The Days Are Long but the Years Are Short

Jackson's teacher emailed me today because Jackson got into trouble for burping his ABC's at lunch. What is it with little boys and body function humor at the table? Sometimes I feel like I am forced to share my meals with tiny versions of Jim Carey. It drives me completely insane. The guys at work assure me ABC burping and armpit farting are perfectly normal little boy activities and no great cause for alarm.

Judging from the teacher's email, I thought Jackson would be stringing a few troublesome days together. It quickly became evident it was Austin's turn. When I rushed from work to after school care, Austin left the building ahead of us. As we opened the front doors of the school, there was Austin, in all his glory, peeing on a tree in the front schoolyard. As a single mom, I certainly did NOT teach him that!

Below is a clip of Austin's soccer performance while he was on the bench. His on the field performance was just as energetic and unproductive.  At the end of the game, I had to race to another field to give Holland something.  When I got back, I realized during the post game lineup, Austin had taken a water gun, filled with his ice cold water, out onto the field and squirted everyone in the lineup instead of shaking hands. Thankfully, the other players appreciated the relief from the heat and were not angry.  Not telling what the parents thought of me.  I wanted to run and hide.

Jackson and Holland both had games immediately following Austin's game. That is always fun, trying to be in two places at once. Jackson played a good game. They do not have a goalie at his age, so he played sweeper and striker and scored 3 of 7 points for the team. The game tied and went into overtime and a PK and we will just pretend I know the ending score. By the time the game was over, I was too tired to pay attention.

Holland had a great game as well.  She played goalie and striker.  One of the parents told me Holland is considered one of the two fastest girls in the league.  Don't know if that is true or not put it sounds impressive. There is one thing for certain, that girl is competitive, aggressive and loves the game.  Her game was also tied and ended in a PK and the team lost.  Here are a few shots of Holland in action.  I had never really considered face protection for soccer goalies until I saw Holland play the position!  It might be a blessing I only saw half of the game.

My day had seemed long up to this point, or so I had thought.  Three soccer games, two going into over time, I was past ready to get home.  I had to stop at the gas station because I had been driving on E since picking them up from school.  I do not know what went wrong.  I heard the pump click and thought it had shut off.  When I grabbed the pump handle, what happened next made me think of a scene from Zoolander, only thankfully I mine was a solo scene.

After dousing myself with gasoline, I got into the car and Holland had a nosebleed. Triaged Holland's nose and proceeded to the drive-through because I realized I needed to shower ASAP and these kids are not going to be able to wait for me to shower first.  Cruising, windows down, trying to pretend everything is just fine and I was not in the least bit freaked out over anything.  Ordered our food and when we drove to the pickup window, Austin jumped up out of his seat, leaned over and sang 'What to do with that big fat butt -wiggle, wiggle, wiggle' to the poor teenage girl working the window. Thankfully Austin is cute and the girl had a sense of humor, even when I had lost mine.

After getting the kids settled to eat, I raced through a quick shower.  Started the washer with all of my gas soaked clothes and suddenly realized the house was quiet.  All the kids had put themselves to bed and had covered themselves up and had fallen asleep.  I did not disturb them, even though they were in their soccer uniforms, because I was ready to put the day behind us.  In the morning, I discovered Holland had even slept in her shin guards and socks. Mom of the year alert!