I Didn't Choose the Mom Life...

I didn't choose the Mom Life, the Mom Life chose me.

Well, let me clarify:
I DID choose to be a mom. In fact, I spent a considerable amount of time, money, and energy trying to convince my eggs to get on board with the plan (which they were none too thrilled to be a part of, let me tell you)

What I did not choose was this lifestyle.

Rest assured, I was not one of those people who claimed that they would continue to travel/work towards career goals/exercise/otherwise continue life as normal despite the birth of a child or two. I wasn't naive enough to believe that the before and after picture would be mostly the same, save for some mussed hair and a trendy baby-wearing gadget.

I was naive enough, however, to believe that women who spent their days being their kids' personal assistant had somehow made a deliberate choice to live that way. I truly believed that they had overbooked their kids' lives to compensate for some emotional shortcoming. As if they were throwing themselves and their yoga pants at soccer games and preschool aid duties because they honestly had nothing better to do (besides face their own personal failures or whatever).

Babies: The best way to ignore your failing marriage and crippling debt since...uh...whenever babies and credit cards were invented. Like the 1950s? Yes. Since the 1950s.

So in that sense, I didn't so much choose the mom life as I walked in to it like a a mountaineer blindly walks off a cliff in the middle of a blizzard.

And here I am. Up to my elbows in preschool registration paperwork and physicals and IEP meetings. I have two children in two entirely different schools, each coming with their own class schedules and drop-off times and sign-up sheets and individual days where your children should be dressed in the color yellow because it's "Yellow Day" and IF YOU FORGET TO PUT A YELLOW SHIRT ON YOUR CHILD HE WILL BE ISOLATED AND RIDICULED AND SCARRED FOR LIFE AND HE WILL END UP BEING A SERIAL KILLER (If Dexter has taught us anything. Not that I plan on abandoning my children in a pool of blood but...red paint? Could happen.)

And the birthdays.
My god, the birthdays.

Three kids, three birthdays, three days. Truly, does it not sound like the pitch line of some reality TV show?

Oh, and my mother-in-law's birthday, which is conveniently sandwiched between the twins and the baby, destined to be hastily celebrated in the few moments we can scrape together between the festivities, eating left-over cake on Dora the Explorer plates, gathered under rumpled, sagging streamers, giving the same line year after year: "we didn't buy you a present this year, but what better gift could you receive than grandchildren? ENJOY YOUR STALE CAKE AND BE GRATEFUL FOR THE LITTLE MIRACLES THAT STAND BEFORE YOU."

The poor, poor woman.

So I'm party planning like a Mo Fo. And my inner Martha Stewart is all, "The centerpieces for the kids' party are charmingly home-made. Its obvious that you tried really hard to recreate the minions from Despicable Me" (because she is a passive-aggressive C-word). And suddenly I find myself standing in my living room, surrounded by shreds of ripped-up centerpieces, unable to recall the last 2 hours of my life, wearing rubber gloves and holding a mop and an extra-large jug of bleach.

At which point I realize that I might have overbooked myself, let alone the kids, and maybe attempting to create six intricate centerpieces for a kids party was not the best of ideas.

And then it's Wine O'Clock.
Because PRIORITIES.

Which is proof that this so-called Mom Life will inevitably end in substance abuse and fugue states.
Which I would normally be down for, but someone has to get the kids to and from their individual preschools every day.

In conclusion:
- I might have perhaps misjudged soccer moms a teeny weeny bit. Yet again.
- Having all of my children in the first week of October was not ideal.
- My mother in law is a birthday saint/martyr.
- Centerpieces area bad idea. Always
- Fugue states should  be followed by wine. Always.

Cash, Credit, or Waffles?

Omg, you guys. What a day.

Right now, my expression is pretty much a dead ringer for the right-most Easter chick. Brian looks more like the chick on the far left, only because he's been screaming at managing the kids all evening while I shovel ice-cream into my face and mentally retreat into my happy place.

FYI, my happy place is clean, uncluttered, and doesn't reek of farts. Not even a little. It's like a padded cell that smells like cinnamon buns.
Heaven.

It was one of those days where the high point of my parenting was when I managed a smile and praised one of my children instead of just sort of glazing over. The low point? We don't talk about the low points.

And of course, as is par for course on those days where the kids are hell-bent on making me regret my life choices, we always run out of milk.

