And it continues ...

"It" is the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. It's been quite a while since mommy has had consecutive days that strike fear and panic into her heart.

Mommy feels completely helpless to stop the onslaught of escapes, pilfered food and malicious woundings among siblings. Every one of them has scars from sibling inflicted wounds. Bite marks, bruises from pushes and shoves, cuts on their feet from being run over by a Big Wheel, half peeled off fingernails from door injuries. If pulled hair left marks, Fiona would be sporting wounds. Mommy feels as though she's toting a band of wounded criminals with her everywhere she goes. Mommy senses that her oldest's impending first day of school and the ridiculous July heat is affecting everyone's psyche.

Mommy's day starts at 2 a.m. when she hears Owen "reading" books in the hallway. Reading, good. 2 a.m., not so good. By 4 a.m., she had shooed him back to his room three more times. Fiona even joined him once.

But by 6:30 a.m., the really scary part began. Her husband bolts back into the bedroom and says, "Fiona's not in her bed and she's not downstairs." Mommy frantically gets dressed. She peers out the windows in her bedroom trying to spot the child. As scary as it sounds, mommy knows in the back of her head that Foudini (one of many nicknames for Fiona) probably didn't get far. Still, that doesn't stop her from imagining the worst.

Mommy can see the 6:00 news now. Preschooler catches school bus to local high school, mother charged with child endangerment.

As it turns out, she had climbed the baby gate, pulled an ottoman to the door, unlatched the chain and let herself out. When asked how long she had been outside, she gave a wicked look and said, "Five minutes." What's so frightening is all the obstacles she overcame to get herself outside. Mommy wonders how many more obstacles she'll have to build into the Foudini containment system just so she can close her eyes at night.

Next disaster involves Owen who is like a drunken billy goat on a suicide mission. He literally hurls himself into walls. It's like he has no sense of how his body works in space. He was pulling these stunts on the stairs and he fell. Backwards. Mommy is standing right behind him, watching as he falls on his head and neck.

Okay. That's over. Next up, mommy needs a shower. The kids know the drill. They stay upstairs and play while mommy takes a quick shower. Five minutes tops. How much trouble can they cause in five minutes?

Post shower, mommy finds Fiona in the hallway leading the 2 year old around with a belt around his neck. And it's not loosely around his neck, either. Mommy starts to shake inside. This is beyond horrifying.

Next mommy finds that Fiona has climbed up on the chest freezer to pilfer granola bars from the top shelf.  Later that same day, her and Owen got into a container of brownies that Nana thought she had put far out of reach. There apparently is no such thing as out of reach for Fiona.
 
Oh, and it gets worse. At the park, Fiona follows a group of girls walking to the bathroom. At least there is an adult with them and it happens to be a friend of mine. I spotted her across the parking lot and thought, "Okay. At least she's with an adult I know." Is it bad that mommy is equally concerned about what her acquaintances at the park must think of a woman who can't keep tabs on her own kids?

Mommy is exhausted. She locks Fiona in her room for quiet time. Don't judge. Mommy is out of options. She hopes that once the first day of school comes and goes, things will start to calm down here. She suspects that the anticipation of it has been hovering above the kids and making them crazy.

Stay tuned for photos and stories from Danny's first day of school which is tomorrow. I'll write. I promise.