With Tracey now back to working two days at Blockbuster, Monday mornings have become a logistics nightmare. From the moment our alarm clock shoots the starter's gun we are moving, moving, moving towards our goal - to arrive at work close enough to our start times to keep our jobs.
This morning, because getting seven people fed, dressed and delivered to four different destinations with all their homework and mental capacity in tact isn't hard enough, we decided to up the pressure.
"You know, if we can get out of the house by 8, you and I can probably have a coffee together," Tracey suggested. Oh, hell yes. That's almost a date! Only better, cause there's coffee.
"I'll do breakfasts and dress the baby while you have a shower," said Tracey. She's in charge when we're in a hurry.
"Now you dress the rest while I jump in," she told tell me as I stepped out of the bathroom. "And don't forget their hats!"
So we don't have to wake up before sun up, we're organised enough so the lunches have been made the night before, and each uniform or outfit laid out for the kids in the lounge room so they don't need to empty the entire contents of their wardrobes onto their floors, but for all that sometimes all it takes is one little fly in the ointment to give Monday the chance to pounce.
This morning, as is so often the case lately, the fly was Miss2.
After supervising the kids dressing themselves I moved onto getting lunch boxes and water bottles into their bags. I pulled them all out of the fridge, including the sandwiches for Tracey and myself.
"Don't forget to make up the baby bottles!" Tracey yelled above the sound of cascading hot water.
"Ya Vol," I called back. When the bottles were done I returned to sorting out the lunches. Three things struck me in quick succession. Firstly, my sandwiches were gone. Secondly, Miss2 had her lunchbox open on the kitchen floor. Thirdly, this despite her lunchbox being still on the bench.
What the little 'cherub' had done was snatch my sandwiches off the bench while my back was turned and grab out a new lunchbox from the drawer to put them in. Unfortunately, after a couple of tries, she must have realized the sandwich wouldn't fit in this lunchbox so she removed the wrap and then the crusts, finally managing to get the whole lot in only after she treated the mass of bread, ham and cheese more like play-do.
"How are we doing?" Tracey asked, coming into the kitchen.
"Great!" I lied. I wanted my coffee.
So we managed our fifteen minutes of 'this is what normal people do' this morning almost totally unscathed - maybe the beast had gnawed my arm a bit, but it was my left arm so not one I use terribly much.
And my lunch? Well I shoved the whole mess into the sandwich press at work and chewed with my eyes shut. Seriously, I couldn't tell the difference.
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