An "Off" Day

I think we all have them (at least, for my own comfort, I hope we all do!) - days in which you reach 4:oo in the afternoon and suddenly wonder what's been going on all day, because you haven't done anything you had intended to do. It happened to me yesterday, as I had planned on a certain amount of schoolwork getting done, even allowing for the large chunk of time I knew we had to carve out for some errands, and yet when I glanced at the clock at the fateful hour, I experienced that familiar surge of panic. Yikes! We hadn't done the all-important math lessons, or polished away any grammar (just trying to get the books done at this point), or gotten anywhere on cleaning the house (although it seemed like I had been doing ALOT of that all day - but that's another matter altogether).

So I tried to rectify the situation by pulling out the grammar books, and I tried to dive into a quick lesson, but I couldn't get anyone's attention. And no wonder. Aimee was in her room reading (no surprise), and Drew was sitting on the couch quietly reading to himself from a book of fairy tales. Drew was sitting. Sitting still. Quietly. Reading. To himself. I have lost a number of brain cells over the past few years to motherhood, so I'm sorry to say it took me a little longer than perhaps it should to realize the significance of this, and to BACK OFF. But eventually I did put the grammar book down (without have had done any damage, as he hadn't even looked up at me once), and I walked away to do some more sweeping and to think over our day in a different light.

There are indeed days here and there that are lost to Wii play or (or perhaps "and" - depending on how badly the day is going!) TV time. There are days in which our time is frittered away, and nothing is left of it that we can honestly call "school" for the sake of that yellow attendance chart on my refrigerator, or even, more importantly, for the simple sake of the nurturing of my children's young minds. In short, sometimes we just do waste time, and have to write those days off. But most of the time, those days we call "off" days, with the 4:00 realization, aren't really failures at all. Which kind of day was yesterday? We woke up a little on the later side, granted, and the kids watched some TV after breakfast while I took a shower. But then the boys went outside while I got dressed and tried to straighten up a little, and when I went out to check on them, all three were in the tree fort (I've long given up on keeping Chase out of it, and he can nimbly climb in and out of it like the little monkey that he nearly is), which had become a ship, named "The Beauty", as its proud captain informed me. Some repairs were being done on the ship by all hands, so I decided to leave this magical moment alone. Aimee at this time was in her room playing with her new kitten and reading, so there was no lack of mental stimulation and imagination in that quarter, either. It did take me a frightfully long time to "get ready" (readiness being this elusive state of being that often takes me all day and is sometimes is never acheived), but at last, at about 11:00, we piled into the car to run our errands. We stopped at the grocery store, then the pet store for some supplies, and then ended up at the library just before it rained "buckets" ("It's going to rain buckets?" Ryan had echoed with concern and confusion when I had earlier made this prediction . I explained, and later in the library, after the rain began, he came up to me and exclaimed with great amusment, "Look! The bucket rain started!") We had brought along a picnic, because at first our plans had included meeting some friends at the park, but owing the impending rain, we all shoved down some peanut butter-and-jelly sandwhiches somewhere along the way, and Chase was still working on his right up until the entrance of the library. Because the park idea had to be abandoned, our friends decided to meet us at the library instead, and when they arrived, the older kids darted away into the back of the juvenile fiction shelves (only needing occasional reminders not to wrestle or run in the library) and the younger ones played with puzzles while the two of us moms sat and talked. When we arrived home later, we were armed with loads of books, which the kids immediately bean to devour. We had some about the Alamo in the mix, and even Ryan insisted that Drew show him a picture of Davy Crockett, who has become a favorite hero here (and whose sad but brave end is always mentioned with reverence. "I'll be Davy Crockett!" A pause, then in somber tones, "He died in the Alamo, you know.") Both Aimee and Drew also read with interest "Multiplying Menace," a math book that I haven't read myself, but it seemed to be engrossing. I made chocolate chip cookies while they perused the books and took turns, admittedly, playing on the Wii (but not for very long), and after the first couple batches were out, the boys had milk and cookies while I read aloud a chapter of the unabridged Peter Pan. Aimee excused herself, because she had already read the book, and she informed me recently that "she's too old to be read aloud to," anyway. I'll address that later, I guess.

After this broke up, the boys went and played in the light rain, and it was shortly after this that Drew came back in and settled down to read the fairy tale book, etc, etc. So it was at this point that I felt badly about not having down much of anything, then realized that perhaps we had done quite a bit after all. Sometimes it's one step forward, then two steps backwards, though, and I was a little...hmm...frustrated during the dinner process. I was trying to clean up dinner, rather miserably, while the kids were playing outside without me, when I realized I could seize the moment and do the dishes later. I went outside with the kids and we played a rousing game of "Texas Rangers, "during which I realized that all my children are faster than I am, at least over the uncertain terrain of the backyard. Of course the dishes were still there when I came back inside, and so was all the other mess, and I did have another "moment", when it was 9:00, and no one was dressed for bed, the bedrooms weren't clean enough to sleep in, the kitchen still needed a little work, and - the last straw - Chase was hitting his brothers with a vacuum cleaner attachement. It was at this point that we piled in the car again, most people shoeless, and one in only boxers, for A DRIVE. Along our outing, we passed a Sonic, and Aimee pointed out that they now have Snickers Blasts. What's better for stress relief than ice cream at 9:30? We pulled and got deliciously sticky with eating ice cream in the car (I splurged on the Blast, but the kids were content with vanilla cones), finally pulling back into our driveway at about 10:00. The mess was still there, but we were in better frames of mind, and I got everyone into bed at last.

So - a wasted day to be forgotten, and perhaps to be made up so that I can check a box on the yellow chart? Or a completely worthwhile day, both for the chart and for our general well-being? I believe, ice cream aside, it was the latter - and maybe even the ice cream adventure was worth something, after all.