Why to do lists never work.

I promise I will get Lucy's Nutcracker dance up here in the next day or two. I just have to download it off our camera. With that said, consider this my official warning that the following post will be long and picture-less, but you might thank me for the picture-less part later.

December 15, 2010

Time 8:00am- My day has been going pretty smoothly thus far. I woke up at 7, picked up Henry (the little boy I babysit), came home and made Shawn a lunch and sent him out the door for work. Kids woke up, fed them breakfast and they all ate incredibly healthy and large breakfasts. I also unloaded the dishwasher and began the task of tackling the kitchen which was left in shambles after yesterday, a day of baking 150 cookies and feeding the missionaries. So far I'm feel pretty good about my accomplishments for the day.

8:45am- I sit down at my desk and write my to do list for the day, today will for sure be the first day in more than a month that I am really going to accomplish everything on my list, I can just feel it. Jack comes down and asks me to hold him. He is acting so sweet and asking me questions like "Where daddy go?" with his inquiring squinting eyes and wrinkled nose, he's very concerned about this you see. I answer "Daddy is at work" (for the 100th time this morning), and Jack says "Ok." Then he starts asking for a bubble bath. I just bathed him yesterday, so I put it off and tell him we'll take a bubble bath tonight. He keeps asking, and asking, and asking. Then he lets out a little cough, just a little one, nothing I'm concerned about. Only what happened as a result of this cough? 1 solid minute of none stop puking. Where? All over me.

The incredible velocity of the first eruption was focused directly at my chest. As I sat there in shock feeling the wonderful sensation of vomit rolling down my body and soaking through my clothes, I sat there helplessly stunned, like a deer in headlights, holding Jack on my lap facing me as the after shocks came. I literally just sat there looking at him, watching. He probably threw up all over me 5 or 6 times, and after each one I thought to myself. "He has to be done now. Ok, the next one will just be a dry heave, he can't have anything else in there." Every time I was wrong. I have never seen anyone throw up this much, child or adult. You better believe I was regretting that large and healthy breakfast this morning as it was being hurled towards my face. I'll skip the details of the consistency of the vomit, just use your imaginations. I just sat there in shock watching as he kept adding to his masterpiece. He didn't really cry or act miserable, he just kept puking, like a man on a mission.

Once the chucking stopped, both Jack and I were covered, I MEAN COVERED in his breakfast, and neither one of us knew what to do about it. I sat there in my chair for more than a full 2 minutes just looking around and asking myself, where do I start? The first thing I wished was that Shawn was still working from home. How am I suppose to shower to get this out of my hair and ear? Shawn is always the one that handles the throw up. He dives in before my mind can even register what is going on. I think he is always trying to break his last record or something, he NEVER hesitates. Me, I hesitate, and I did at least 5 minutes of it before I decided to pull Jack off my lap and stand him up in the puddle of vomit at my feet and strip him down.

Once I got Jack striped to his diaper I told Lucy and Henry to go up in her room and close the door and not to come out until I told them they could. Once they were safely tucked away, I stood up in the puddle myself and tried to decide how I was going to go about taking off my puke soaked clothes. I already knew I had to take them off there because I was not going to walk around the house dripping and plopping as I go. My pants were easy, but when I went to take off my shirt I discovered that there was no way I could take it over my head without smearing large amounts on my face. See I had just as much puke in puddles and piles on the inside of my shirt as on the outside. Unfortunately going over my head was my only option since I can't exactly slide anything over my belly these days. It was awful, just awful. I don't like to think about it. Then I picked up Jack and he and I marched up the stairs in our unmentionables and he got the bubble bath that he had been begging for only minutes ago. I took a shower and scrubbed every crevice I could using a loofa, q-tips, cotton balls, and of course soap, lots of it.

After cleaning and redressing myself and Jack, I tackled the puddle on the floor and spent a good 20 minutes rinsing our clothes before putting them in a sanitation round in the washer. I will say I was grateful for a few things at this point. 1- My hard wood floors. 2- My very obedient 4 year old who kinda ran the show while I was in the shower. And 3- That I wasn't sitting on my couch to make my list, in my car, on my bed, going through security, on an airplane, or in any other public place.

Now, several hours later, here are the lessons I have learned for the day. 1- To do lists are pointless with children. Seriously, who really thinks that they can have a predictable and planned day? I have yet to have one of those work out for me ever, since I have had kids. Still I make 1 or 2 or 3 (on really bad days) lists everyday. Life is unpredictable. It's so unpredictable that even though my 22 month old son just set a world record in the vomit capacity and velocity for his age group, he is completely fine and happy. He has gone the entire day without any other symptoms of any kind of sickness, which leads me to lesson #2 for today. Jack will stop at nothing to get what he wants. If I won't let him have a bubble bath, he knows how to make sure that happens. And so I face the remainder of this day wiser, less organized, motivation-less, and completely confused about life. I'm too OCD with my lists to live without them, but I know they never work. This may be the start of a mid life crisis at the ripe old age of 24. My outlook is bleek.