Sunday, August 12, 2007

Headaches, Chocolate and School Clothes.

So this morning I had a headache so fierce, so pounding, so awful - that I cried my eyes out and scared my family out of the house for two full hours.

Note to self - that worked out pretty well, all things considered.

Big Al took the boys and their bikes to the park, telling me to turn off the phone and lay down on their way out the door. Ay-ay Captain. I woke up an hour later feeling better, thank goodness. Ugh. I for one, don't know why Tylenol is even on the market since it works about as well as say strapping a banana peel onto my forehead. I had a moment of being irritated at my little Jack....it was his fault that I couldn't take 3 advil which would have fixed me right up.

This is the final stretch. "Stretch......" Yeah. No kidding.

My Mom has saved me this weekend by taking the boys for about 4 hours of both days. Hallelujah. Big Al has one more week of work and then will be off for 3 glorious sort-of-helpful weeks. I say "sort-of" because as great as he's been about helping me, I still have to be very specific. He doesn't see the pile of breakfast dishes in the sink unless I point them out and ask him....ever so sweetly.....to put them in the dishwasher for me. He will step over the gigantic pile of dirty laundry that the boys have left in the hallway....not thinking...."Hey, it's easier for me to bend over and pick these up and deposit them into the laundry room than it is for her at this point. I've got this covered." No....I have to ask for help....and mostly that's okay I guess. I've learned that with most men you have to ask for what you want or else you'll just live a very bitter existence with them! They are absolutely incapable of reading between the lines and reading our minds. The sooner we figure this out and be truly okay with putting it all out there and asking for what we need, the better. Anyway, here's another example of his sweetness/cluelessness: I got up this morning with Little Boy around 7:30am to find Big Boy dressed. Sort of strange since the boys usually eat breakfast around 8am - still in their jammies. Big Al had taken him to Starbucks for hot chocolate while LB and I were sleeping. My early risers often do this on the weekend. So what's the problem, you may ask? The problem is that BB was wearing school clothes. NEW school clothes. Like....tags had to be removed in order for him to wear them.......school clothes.

SIGH.

Really? As you were pulling the tags off of the clothes....clothes that came from a drawer full of other clothes, also bearing tags.....it didn't cross your mind that maybe....just maybe......something was off about what you were doing? Luckily, no one died as a result of this horrible mistake - since by some miracle, he didn't get chocolate on this new shirt....and therefore...I didn't have to kill anyone.

2nd Note to self: Put little star stickers on each dresser drawer that Big Al and Grandma can choose from while I'm in the hospital so that I don't come home to a total and complete nightmare.

Yes, I know that I'm a control freak and maybe a tad OCD....but really....you should see their dresser drawers. I should let go of the perfectness that is their folded clothes....you know...so that they can get their own clothes out instead of my picking them out and throwing them on the bed for them to put on. The truth is they show NO INTEREST in picking out their own clothes! It's AWESOME! When I ordered them a couple of Boden shirts a few weeks ago, I let BB come over and point out which ones he liked best....but as far as daily outfit picking, he doesn't care.

Now shoes......shoes are another matter.
He has a TON of feeling and opinion on shoes.
I don't know where he gets it.

1 comment:

nb said...

Word for word what I go through with my dear, helpful, helpless husband too. Well-stated: just something we have to live with or else go crazy.

Him: "Just tell me what you need me to do."

Me: "I need you to find what needs to be done and do it!"

Nice to know even the most capable husbands see things around their houses as one big blur. Work is invisible to them until we direct their very specific attention to it for the ONE-THOUSANDTH TIME!

It must be practice for teenagers.