NOTE TO STEPHANIE NEWTON

First, I want to say, my kids are fine. They're healthy and we've had no wire hanger moments this week.

Second.
Stephanie Newton's blog and her thermometer with the warm spring temps. Once i can get the chains on my tires, I'll be down to talk to you about that little salt in the wound moment.

Third.
i'm procrastinating.

Why? Because I really like sitting and doing nothing. That sounds a lot like being lazy, but I'm PROCRASTINATING! It's a big word and means 'putting stuff off until later.' Uh, yeah, much better than calling myself lazy.

I'm a PROCRASTINATOR.

It sounds like something important, like a gift, or a special skill.

And while I procrastinate, I am thinking about Cowboy book number 5, which is in the works.

WIRE HANGER MOMENTS

I would love to pretend I'm the perfect mom who never loses it, is never responsible, in the least, for the counseling her children will need in twenty years. The truth is, we all have WIRE HANGER moments.

NO, I don't mean we beat our kids with wire hangers. What I mean is, we all have that moment when we're pushed too far. We lose it. Our normally kind, patient, mommyself is lost to BAD MOM WHO HAS PMS, RUN FOR COVER....
It starts with: "Mom, come here, I need..MOM, where are you, Mom, I said.." or "Mom, he won't let me..."

Remember the scene in MOMMY DEAREST when Joan Crawford goes into the kid's room in the middle of the night and she finds....WIRE HANGERS.
OH NO, not wire hangers.

She loses it and yells, NO WIRE HANGERS. I don't think I enjoyed that line as much until I saw it again in Diary of a Mad Black Woman. Tyler Perry is a genius. Oh, sorry, sidetracked.
The point is, it wasn't the wire hangers that made Joan lose it. She'd already lost it at that point. The wire hangers were the 'last straw.'

My children sometimes push me to 'wire hanger' moments.

If someone tries to convince you they never have wire hanger moments, well, I don't know what to tell you. I can only tell you this, I'm a good mom, a good Christian, and I have wire hanger moments. That's reality and I think that we should be honest with one another. If we hide behind a mask of perfection, saying that we're perfect, our children are perfect, our marriages are perfect, then some young mother out there is having wire hanger moments alone and worrying that there's something wrong with her, that she's the only one losing it from time to time.

Oh, look, one of my little offspring has sneaked out of her hiding place with a note to tell me she loves me.
NO WIRE HANGERS!!!

STOP THE INSANITY

I moved three weeks ago and since I've moved, I've heard the same question every day, "Are you unpacked yet?"
For the record, the answer is NO. Every room of my house is full of boxes. The kitchen is the only room that I've unpacked, and it's a mess. The good thing is, I can use the excuse of, 'just moving in' for that mess.
Why haven't I unpacked.
Reason ONE: Procrastination.
Reason TWO: Children.
REASON THREE: LIFE.
procrastination. The obvious is that I love coffee and I'd rather drink coffee with my back to the mess than face it and unpack.

Children. Here's an example of a typical day: Kid 1 goes to work, has to be picked up seven hours later. Dogs have to be walked at least 4 times during the day. Dishes need to be done, laundry has to be washed. Drive fifteen miles, pick up Kid 1. Drive back. Kid 3 has to be picked up from tutoring. Kid 2 has to be picked up from practice. Off to ballet, go to the grocery store. "Mom, I don't have clean socks." Buy new socks. "Mom, what's for dinner." Order pizza. "Honey, I need deoderant." Go to the store, buy more socks, buy deoderant.
Go home, do laundry, clean kitchen, take dogs out again.
OH, wow, I have a deadline. This book has to be finished in a week.
zzzzzzzzzzzz
the end.
And no, I haven't finished unpacking. As long as I haven't unpacked, I have a reason for the house looking like this. And I'm not going to show you a picture.