GAME OVER.
The boys get about 90% of their calories from milk (the rest being from chicken nuggets and sandbox sand, of course). So without milk, I'm pretty sure they'll start withering away and by lunchtime someone will have called CPS on me.

So off to ShopRite we went, which is a lot harder than it sounds. Just getting my herd out of the car, across the parking lot, and into the store is a feat worthy of some sort of medal (or at least a solid high-five). The closest analogy I can come up with is putting several territorial, poorly socialized Saint Bernards in a canoe and telling you to paddle across a lake with them.

Tricky is an understatement.

And then when we're in the store.
Oye...the comments.

I mean, don't get me wrong. I enjoy a lot of the feedback that I get when I take my three-ring circus on the road. I love when people tell me that my children are beautiful and that I'm so lucky because occasionally (okay, like 99% of the time), I forget that they are and I am. Which is sad but I'm sorry, sometimes that message gets lost while I'm pulling raisins out of their noses.

And I love when people give me a sympathetic look and comment on how tired I must be. Because then I'm all "OMG, how did you know? You are a mind reader. You get me. We are totally connected. We are like soul sisters. Do you babysit? I can pay you in waffles..."

But I often get comments that fall into this third category. I call it the Do You Hear The Words That Are Coming Out Of Your Face?? category. These are the questions that are either two dumb to warrant answers or just so bizarre that I have no answers. For example:

1. Are they twins??
No. I can see how you'd be easily fooled into thinking they are twins, what with the similar features, identical height, and obvious equivalent age. But no, we just had two kids in quick succession and decided not to feed the first one until the other caught up. It sure has saved us a lot of money on groceries! We've already decided not to feed the baby until we get our fourth child!

2. Are they identical??
Depends on how you define identical. I personally define identical as originating from the same egg and therefore looking like carbon copies of each other. But if you define identical as having the same color and texture of hair and a similar wash of jean shorts....then yes. Yes, they are identical. Pay no attention to their faces. It'll only confuse you.

3. Aren't you glad you got your girl??
This could go either way. I could respond, Yes, thank god she was a girl, or we would have had to wrap her in a blanket and abandon her in the woods to be raised by badgers. Or I could say: No. I wanted a boy. I cried for days when I had her. Do you want her? Either way, I bet they'd regret asking.

4. Wow you must be busy. How do you do it??
There is no answer to this one. I want to say Well, get woken up at 6:00 am by children who need to be fed and clothed and played with and changed and supervised and fed again and changed again and entertained and kept safe and changed again and fed again and stimulated and bathed and changed again and fed again and put to sleep, but I'm pretty sure I'd lose them by the third changed again. And on bad days, I want to pour my heart out to them and tell them that I DON'T KNOW HOW I DO IT and I often worry that I'M NOT DOING IT RIGHT and I don't know how on earth I'll find the fortitude to WAKE UP AND DO IT AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN. I want to tell them that I need encouragement and support from them, even though we're strangers. That I'm so tired that I could lean on them and cry, even though we're strangers. That I'm so frazzled, I'd let them help me get the bags in the car and the kids in their seats, even though we're strangers. That, hell, I'd even let them come home with me and cook me dinner, even though we are complete and total strangers.
Of course, if you catch me on a good day and ask me that question, I'll just tell you it's easy and strut myself and my three angelic children back to the car as if we're walking on air. Because those days are so awesome I don't even mind getting asked stupid questions.

You'd think I'd be used to the dumb questions. They started when people, staring at my pregnant belly, found out I was having twins.
Oh, are they natural?
Well, why don't you pour yourself a glass of wine and sit back while I tell you the romantic story of how they were conceived with just me, my husband, my IVF doc, and a surgical staff of about 15.

I do understand, at least on some level, that I'm being persnickety and even...dare I say... a curmudgeon. OBVIOUSLY these people aren't as dumb as their questions would have you believe. After all, they're not walking around with their underwear on over their clothes, so clearly they have an IQ over 70 and therefore must understand the basics of reproduction and child rearing.
I guess I'm just tired and cranky.
Understandably so, after dedicating my life to raising my non-identical twins and the girl baby that I may or may not wish I had.

But a word to the wise. If you're going to ask stupid questions, be prepared for a stupid response. Or better yet, skip the questions alltogether and help that tired mamma get her three screaming banshee children into the van.

(I hear she pays in waffles)