A typical school night

We had scouts tonight, which meant I raced from the car dealership (where my car was for the third time in eight days) to get my youngest, to McDonald's, to get the Bigs at extended day. They tailgated with their food and then I ushered them quickly through homework and/or bath (younger two). Oldest offered his daily nagging for me to look at his book order and commit to buying him the DS game he reallywants. I told him his timing was bad and that he ought to consider asking me to spend money on things he wants (and doesn't need) sometime when I haven't forked over a day's pay for car repairs.

We walked to the meeting since it was at the elementary school (I am all for squeezing in some extra exercise!). I thank God that my middle son, whose scout meeting it was, was being an exemplary scout (he even wore dress pants instead of his usual athletic pants), because my oldest was griping about the homework he brought and my youngest decided he wanted his lovey after he fell off the cafeteria stool. I said, "well, where is it?" but I knew. It was at home. And yes, I did think of this when we were rushing out the door, but we were late so I decided to risk it. I wound up consoling him for half an hour until it was time for snack, when he made a big deal about getting his own cupcake (they were fabulously decorated like howling wolves), off of which he proceeded to eat the M&M eyes (what a horrible waste, but I didn't want to bat clean up on that). Then he ran around with his brothers and the other scouts while the parents cleaned up. We jogged home with me admonishing the boys about appropriate flashlight manners (i.e., not shining it in oncoming traffic).

Getting them to bed took more than half an hour! I can't even begin to say what went on for all that time. It involved potty, brushing, changing (and hauling the clothes that had only been worn for two hours back out of the hamper), putting laundry away that had been at one time stacked neatly on their beds, organizing and reorganizing their beds, choosing a book (each), a short love treatment (lotion rubbed on their backs) (each), and arguing over the body pillows (we have three, but one of my boys thought he needed two). I couldn't take it anymore at that point and excused myself from their room to let them work it out. The solution: the Bigs are sleeping on the floor in between their two beds.

I took yesterday off for the Columbus Day holiday -- we spent the day at the camp on the lake where the kids are all summer...there was a small festival (for which I had baked over the weekend). I can't seem to actually take a whole day off, though. I wound up checking in a couple of times. It was a good breather for me to be able to write some press releases (for the Christmas anthology I'm in, Christmas Through a Child's Eyes, and also submitting a short (half length) column for the publishing company I write for. They have a column on hand (which I submitted six weeks ago and has not been published), but I think they are constrained for space and I really like this venue, so I am looking for a win-win solution.

Okay, so I just ate a bunch of Keebler cookies and got my second wind and now maybe I can write, or at least think about writing, the church column that is due tomorrow (which will be based on the recent blog post about kids at church).