So much for that idea...

So I posted last night about how I hoped my kids would let me sleep in some this morning. Alas, it wasn't to be. My kids haven't learned to enjoy the art of sleeping late on the weekends yet. I have a tendency to sleep on the couch when the hubby is home...the bed just seems too big and lonely. So I was down here on the couch, and I heard footsteps pretty early, but it didn't quite register how early. So I propped my head up and looked over, seeing the boy sitting on the loveseat, and it was BEFORE 7 a.m.! UGH! Instead of sending him back upstairs to bed, though (I knew where that would lead...he thinks the entire house has to be up when he is and would certainly have waken his sister up), I told him to lie down on the loveseat and rest quietly. He asked me if he could go back upstairs to bed, and I told him "no" for the very reason I expressed above. So I dozed back off, but heard footsteps on the stairs shortly thereafter. So I again propped myself up, looked at the loveseat where I had told the boy to rest quietly, and he wasn't there (remember, I'm in a bit of a sleep-deprived stupor here). So I called to him in a bit of a stage whisper, but he answered in a loud voice. Okay, so much for not waking his sister up. So I told him to come back downstairs and lie down on the loveseat like I told him to do. The girl child was less than two minutes behind him. I tried to get them to watch TV quietly, but it didn't work out quite that way. So I was up before 7:30 a.m. (not a pleasant thing on a Saturday) and got their breakfast for them and our day started.

I sat around being lazy for a good bit of the day today. After working so many hours over the last few months, it was nice to be able to just veg out here with my laptop surfing the net just doing what I wanted to do. The hubby called between 11:30 and 12:00 when he was on a break from training letting me know he'd probably be leaving there around 1:00 this afternoon. I always like him to let me know so I have a ballpark of when to expect him to be home. This afternoon I set to cleaning the house. I didn't get it all done by any means, but I'm trying to gradually get the house to a point where the cleaning will be easier to maintain since I won't be working anymore. I've never been a great housekeeper, but I do a much better job of it when I'm not employed outside the home and can keep up with it better. I'll freely admit that I've neglected my womanly duties around the house since I started work and school, because there just aren't enough hours in the day to do it all. I thank God on a regular basis that I have a wonderful husband who has picked up my slack, usually without much fussing.

I love my kids more than life itself, but there are times when they push me to my limit. They don't usually give me a lot of grief when the hubby's gone, but this time was different. I swear they did everything in their power to tick me off as much as humanly possible. They had made a mess upstairs last night, and they were supposed to be cleaning that up this afternoon while I was cleaning down here. I checked on their progress a couple of times and reminded them of their responsibilities. At one point I went upstairs, and the hallway up there looked way worse than it had less than an hour before. I was PISSED! The excuse? "The books fell off the shelf." OK, we do have more books than we have room for on the one bookshelf that we have upstairs. And sometimes the books on the front edge of the shelves get knocked off when we walk by them. But somebody explain to me how HALF the books, including those on the rear part of the shelf (which is more than wide enough for books to sit on without hanging over the edge), just "fell" off the shelf. I'm totally not buying it.

On top of their refusing to pick up their mess, they were arguing and fighting, and just generally getting on each other's nerves this afternoon. When A. gets really irritated, her voice rises to a pitch that literally hurts my ears, even when she's upstairs and I'm downstairs. I don't think her voice came below that painful pitch this afternoon. I know they were getting on each other's nerves so badly because they were so tired from not getting enough sleep. I finally couldn't take anymore and made them lie down for a nap. I don't do that very often anymore, but there are times when they just HAVE to take a nap. I was about to lie down for one myself when P. got home. I was very happy to see him, but was still pretty stressed. He was really tired and decided to rest for a while himself after he told me a bit about his trip. So after he went upstairs, I messed around on the internet for a little while longer, and ended up resting here on the couch myself. I nap on the couch because chances are better that I'll get up after an hour or two instead of sleeping four or more. That way I can wake the hubby up before he sleeps too long. So we got up, the kids were put to work finishing their cleaning upstairs, and then we all had dinner.

In the middle of dinner, I hear the baby girl proclaim "My tooth fell out!" She didn't feel it come out, but noticed a "big gap" in the bottom of her mouth. So I asked her where it was, and she said she didn't know. Then a few seconds later, I hear her say "it's in my mouth!" Thank goodness she didn't swallow it along with her sandwich. I had her put it on the kitchen counter by the sink so we can rinse it off before she puts it under her pillow tonight. She's looking forward to a visit from the Tooth Fairy tonight. Both of her two front teeth on the top are loose, too, so it's just a matter of time before she loses those.

She's been playing with pencils tonight. She was holding two of them on top of her head while sitting on the couch and said she was a bunny. Then she was sitting by the back door holding one on top of her head. The hubby asked her what in the world she was doing. "I'm a unicorn!" Alrighty then!

The boy was complaining of his foot hurting after his nap this afternoon. Let me just preface the rest of this paragraph by saying that the kids and I didn't have the flu shot this year. They came down with the flu (at least I'm pretty sure that's what it was) while they were on Christmas break, and the hubby did too. So after that, I didn't see much of a point in having them vaccinated. Besides, even if they hadn't come down with it, they've been sniffling, sneezing, and coughing off and on since then, and I simply will not let them have the flu shot if I think their immune systems are the least bit compromised. I'm the only one who didn't get sick during that time, but I didn't have the shot either. The hubby wouldn't have gotten the shot either, but he had to. The Army doesn't exactly make exceptions for those who have had the flu before they get the vaccine.

But I digress. The boy is sitting down here on the loveseat saying that his foot hurts since he took a nap. Whatever. Then I hear him say..."My foot hurts. Should I get the flu shot?" WHAT?!? Where does he come up with this stuff?? The hubby looks at me and says, "What did he just say?" I told him he had said exactly what he thought he'd just said. The boy is goofy!! They keep me on my toes though...there's no doubt about that.