When the baby is screaming - all morning long - is it better to let the kids cut up newspaper into little teeny tiny pieces all over the kitchen table, and eat cereal in, around, and all over the living room, and pull out all their pillows and blankets to make some kind of indoor campground in the hallway (oh, and pull out all their stuffed animals to join them, too!), and then get out some markers and paper (lots and lots of paper...) for "art time" ("Can I make a copy of this coloring page? What about this one? And can I have some tape? Can you help me with the tape? Why not?")...or to let them watch too much TV? (While I pondered this question, we managed to avoid the TV, but what price my sanity? Still pondering this big philosophical question.)
Does all the bouncing and pacing (and bouncing and pacing...and bouncing...and pacing...) that I've been doing to console the baby count as a workout? Or, even if it does, does periodically downing handfuls of chocolate cancel out any benefits? And exactly how much do I care?
When the baby finally falls asleep, what to do? Should I take a shower and get dressed? Should I clean up the bits of newspaper (or the breakfast things all over the kitchen and living room?). Should I do something about lunch, since the morning is now over? Should I ask the kids to do something that resembles schoolwork? Should I throw in a load of laundry? Dry and fold one? Put one away? Should I do none of the above and just sit in silence with my eyes closed for a minute and hope I don't fall asleep? (Should I now, in this particular quiet moment, be sitting in my pajamas and blogging? Probably not...)
Fortunately, these were yesterday's questions. Today has been a little smoother. Still, this is the extent of my deep thinking these days!
3 comments:
:-) You are an amazing mom, an incredible woman and a person I hope to grow to know more and more :-)
At least you can put the baby down when she falls asleep! There's something to be thankful for, most definitely. Although I don't know if I'd trade that for more crying than I currently have. There's a philosophical question for me.
OH, Anne! I have so been there, albeit not with so many kiddos. Sounds like you have a rather high-need baby ... even though I think you've surely earned a quiet one by now. Much grace to you!
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