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By rebecca, March 4, 2010 4:25 am

DAILY SNACK

He’d been thrashing around on the bed for twenty minutes.

He was being silly,

Obstinate,

Unfocused.

I kept begging him to put his pajamas on.

“You can win another happy face sticker.”

Lame.

He was tired; I was tired.

I let go of Irene to pick out her pj’s,

Just as he reached over and grabbed her,

And she rolled over willingly,

Wrestling like they always do.

Except there was no bed on the other side of him,

And she went careening over him,

Head first.

I dove across the bed and caught her ankle,

Just as her head was hitting the floor.

And time froze for a couple beats,

As I dangled my daughter upside down off my bed.

Then I let her down gently and got up to comfort her.

She was hurt, but not badly.

Then,

I started screaming.

Thank goodness for doors that close and rooms to calm down in.

Thank goodness for teary-eyed hugs and I’m sorrys.

Because I know he didn’t mean to hurt her.

And he knows I didn’t mean to hurt him.

And I think we’re going to be alright.

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By rebecca, January 22, 2010 5:00 am

DAILY SNACK

Last Sunday a friend was making the rounds

Picking up food and cash donations for Haiti.

I had agreed to donate both.

Suddenly I realized that I was home alone

With a puke prone boy and a baby girl,

A bare cupboard and an empty wallet.

I’d forgotten about Ed’s morning commitment and my own commitment to donate.

Until it was too late.

Miraculously, I did manage to extract a bag of rice, dried beans, lentils, tuna, tomatoes, and mixed fruit from my cupboards.

But the wallet wasn’t coughing anything up.

So I left Colum at home and took Irene to the bank.

Of course, we do live above a store

With a bank machine only four doors away.

We were gone for less than five minutes.

Many people have garages that are further away from their children’s bedrooms.

Don’t tell me they don’t run down to grab something from the garage.

Still.

Colum was standing at the top of the stairs when we got back.

He did not want to be left alone.

This post was inspired by Her Bad Mother’s admission to having left her sick four year old alone for a few minutes. (Which was, in turn, prompted by Anna Kournikova’s mother being charged with child neglect for leaving her five year old unattended.) I wouldn’t make a habit of running downstairs to take care of some errand or other, but I also stand by my decision in a pinch. What do you think?

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By rebecca, May 5, 2009 10:19 am

Yes, my home is a mess. And I don’t just mean that I have a couple books lying out and the laundry still to be folded. It’s a real disaster. Now, nobody has ever accused me of being a particularly stringent housekeeper to begin with. Nobody has ever had to plead with me to just let something go and nobody has ever, ever made any claims about eating off my floor. I’ll even admit that we have lived in states of squalor worse than this back in our newly-wed days if only because we could all but abandon our apartment and only come home to shower and sleep. This may be the worst it’s been, however, since the children have arrived and since I’ve had to really live in my home. Continue reading 'Cleaning House, Somebody’s Gotta Do It'»