It's official. I'm exhausted. Have you ever noticed that sometimes the stars allign in just the right way, pointing to one day on which all events will happen? Perhaps you are all just better planners than I am, but some days just seem to be heaped. This particular day only had two major events, but being bookended by two birthday parties is perhaps adding to the feeling. You may remember that I taught RAP a lot of sign language as a babe, and we used the video series "Signing Time" to help out. The "signing time lady, " a.k.a. Rachel Coleman, is much loved at our house, and I found out that she would be performing today at Hogle Zoo. I faithfully put it in our calendar several weeks ago and we've been looking forward to it ever since. In the meantime, my good friend Emily, mother of three beautiful boys, wanted to celebrate the end of summer with some big outing days and invited us along. I love being invited along! This afternoon was the only day and time that worked for us to spend some hours together at Discovery Gateway, the children's museum in the Gateway shopping center. So the day went like this:
1. Hurry and wake up the kids, get dressed, shove food in their faces and drive to the zoo, just in time to wait in line for 40 minutes to see the Signing Time show. (Pictured is the line stretching behind us another 200 or so people. Wow!)
2. Enjoy the show but leave early to get CTP to school on time, stopping along the way for fast food to get something in his tummy. I did, just so you know, bring an apple and a granola bar, both of which were rejected. (I must attempt to appear like a responsible mother.)
3. Drop CTP off at school (only 7 minutes late - pretty good!) and then do errands quickly before RAP fell asleep.
4. Come home, get stuff done as fast as I could for two hours before waking up RAP to go get CTP.
5. Hurry home, stuff more food in my kids' faces, and head off to the museum, where we then spent almost four hours playing and having a total ball.
6. Come home and crash. Of course, RAP had a nap, so she was up until midnight.
Sometimes, after slapping myself, I wonder why I do it. We did manage to carry out the day without too many incidents, but it's really asking so much of my kids to survive (and behave well) on a day like this. When I think about it, though, I wouldn't have skipped any of it. The Signing Time show was really fun - R and C were so thrilled to see Rachel and the kids from the show. And we haven't had so much fun at the children's museum for months. So is it worth it? I think probably, in the long run, the kids will remember the things we got out to see and do, and hopefully won't remember feeling super rushed or exhausted by it. Even showing RAP the pictures this evening from the day's events she was all excited again. So, though I feel pretty wiped out, and I hope to keep our schedule a little more evenly spread, I think it was worth it.
1. Hurry and wake up the kids, get dressed, shove food in their faces and drive to the zoo, just in time to wait in line for 40 minutes to see the Signing Time show. (Pictured is the line stretching behind us another 200 or so people. Wow!)2. Enjoy the show but leave early to get CTP to school on time, stopping along the way for fast food to get something in his tummy. I did, just so you know, bring an apple and a granola bar, both of which were rejected. (I must attempt to appear like a responsible mother.)
3. Drop CTP off at school (only 7 minutes late - pretty good!) and then do errands quickly before RAP fell asleep.
4. Come home, get stuff done as fast as I could for two hours before waking up RAP to go get CTP.
5. Hurry home, stuff more food in my kids' faces, and head off to the museum, where we then spent almost four hours playing and having a total ball.
6. Come home and crash. Of course, RAP had a nap, so she was up until midnight.
Sometimes, after slapping myself, I wonder why I do it. We did manage to carry out the day without too many incidents, but it's really asking so much of my kids to survive (and behave well) on a day like this. When I think about it, though, I wouldn't have skipped any of it. The Signing Time show was really fun - R and C were so thrilled to see Rachel and the kids from the show. And we haven't had so much fun at the children's museum for months. So is it worth it? I think probably, in the long run, the kids will remember the things we got out to see and do, and hopefully won't remember feeling super rushed or exhausted by it. Even showing RAP the pictures this evening from the day's events she was all excited again. So, though I feel pretty wiped out, and I hope to keep our schedule a little more evenly spread, I think it was worth it.
Here's CTP, who found a long-lost friend from his preschool class, last year. I loved watching them running around holding hands.
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