This school year went by way too fast.
And now all my boys are at home, all together for every hour of every day for the next several months. It’s the first time we’ve encountered this boy-count for a significant stretch of time since we had our sixth boy in January.
I tell you, I don’t know if I’m going to make it.
Naturally, I woke up that first morning with a massive headache, because life is hilariously unfair like that.
There was a foreboding that was more than just the headache, right behind my eyes, because I’ve been entrenched in edits for a middle grade novel and the house is a disaster and the boys came home with all their leftover supplies and fifty-thousand pieces of paper yesterday.
So I had my suspicions about how this day would go.
Here’s a rundown of the highlights:
5 a.m.—I get out of bed to write for a couple of hours before the boys are expected up between 7:30 and 8 a.m., because they’re surely going to sleep late this first day of summer vacation. Surely.
5:12 a.m.—The baby starts fussing, even though he usually sleeps until 8.
5:19 a.m.—The baby goes back to sleep.
5:42 a.m.—I hear footsteps. Surely not.
6 a.m.—Still writing, but those footsteps are sounding more and more suspicious.
6:17 a.m.—Now I have to investigate, because it’s completely quiet. That never means anything good.
6:24 a.m.—(Because it takes that long to get down the stairs with a stupid boot cast). I find them, one school boy and his next-in-line brother using the scissors they left out last night to cut tiny little confetti-sized pieces of paper out of the 6-year-old’s final kindergarten report card.
6:31 a.m.—I start breakfast, trying not to stare at all.those.pieces of paper. The awake boys disappear, and before I’m three minutes into fixing breakfast, they’ve woken every other boy in the house, and the walls are shaking.
6: 34 a.m.—I’m hungry, Mama. Yes, I know. I’m working as fast as I can. May I have an apple while I’m waiting? No, you may not. This will be done soon. But Mama! I’m starving.
6:35 a.m.—I try to listen to the talking ones and get breakfast in the oven while trying to keep the twins out of the markers and glue sticks and sharpened pencils that have multiplied overnight, I swear.
6:43 a.m.—Someone throws a pillow at someone else and accidentally breaks a picture. Clean it up.
6:48 a.m.—Someone dumps out the entire bin of LEGO pieces on the dining room table where the clothes were all folded and ready to be put away. Seriously, guys. BREAKFAST IS ALMOST DONE. JUST SIT IN YOUR CHAIRS.
6:56 a.m.—Smoothies are ready! Come get them at the table. Eggs will be done shortly.
6:57 a.m.—A twin plays with his fork and knocks his smoothie cup off the table. Clean it up.
7:04 a.m.—The eggs are ready! Watch out, it’s hot. Blow on it before you eat it. (Fantasize about how maybe this will give me 4.7 minutes of relaxation time.
7:07 a.m.—We’re done! Let’s dump out more LEGOs!
7:09 a.m.—Mama, may I have some milk? Will you play LEGOs with me? Will you come outside with me? I want to color, Mama. Too many people talking at the same time. Lock myself in the bathroom.
7:12 a.m.—Yeah, that was a bad idea. One of the twins found the 150 manuscript pages I brought downstairs (wishful thinking that I’d actually get a chance to work on them) and made it rain paper.
7:34 a.m.—Turn on an audio book. It usually quiets them for a while.
8 a.m.—Feed the baby while they are (mercifully!) listening to the audio book.
8:02 a.m.—The 6-year-old skips to the refrigerator to get an apple, even though he just had two smoothies and three eggs. Um, no.
8:17 a.m.—Baby is finished, twins asked for some crayons.
8:20 a.m.—Twins decided paper wasn’t working for them today and now have colored in one of their brother’s library books he left on the table.
8:31 a.m.—Someone left the door open. I yell at them to close it. It will not be the last time I get to practice my delivery, though. I will get to perfect it six thousand other times. I discovered there are quite a few variations of this phrase.
“Shut the door, please.”
“Please shut the door.”
“Close the door, guys.”
“Hey, guys, close the door.”
“Ohmygosh, close the door.”
“Hey! How about you close the door?”
“How many times do I have to tell you to CLOSE THE DOOR?”
“Are you forgetting something? How about CLOSING THE DOOR?”
“CLOSE. THE. DOOR!”
I love my boys just as much as any other mother, and I really am excited about having the bigger ones home for the summer, because they’re awesome people and I enjoy talking with them anytime I feel like it.
But the dynamic of six home at the same time, asking for something, getting into things, leaving the door open is just…crazy.
It wasn’t all crazy, though. It was also really fun and beautiful and wonderful.
I got to see them play with LEGOs together, constructing fire world and ice worlds and grass worlds together. I got to see them waiting at the table when I came down to make breakfast, dressed as Spider-Man and Starscream. I got to see the 6-year-old read a story to his little brothers and run to kiss “his baby” whenever he felt like it.
I got to see the 8-year-old settle into an old story, and I got to laugh with him about how the boy in the story told his school counselor that he likes to eat dog food, and I got to see him teach his twin brothers how to build a LEGO car that actually works.
It really wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought.
Of course there’s always tomorrow.
