The First Week of School

Do you ever have that dream where you are under water and you can almost get your mouth to the surface but then you get sucked down? Luckily, I can breath underwater and run effortlessly in my dreams. But I can imagine that the drowning dream is akin to the last few months of my life. It's been crazy ever since Beck was born. I should have blogged about it but . . . you know.

Anyway, as once again I have completed the obligatory "I haven't blogged because. . ." , we can get on with things like THE FIRST WEEK OF SCHOOL. Sadly, this won't be a post about their perfect hair or cleanliness or how organized I am. Far from it. Imagine if someone picked up your house and turned it on its side and you still had to function. That's about how that week felt. I had taken on too many projects (stupid pinterest.) AND Lexi was coming to visit. The kids are lucky they went to school at all.

We made it until ten-thirty on Thursday unscathed. But then the nurse called.

Please read in your most "old-lady perfume" voice:

"Mrs. Stroud, hiiii. I have Camryn here in my office. She said you wouldn't let her have breakfast and she's shaky and weak."

Flashback a few hours and you'll see Camryn laying on the floor and me pulling her almost lifeless body to the shower. A few minutes later that same Camryn will be lying on the floor wearing only a towel and will require being dragged to her closet. This went on for TWO HOURS. During that time I asked her exactly 576 times to please eat breakfast. As 4/5ths of us were walking out to the car, Camryn grabs a bowl for some cereal.

Please read in your most "I want to take you out to the desert and leave you with a canteen, a book and a note for whomever finds you" voice:

"Sorry Cams, too late. YOu cAn't haVe CerEaL. You can have a granola bar, gogurt, or a banana in the car."

Read in a Banshee voice:

"I HATE ALL OF THOSE THINGS!!!!"

Now read my response in the same voice as before but cover it in syrup because the neighbor kid is there:

"OK, I'm sure glad you ate a lot when we went out last night because you're going to have to wait until lunch."

Flash forward. I tell the nurse that Camryn CHOSE not to eat. She said,"We-elll, that may be true but she says she al-so didn't get enough dinner last night . . ."  Ugh. Whatever. I tell the nurse that that is true and that she should feed her as many saltines as she has because I won't be feeding her again for quite some time.

Oh well. I went back to doing things that in no way help me to prepare for the arrival of my sister or help me finish any of my 32 projects.

1:30 pm. Same day:

"Mrs. Stroud, hiiiiiiiiii. Don't worry, nobody is hurt. It isn't even about Camryn. I have Mason in my office and apparently while he was out at recess he found a dead cicada that was covered in maggots. He chose to put it in his pocket, so I made him change his shorts. I just wanted to inform you so that you wouldn't be concerned when he came home in different shorts."

"Oh, neat. Ok. Hey- do you want me to stop by and pick up my You're Awesome award or do we have to wait until the end of the year? It seems like just a formality at this point . . ."

The end.

FYI - I googled "dead cicada +maggots". I don't recommend that. Here's just a dead cicada.