The Swings at Home Depot

I am planning on having about 20 women over to my house for an RS Girl group. I am totally excited about the party but why does everything have to go wrong just before you need to do something?

We have a cute little pug puppy who has been limping around for the past couple of days. Probably some injury due to the fact that she likes to wrestle with our 80 lb black lab mix. I decided to make an appointment with the vet today. However, I still needed to go to the grocery store to buy all the goodies for the party. I packed up all the kids and headed for two grocery stores- one has great produce and the other has good stock stuff. Anyway, we were rushing around in the grocery stores so we could make it to the vet in time. If I had been by myself, I could have gotten this done in 20 minutes flat. In order to help me, I thought I'd let the older boys push the cart with their little brother in it; they could follow me and I could just grab and run. It turned out that Cade thought it was some kind of racing game and decided to run full speed in the grocery store with his brother in the cart. While Henry was bellowing war cries in the cart, Conor was bitching at both of them, hoping to both make himself look mature and possibly get Cade in trouble (this is a recurring theme in our house). I asked Cade to stop. Not 1 minute later- same thing. I would just like to add here that parents can't speak normally to children. Whatever you say is only effective if you say it 20 times. Anyway, after repeating myself numerous times, we got to the check out counter where some woman gave me a dirty look and rolled her eyes.

Second grocery store: same thing, wash, rinse and repeat. Except, this time Conor, the babbler, is trying to have some kind of conversation with me. I tried to tune him out but its just not possible. Meanwhile, Cade was giving me the "stink eye" because I wouldn't let him push the cart anymore and Henry was whining about not being able to participate in the Von's 500 Race Spectacular. Fried and frazzled, we get home, unload the perishable stuff, get the dog, head to the vet.

When we got to the vet's office the 10lb pug decides to play "quien es muy macho" with any dog who gets close to her. I'd never heard her growl before but it was pretty pathetic. In order to keep the dog calm during the vet visit I decided to leave the boys in the waiting room. They had a great play room with a TV and chalk boards. Sounds good? That should placate them for 15 min. right? I don't think so. I was discussing different options with the vet, one of which included $700 worth of x-rays and multiple diagnostic readings, when I heard screeching and then crying from the waiting room. I say calmly to the vet, "those are mine, give me a minute." The vet laughed- you know, that fake laugh that really says "I'm glad I'm not you." Anyway, I went out to the waiting room to find my 10 year old's head stuck in some kind of box in the play room. I have no idea if it was a left over box from some surgical supplies or what. At this point I'm asking myself if this normal behavior for a 10 year old. The 3 year old is crying because the 12 year old wouldn't let him stand on the chair- go figure. I put the 10 year old in time out, yes folks, time out in the vet's office and go back to the patient room to see how much worse my day can get.

Thank the gawds for naps! We got home and ate a quick lunch. My sweet little 3 year old snuggles up to me and says, "go mommy bed." How cute! I head to the bedroom with Henry and threaten the boys with pain of death should they wake us up. Luckily they were quiet. However, the first thing which occurs the minute we get up is a nice little spat between the 3 year old and the 12 year old in which the oldest tells me his little brother is picking on him. Huh?!? They got into some kind of verbal argument in which I could hear the grating sound of Conor lecturing and Henry's non-discernible babble in retort- remember he's only 3. How do you argue with a 3 year old? At this point, I'm about ready to kill Conor with my bare hands and wondering if I will actually enjoy it. Instead, I decide to go to the Home Depot.

The main light in the kitchen blew out so we replaced it with this really great retro light. Unfortunately, we had to go through the attic to re-wire everything while taking a good chunk of the ceiling out. After we repaired the ceiling, we just needed some paint to match the existing ceiling. Hence, the trip to THE Home Depot. An aside: I don't think you can really refer to Home Depot without the "the" in there. Something about having an awful experience there 99% of the time warrants the infamy. Anyway, I went to the paint counter in which some new guy was there that can't match the paint color. Why? Because he doesn't know what he's doing. He actually said this to me. He didn't know how to put less yellow in the paint color and suggested I wait 30 minutes for the "real" paint guy to get back. Yeah, like I have 30 minutes to kill with 3 hyperactive kids. I smiled and decided I would try to make the best of the situation.

The minute we walked off, all 3 boys starting fighting about who would get to push the cart with Henry in it. I call my husband, begging for mercy. Please come meet me at the Home Depot, I beg. He's on his way. In the meantime, Henry wants to stand up in the cart because sitting down or even sitting in the intended part of the cart is just too boring. So I let him walk with me- so stupid. He started running every direction like some kind of sniper target with the two older boys running after him screeching and hollering at eachother. As I watch this display, I am keenly reminded of the velociraptors in Jurassic Park. I'm done at this point. I notice some swings for sale in the garden section. I sat down on one and started to swing. This is pretty good. Suddenly, I don't really care what they're doing. I'm also wondering if I'm at the begining of some nervous breakdown. My husband finally shows up, looks at me with a questioning, half scared look. The minute he got there the boys were angels. What's up with that? At this point, I don't care. The real paint guy has showed up and technically my shift is over.

Anybody else know this kind of day?