Monday, May 23, 2016

Summer Better Shape Up

Our second full weekday of Summer break is coming to a close and I want a refund. I was promised stress free nights turning into lazy, carefree mornings and so far I've had neither.

Tate was so done with school last Thursday he couldn't even make it into the house with his backpack.

Drue, on the other hand, headed straight up to her room to read when she got home. There are a slew of books on her Summer reading list so I don't expect to see her again {other than mealtimes} until mid June. I have set a reminder on my phone not to forget her when we leave for vacation. She's already finished 3 of the books since Thursday. Reese and I get to help her celebrate by watching the movies with her. 

Me settling in on the couch to watch anything past sunset is a joke. I slept through most of the first movie and drifted in and out last night during the second one. Meanwhile, David and Tate headed up to our room to watch TV and fell asleep. 

So KC {who was adopted and returned AGAIN last week!} and I just crashed in the basement. Around 1am I heard little footsteps and the doggie gate on the stairs creak open. 

All sorts of scenarios started spinning on which little family member it was. I'd already narrowed it down to a kid, because when anyone over 100 pounds walks around upstairs, it sounds as though they'll crash through the basement ceiling into your lap at any moment.

Maybe one of the girls was scared, had a deep question they'd been pondering, or were going to tell me they might throw up. Or perhaps I'd be lucky and they'd just be heading to the kitchen for a drink. 

Nope. The footsteps continued down the stairs, the second doggie gate creaked open, and the entire basement was illuminated. Tate appeared at the end of the sofa bed and sweetly asked, "Do you need anything?"

Squinting my eyes from the light, I said, "No buddy, I'm good. Thanks. Wait, are you even awake?"

"Yep," he sleepily replied as he crawled into bed beside me. 

I slipped out between him and KC, hit the lights, then carefully felt my way back into bed. 

I would have had no problem drifting back to dreamland if the ear piercing alarm from our smoke detector hadn't started going off next. You know you're tired when you hear that and just decide to lay there for a minute and sniff the air for smoke. It stopped after a few seconds. As a parent, that's not just something you can easily fall back to sleep after. Too many "what ifs" to keep you awake. 

After the second time the alarm went off, David came downstairs to fiddle with the one in the basement. I mumbled something about Tate coming down earlier and he said, "What? I thought he was sleeping upstairs with me?" By this time Tate was awake again so David asked him how he got downstairs. Tate just rubbed his eyes and said, "I have no idea." 

Great. So not only can he maneuver three sets of stairs and 2 dog gates in his sleep, David had no clue any of it was even happening. Neither situation makes me feel safe. At least Tate remembers his manners in his sleep. 

The alarm went off once or twice more. I decided this fell under my blanket excuse, "I birthed the kids, David can deal with this..." and never left the bed. 

As the sun peeped through the window, I pulled the covers over my head calculating how many more minutes of sleep I could get without coming up for air.

Air.

Dang. It. This was the day the air conditioning company was coming to do a routine check of our system. Their window of time was 8am-12pm. Any other day you know they'd be pulling up at 11:50 but because of my sleepless night and extra frumpy appearance, they'd surely be arriving at 8:01. 

I slithered out of bed to throw on a hat and shut the bedroom doors of all my sleeping offspring. As I entered my room, the smell of 1000 roadkill corpses mixed with dog food burned my nares. The largest pile of dog throw up I've ever enountered greeted me. Of course George's aim was impeccable...right snack dab in the middle of the pile of clean laundry David had shoved off the bed onto the floor the night before. 

Seriously, Summer? Pulling out the big guns right off the bat? Couldn't just let me ease into you and establish a new relaxed routine? 

You're just jealous because Fall has always had my heart. 




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