It has been a heck of a week. Oliver is on antibiotics for a sinus infection, all Will wants to do is play on the computer and I keep breaking out in hot sweats but I am not sure if I have a slight flu or if it is the M word (you know… menopause…but that’s a post for another day!). We also have a labour dispute in my corner of the world so the schools which should have been in session last week, are closed. My husband is back on his 12 hour days at work so it is just me with the boys pretty well from sun rise to sun up. Up until now we have been in full summer holiday mode; swimming lessons, art class, lots of beachcombing, bike rides and trips to the playground. Along with these leisurely summer days come leisurely food; cookies from the bakery, pepperoni from the butcher, Frosters (like Slurpees) from the local corner store, ice cream and of course McDonalds french fries, Oliver’s all time favourite treat. No sooner have we backed out of our driveway in my trusty mini van (complete with pretzels ground into the seats and carpeting) when Oliver starts asking;
“Is it hash brown time or fries time?”
In case you don’t know, 11:00AM is the witching hour where the breakfast menu panels flanking the McDonalds drive thru miraculously turns into pictures of hamburgers, and hash browns give way to french fries. Given his druthers Oliver would always choose fries but he will gladly accept a hash brown if it is;
“Not fries time yet”.
We have been hitting the drive thru window at McDonalds a bit too much lately where our order is generally ‘2 small fries and 2 kids waters’. Somedays we are late getting out the door, then we have to get groceries or run some kind of errand which causes us to miss snack time or the kids said they were hungry and wanted to eat their snack that I packed as we sat parked in front of the house getting ready to leave, and now it is close to lunch time and we still have to get to the park as the boys have SO MUCH ENERGY TO BURN OFF and everything takes longer than I think it will. In this scenario I may use the fries as a bribery tool a la’;
“If you behave yourselves while shopping and help me out I will get you some fries after”.
These days with very few things planned (as I thought they would be at school dammit!) and two young boys at loose ends who are bored with their mother, the eldest of which has to be constantly ON THE GO from oh, about 4:30AM until he drops off at 8PM at night and thrives a lot on structure and one on one activities (bird bingo anyone?) …and added to this mix the mother’s valiant attempts to HOMESCHOOL and teach piano which usually ends with the younger child yelling and in tears…, well lets just say these days can be VERY LONG and we seem to be running errands together ALL THE TIME. I know I would be slightly horrified if I tallied up how much money we have spent at McDonalds this summer but up until now I have shrugged this off as it was you know ‘it’s summer holidays’ but this summer holiday seems like it will NEVER END, and I woke up today realizing we need to go to the grocery store as we are out of toilet paper and I need things for the pizza I am making for dinner tonight, which likely means that Oliver will ask for fries again. As all this was running through my head I wondered;
“Am I a bad mother for letting them eat french fries so often?”
but then I thought,
“Hell No!”
I made them a lovely chicken stew for dinner last night, today for lunch they had peanut butter and banana and carrot sticks, for an afternoon snack they get blueberry kale smoothies and they often have porridge with nuts for breakfast, and tonight, well tonight they are getting homemade pizza! -HOMEMADE people!!! And to make this pizza I have to stand in a kitchen with a western exposure which means sun blasting through the kitchen window and despite the blind being pulled down it will be 3o+ degrees in there as I will also be in front of a hot stove MAKING HOMEMADE PIZZA FOR MY FAMILY.
So no, I am NOT beating myself up over a few orders of small McDonald’s fries.
Somedays when your kids are fighting over the iPad for the umpteenth time, or you are missing an essential ingredient for tonights’ dinner and you have beads of sweat on your forehead (Why???? is it this furnace of a kitchen? or am I sick or just getting old???????) and you would love nothing more than to lie down and take a nap… …those are the days where you SAY YES TO THE FRIES if only to keep your kids from running amok in the aisles at Save On Foods, and to buy you 5 minutes of peace when they are inhaling them in the rear of the car and you can lean back and sip your coffee and listen without interruption!!!!!! to the news on the radio. And if you do think I am a ‘bad mom’ for letting my kids frequent the evil Golden Arches well, to steal a phrase from Rhett Butler in that classic movie ‘Gone With The Wind’,
“Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.”
***Disclaimer- I did NOT end up making homemade pizza that night because after a walk, grocery shopping, homeschooling, piano practice, hanging out a wash, breaking up fights over whose turn it is to play Minecraft etc. etc… I WAS TOO EXHAUSTED so I just opened a can of baked beans, whipped up some garlic toast topped with tomatoes and parmesan cheese and THAT was dinner.
At the end of the day we are all just doing the best we can aren’t we?
And no one really knows what kind of day we are having (or have had) so we don’t need to apologize for being spotted at the drive thru window or if dinner comes from a can, because by easing up on ourselves we might just…
preserve our sanity.
And on that note I am off to pour myself a generous glass of red wine and call it a day!
Ciao
and thanks for allowing me space in your in box!
xo
Eliz
