Adventures of a SAHD - part 2

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   2nd Day on the job.

DW is looking great as she goes off to work. She's all made-up and mmmmmnice black skirts and  stuff. It's hitting me that I'm the solecaregiver now and that's freaking me out a bit. I'm feeling totally unprepared. 

Today started off well. We had music on by 7:30, breaky porridge finished by 7:45. I changed a few nappies and put the load of nappies on. Then I did the rubbish. Suddenly it was nearing 9:30 and I wanted to keep my promise to the girls that'd we'd go to the library. But guess what I forgot. Groceries! Oh shoot. 

Ok, we start getting into the van and I suddenly understand why busymum takes that baby bag everywhere. My thoughts..in order.."Oh..what if Krissy gets hungry? Damn. Gotta make a bottle. Okay everyone settled? Now I go to make a bottle. ...*footsteps up stairs, rustling in cupboard*... Pull out the bottle...hmmm is this the right one? It looks right. Uh....no. this is the other one. The dishwasher! *soundly of scurring to the dishwasher and creaking as it opens* bottle bottle bottle, where....Ah! got it!. Teat. Where's the teat. Cmon cmon. Teat! found you. Fingers... too big... to reach you at the bottom of the cutlery box....sigh. Gotta pull everything out. Grab the teat, Cmon man, the kids are in the van!! Now what was that formula again? 100 cold, 100 hot and 4 scoops. This teat leaks. And theres no lid... I need an icecream container... and grab the other teat thats got the lid as well, but Krissy doesn't like it. Who cares?? I can use it as a lid!"

As I walk downstairs I suddenly realise that we could be out over morning tea time and the older ones might get hungry. So I grab a biscuit packet. And two muesli bars, one for me and one for the inevitable question "CAN I HAVE ONE DAD???". And two raisin packets. And then I realise that the kids might need a change while we're out. So I grab 2 nappies, four pads, 2 liners, leave the wipes cuz I saw one in the baby bag - which turned out to be almost empty anyway.

By the time I reach the van my arms are full and I do a "stuff and shuffle" bag side step and twirl. So we're ready. Off we go!

I announce that we need to go get groceries then we can go to the library and DD1 says "no, library first." I started hearing the army men calling to me. "No, groceries first then we can go to the library." Thankfully she accepts this and we are all happy.

We get to the supermarket and I slowly realise...that I'm gonna have to leave the kids in the van to get the trolley. So I get DD1 out. I lock the van and we go get the trolley. We come back to the van and put the other two in. Who cares what the trolley safety instructions say?? I gotta get these kids into that store safely and this is how im doing it!   

The first thing we come to is the fruit and veges section. On the list (that busymum did) it says "fruit - anything except apples." So I look around. All i see is veges and apples and more apples. I figure I'm in the wrong section. I move on and come to the teeny-tiny corner that has no apples, but nothing I call fruit. I grab some bananas and beep those and move on. The next thing on the list is potatoes. We go there. I look around. I see lots of potatoes in different size packs and packets. I look around to see if anyones watching and pick up the largest pack.  I say to DD1 she has to move up to the front. She moves to the back...right where I want to put the 10kg pack of potatoes. I put the potatoes down and show her where I mean. I pick them up again and put them in the trolley. I beep the barcode as we swish past.

With a bypassing hello to Andie and mummy_becks (I think...still haven't got the handle on all the handles here,) we carry on the search and hunt, shop and go carting spree, (I almost forgot the shop and go bit.)

Speaking of shop and go, I get to the last thing on the list and start to go the the checkout when I get that sinking feeling. You know the feeling when you realise you've forgotten to scan your items, and your trolley is full? Yeah. That's the sinking feeling I had. So I scan them ...go up to the checkout and ... skip the whole embarrassment of getting my scans wrong and I requested a rescan. So that's cool. We go out to the carpark (dd3 is asleep) and I figured out if I put my left foot through the trolley base, it won't roll away, with all our groceries and kids...

I chuck the stuff in the back, put the kids in and whip out the bikkies and bottle and sit there on the side of my (mummy) van, feeding this kid, feeling like...I dunno...a mummy? When I finished that, I sit in the front seat and scoff some cashews *for energy* (nahahah, you kids aren't getting any...oh allright. here's a few).

By this time, I think it's too late to go to the library (seeing as how dd3 is asleep..oops i mean now awake) but the girls are keen so off we go (scoffing cashews all the way.) We park, do this kind of safety-stay-near-the-van, open the back, grab the stroller, open the stroller in one awkward move, put the girls in, try to close the back, move the stroller, close the back properly, move the stoller to the back of the van so we aren't taking up TWO carparks (luckily no one wanted it anyway,) and we set off to the library. Who knew carparks were so dangerous?!

