Welcome to the Jungle

Or insane asylum, perhaps, would be more accurate. Things around here are just...loud. Messy. Chaotic. Prime fodder for a case study on just what drives a stay-at-home-mom to literally tear her hair out, drink a box of wine in one sitting, and pass out into peaceful oblivion.

I can't even put a finger on what exactly the chaos is made up of. Squealing. Screaming. "Ay-yi-yi-ing" (yes, Nora's still channeling Bob Marley. Well, him and Chewbacca. She does a mean impression when she gets going). Endless claims of "It's mine!". Constant admonishments from Tate that I must stop requesting for him to do things since he will, in fact, NOT do what I ask him to, because as we all know, he is extremely busy doing one of the actions mentioned above.

It's just been one of those days. You know the one. Where you're trying to obtain some semblance of tidiness in your kitchen while your baby girl is pulling a mummified Skittle covered in dog hair out from under the fridge and trying to eat it and your two year old son is running around half naked with blue Sharpie all over his face, pausing only in his careening in circles to pull his sister's hair everytime he passes, resulting in more screaming and ay-yi-yi-ing and desperate clinging to your legs trying to escape the whirling cloud of sassiness who at the moment is pulling every plastic cup he can find out of the drawer and you wondering why you have that stupid stupid song from FreeCreditReport.com in your head and wishing desperately it would just go away since you don't really CARE about the stupid guy serving chowder and ice tea and all you want to do is sit but you know that you can't just quite yet and....ARGH.

Then you look at the clock and realize that it's almost that magical hour known as bedtime. The end is near. Then you look at the windowsill above the sink where you keep the kids' medicine and remember that you're out of infant Tylenol. Normally, not a big deal. Today, when you have a teething infant with a temp of 102, BIG DEAL. But no way in hell will you be driving to the store to get some. Not tonight. Not by yourself. You let your eyes dart fleetingly to the liquor cabinet but decide that ultimately you just don't feel that comfortable rubbing Malibu or Butterscotch Schnapps over your daughter's gums to try and grant her some relief. You settle for the Orajel. You're heading into the home stretch...getting the baby changed and jammies on and all that jazz. Baby enjoys a little naked time at the end of the day so you let her charge around bare-assed on the floor while you attempt to do maybe a little more cleaning up. Then you look over and see your baby sitting cheerfully in the middle of Lake Urine. Better than sitting atop Mount Poo, yes, but still not something you really quite feel like dealing with right now.

But then finally, you sit in the rocking chair with your baby as you feed her her bottle and watch her eyelids droop and finally close, and you breathe in her smell and listen to her breathe and feel completely, 100% in love with this little human. Then you cuddle on the couch with your two year old son and stroke his hair and feel him burrow in as close to you as he can while you expose him to the awesomeness that is American Idol. And you think, "Yeah, this isn't so bad. I suppose the kids are worth the trouble. Tomorrow will be completely different...calm, Lake Urine-free, quiet..." and you completely ignore your subconcious knocking at the back of your head screaming at you that for the love of GOD, listen to yourself, you're in denial, and you snuggle with your son and you're happy.