the school offers including the service oriented things (which, by the way, she's required to participate in 20 hours of community service each semester.... HUH? Really? When would like her to squeeze that in? I guess she could visit a homeless shelter and cover people with blankets between the hours of 2 AM and 4 AM... YIKES! This is NINTH GRADE!!!). For me, I've had to learn Geometry all over again to help her every night, but I've rehired her math tutor from last year so that should at least free up my evenings again (HA! Keep reading...) It sucks.

We're going camping this weekend, so I've been busy cleaning out our camping bins and making lists of what we need to survive 3 days in the wilderness with 2 teenage daughters, one 9-year-old-pyromaniac, one barely-potty-trained-3-year-old and one take-five-steps-fall-on-his-hiney-one-year-old. I bought a Barbie fishing pole today (WHAT?!), and I'm determined to cut up little worms and hang them on hooks so that she can experience "fishing"... ugh. YUCK! Isn't that the dad's job? Not in our house. In our house, "I hate fishing" means MOM gets to take Barbie and Bait to the quaint little lake by our quaint little campsite and ATTEMPT TO FISH. In the meantime, hubby and I have MADE A LIST of all the things we need to talk about while on the camping trip since we never talk in real life anymore. Usually if I'm talking to him, he's sleeping since he can't stay awake after 10PM, OR I'm sleeping when he's trying to remind me of the groceries I need to get on my way home from tennis practice. Of course, he's having this conversation with a comatose person since it's still dark outside and therefore, God is still sleeping and so am I. Anyway, in addition to our fishing, smore-making, hiking, horseback riding, general cooking and cleaning up, we're going to have some valuable bonding time and quality conversation about what to do with the rest of this year, next year and the following 5 years. At least I won't be doing laundry.

I'm also training hard for the Booby Walk. It's less than 3 weeks away. I walked 6 miles 2 weeks ago, and 8.5 miles last Saturday. It was brutal. I guess that's nothing compared to what walking the 20 miles in one day will be like, but I'm getting there. One mile at a time. I decided to go ahead and buy tickets for my reunion, and if I can still move after 20 miles, hubby and I are going to get dolled up and go for a couple of hours. However, I have to be back in the hotel sleeping by 11 in order to get up and walk the last 10 at 7:00 in the morning on Sunday. Is that even possible for me? To go to the reunion and not drink myself into a 3 day hangover? To go to the reunion for a little bit on Saturday night and actually LEAVE if I'm still having fun? To even be able to get "dolled up" after walking 20 miles? Will I even be able to stand upright and take a shower? I don't know, but I'm betting $170 plus an awesome dress that I will...

My weeks look like this...Monday morning, I drop off SJ at school at 9:15 then go to tennis practice from 9:30-11. Then I'm free for the whole day! WOW! What will I do with all that time? Oh, the grocery shopping for the week, and pick up the dry cleaning, pick up from the preschool at 1:30, oh then I have carpool to the high school which is over 2.5 hours each afternoon. But other than that, Mondays are pretty quiet.

Tuesday... SJ to preschool and home, and high school carpool again. Not too bad really... but this is laundry day...not to say that other days AREN'T laundry days, this is just the day that I ESPECIALLY do laundry because it has grown exponentially over the weekend and on Monday.

Now Wenesday, that is a special treat. No pre-school, but 3 different gynmastics classes at the same place but at 3 different times. Well planned, don't you think. One is 12:45-1:30, then I go do afternoon carpool to the highschool, come home grab another kid, go to the gym from 4:15-5:30, take him home, cook and eat, then take the last one to class from 8-9pm. How about that? Apparently SJ (age 3) is doing VERY well, as "daredevils make great gymnasts" according to her teacher.

Thursdays we do preschool, but both little ones go this day. I hope Gabriel likes it, but I'm not holding my breath. He screams from the time we pull into the church parking lot, through the entire check-in process until exactly 1 minute after we drop him off. It's the strangest thing. I'm sure school will have the same affect. Anyway, I'll drop them off then run to my tennis match. It will probably last until long after time to get them at 1:30, but then I'll still have to leave at 2:30 to do the high school run. Then I'll come home cook, we'll eat (early) so that Geo and Carri can get to Tae Kwon Do at 6:30. L will go to tutoring at 7, and I'll have plenty of time to buzz back out to pickup from Tae Kwon Do. Uh huh... right.

AND starting this week, Geo will be doing cub scouts with his Grandpa. We don't know when that will meet, but that's ok... it's not my problem. Oh, and Gabriel is finally walking. It is very sad. I'm going to have to promote him out of the crawling room at the church nursery. It will be a sad day. It is official...he'll be a toddler. WAHHHHHHH. Don't worry, I don't want to untie my tubes... you saw this schedule, right? I'm going to go an take my ADD drugs so that I can stay awake for the entire day, and then I'll take my anti-anxiety pill that I take well, for obvious reasons. Better living through pharmacology...

I have 5 kids in 4 different schools. You'd think I have all the time in the world. I don't. I do everything, but feel like I do nothing. How did moms do it with 8 or 10 kids?

PS. I just found my fully dressed toddler in the shower with the water running. (I had turned it on so I could jump in the shower after I posted this...) It goes on and on and on and on... Does anyone else dream with Sesame Street characters playing your friends?