The First 28 Minutes of My Day

13 Snippets from my morning:

7:00 am - (It is a non-Shred work-out day because I plan to run later in the morning with the jogging stroller.) I wake-up to the sounds of feet pounding down the stairs. I hear my 2 year old telling my husband who is already in the kitchen, "There's dirt in my bed! Somebody need get dirt out!" I instantly know it is not "dirt" in the toddler's bed, but likely poop from an overflowing diaper. Pull covers up to my chin. Do I have to get up?

7:03 am - Realize no other mom is showing up today, so I must do the job. I get up, put on running clothes and begin working on packing 6 year old's lunchbox with all his favorite things, just like the day before

7:10 am - Husband tells me, "He didn't eat any of his lunch yesterday. I unpacked it all last night and just some of the bread was eaten, nothing else."

7:13 am - I'm feeling the joy of packing a lunch that may return to me uneaten. Instead of writing, "Have a SUPER day. Love, Mom" on the napkin for the lunchbox, I write, "EAT YOUR LUNCH! Love, Mom"

7:14 am - Pour myself some cereal and coffee and head into dining room where my 3 children and husband are already happily eating breakfast.

7:15 am - Am OVERWHELMED by the smell of poop! And amazed that everyone is eating and nobody seems at all bothered by the smell! "Does Toddler have a dirty diaper?" I ask (Toddler still wears a diaper for sleeping). "Don't you smell that?!!"

7:16 am - Husband does not, in fact, smell that, but does manage to lean over to check the diaper status of the toddler sitting next to him. "He's not wearing a diaper!"

7:17 am - The realization hits. Toddler got his bath early last night and was put in jammies without a diaper since he'd still be awake for a while. Then when we put him to bed we didn't think to put the diaper on since he usually gets the diaper with the jammies. Suddenly the "dirt" in his bed makes perfect sense to me. My husband still doesn't get it. "Yeah, I didn't know what he meant about the 'dirt'"

7:18 am - Because I have already poured the milk on my cereal and not had even one swallow of coffee, I opt to try to finish a few bites of breakfast before dealing with the situation.

7:19 am - Toddler is done eating, gets out of his chair, and comes over to me. Toddler wants to sit on my lap! Smell is overwhelming! Breakfast is over!

7:21 am - Toddler gets hosed off in the bathtub.

7:25 am - I head into Toddler's room in total fear of what I'll find.

7:28 am - Thankfully not too bad, as poop hunts go anyway (yes, having 3 children it is not my 1st experience with such things). Fairly easily cleaned up, all the while explaining to my 4 year old daughter why there was poop on the floor. Sheets and jammies in the washer on hot with the color-safe bleach. Bathtub needs a bleach treatment, too!

What can I say? It's a glamorous job!


Find more Thankful Thursday & Thursday Thirteen