Happy Endings

Tonight is one of those nights where I am thankful for good friends, long phone conversations with my mother, and having some peace and quiet after finally putting children in bed.  Oh...and alcohol.  I'm very thankful for alcohol.

I can't pinpoint the moment things started to go downhill...but I do remember the moment I realized that the evening was not going to get any better.  Bruce called to tell me he would be working late tonight.  This meant that I would have to take care of kids, homework, dinner, getting them (and myself) ready for Tae Kwon Do, and getting to and from the martial arts building...with five kids.  I tried to mentally prepare myself...which never goes well because I've been through this enough to know that things will not go well.

Homework ended in arguments between the teenagers because one asked the other one for help.  The helper was not very nice, and the helpee retaliated with some creative, yet derogatory name-calling.  While that was happening, Irelynn began crying.  She cried for the next hour, for various reasons:  Owen used all the blankets to make his tent, she used a permanent marker on a maze and messed up, people were staring at her, and she lost her pencil.  Connor began crying because he stole Owen's blanket Snoopy...so Owen hit him with a light saber.

I decided that I was going to forego making dinner (which involved prepping vegetables and had several ingredients,) and opted for pizza.  I did not want the same battle that we had the night before when I tried to feed my children orange-glazed fish and a beans and rice dish.

Dinner was chaos as the kids had not eaten food like this in awhile (I have been on a kick lately experimenting with healthy dishes.)  The kitchen turned into the set of "The Hobbit," where five starving children hoarded pieces of pizza and breadsticks as though they would never eat again...I think I even heard one of them talking to the pizza, calling it, "Precious..."

Then, Owen yelled.  Why he yelled, I'm not sure, but what he yelled was, "DAMMIT!"

Connor then responded, "MOO-oom...Owen said 'DAMMIT.'"

Before I could reply, Irelynn piped up.

"Oh yeah?  Guess what Brendan said in class today?  He said, 'shut the f-u-c-'...."

"OKAY.  THAT'S ENOUGH."  I cut her off, but not soon enough.

"What?  I was spelling it so the boys wouldn't know."

After dinner the teenagers promptly disappeared.  The three younger ones started feeling the effects of the soda they drank with dinner, and all chaos ensued.  Owen began chasing the dog with a Nerf gun.  Connor started jumping on the couch.  I told Connor to sit down, and then went into the kitchen to see the dog...on the counter...eating breadsticks.

"ONYX!!  NO!"  And then glass broke behind me.  I turned around to see a pink snow boot laying next to the glass dish from my oil burner...on the floor next to me.

"Oops."

Irelynn had kicked off her boot, which went through the living room, over the counter, into the kitchen, and knocked down the oil burner.

At this point I decided that we would skip Tae Kwon Do tonight and I would just put kids to bed early.  I called my mom, who is always great at making me feel better, when I heard a knock at my door.  I was thinking, "uh oh...now what?"

I opened the door to find my good friend standing there...with a bag full of Smirnoff Ice.

"I read your Facebook post and decided I needed to come over."

The kids are now in bed, and the house is quiet.  And I am toasting my Smirnoff to good friends and skipping class (which I don't normally condone...but in this case, I'm glad I did.)

Perhaps I should watch "The Lord of the Rings"...and reheat some pizza for "second dinner."