DD1 pushes the button in the elevator (Cuz "thats what I always do"). I push this two seater stroller around with dd1 walking besides me and I'm thinking..."this is a far cry from my bachelor days." We go to the little kids section and there the girls are happy. So I try a little thing (that I will never ever try again) and tell the checkout lady that I'm going to the scifi section for 1 minute. I go there and I start walking back, when it occurs to me that lots of people use the library and that I've just left my kids back there in the eye of a busy stranger and who knew who type of person uses the library (no offense to any mums I saw there). My pace quickened and I come back around to the little kids section, and with relief see them standing there playing with the bead toys that they were playing with when I left. I resign myself to sitting down...and watching them. No book hunting for me.

DD1 and 2 go playing on stuff "just over there" and I get my eagle eye on. I'm starting to go crosseyed watching dd3 in front of me, dd1 over left and dd2 over the right. I figure some collaboration is in order so I ask dd1 to find some books for herself to read. She runs over to an age range far below her and grabs the first 5 books that she gets her hands on and proudly announces "These are my books". I suggest to her she might like to get something more challenging and indicate to her the books in her reading level. She grabs the first book and says "This one!" I'm like..."do you like the book?" "yes!" she says. "What do you like about it?" I reply. "I don't like anything on it," she says. "Well, put it back then. Get something you like," I smarm.

She finally picks out 4 ("But mum lets me have 6." "Ok go pick two more") and she brings them back to me. I ask her to put them in the stroller, and she goes OK and takes two books. And I wait... for 10 minutes. Finally I scoop dd3 up and go hunt for my dd1 whos supposed to be putting the books in the stroller. She's been waylaid by a (sameage) boy who wont stop talking to her and she's fascinated. I attempt to get her attention, go get the books, direct her to put the books into the stroller and find out she can't anyway. I show her how.

I stick all 12 books into the stroller and we go to the checkout desk. The nice lady (thank you God for nice ladies) talks to my girls and gives them a stamp on their hands. Theyr happy and that makes me happy! I'm wondering why on earth I took my jersey into the library cuz now I'm hot and have no where to put it. I continue pushing the increasingly heavy stroller, and we do the elevator thing again ("and I push the button cuz I always do that") and we go to the blue teen room in my hopes of getting some comics since I'm a SAHD now and have heaps of time for my own hobbies (haha...not).

We push the freaking heavy stroller back to the car, load up and drive on home. We try to visit a friend who supplies some nappy pads so we can buy some more, but I got lost...I'm sorry ...INVESTIGATED AN ALTERNATIVE DRIVING ROUTE. I ask dd1 where this ladies place is and she says "16"! I'm like..."are you sure?" cuz it don't look like i remember. I come to the conclusion that it would be better for me to drive home and contact the lady ...later.

We go home. I do lunch (at 12:30ish...i don't know..by this time I'm losing track) as quickly as possible and put the girls to sleep. dd1 stays up to play monopoly. I'm just about to go downstairs for a siesta, when I realise I've forgotten about dinner. Oh 5#17! I walk(run) to the freezer and look around...mince...sausages..ahhh what have we here? Bless you Teresa for making double dinners and storing one. With dinner done, I feel I have to sleep before I crash.

At 1:45ish I close my eyes. I dream of Wolverine(Xmen) and blood and guts. It's a beautiful sleep.  

...

I open my eyes to the sound of Krissy crying. I roll over and I've not been asleep for 40 minutes. I sigh. I stand up and get Krissy. I think the wind disturbed her. She seems ok so I take into the study to start writing this post. It's now 2.43pm, DD1 is fast asleep on the lounge couch (after adamantly telling me that shes going to play monopoly). DD2 is asleep, DD3 is awake and fussing and I have no idea what for. I first thought morning tea but it seems too early for that. 

On second thought I probably didnt give her enough lunch...which after a 15 minutes interlude seems to be the case. She had the left over formula from her bottle from this arvo. She was happy. I gave her a slipper while I tried to write this. That didn't last long. She's trying to tell me something. I know thats the case cuz she's eyeballing me - making her particular "I want something but aint gonna tell you what" noises. 

Now that I've properly woken up, my brain has started telling me that I need to work on some of the jobs that I just dropped. I think there's a whole pile of washing that needs to come in. And out. And folded. And away. And the groceries are watching me. I think some of them have thawed. The dishes are yelling at me to "clean me! clean me!" The table is grumping about the weight on it's shoulders. 

...Time passes

It gets to 3:45...Busymum comes home. Right. Time to get the gloves on and do some actual work around here. I chuck the kids at mum and say "I want to finish this (post)" 

Some more time passes (4:30). I see the dishes and stuff and think... Maybe I should do them instead of the post. Gloves on...over the er... gloves already on.

5:10pm - I've put the groceries away, cleared and set the table, brought in and put out the washing, put the nappy pads into the dryer and now I'm wandering around wondering what to do.

Amazing what an extra pair of hands and non-interrupted time can do. 

Oh my Gosh that was a long post!! Look at the time!

This day reminds me of more than a few times when I've said "what have you done all day" to Teresa. I now have a fuller appreciation of what I was actually saying to her... 

Edited by busydad