34 ḠṏḭṆḠ ṏṆ 16

Now, I love my kids just as much as the next, but how the hell do these cute little love bugs turn into such nightmares in a matter of seconds? It's legit like they have 2 different split personalities. I always wonder what characteristics they get from me and what traits they get from my husband, well they definitely inherited a hatred for early mornings from me. For instance, my girls would not stop fighting in the car while running errands this morning. NOTHING made either of them happy, and the smallest arguments started a miniature war between two - 4ft small Irish girls strapped to Graco's. When I had just about enough, I actually slammed on my breaks and told them to both get out. Completey serious, I deserve an Oscar some days. Since we were on a dirt road and it was fields on both sides of me with crazy amounts of snow, they clearly chose to stay in the car verses the alternative. I honestly do think that my four year old daughter could survive the frozen tundra and take on a cougar if she crossed paths with it, but that's totally a different story for another day.

Addison (oldest) kept crying about how Scarlett (middle) wouldn't give her back her damn barbies. UGH. Literally, they were just playing with them perfectly about 10 seconds before this fight. When I say "play barbies", I mean pretty much pretending like they're kissing and having babies every few minutes. So after the crying finally commenced and a few minutes of me yelling, I had total flashbacks of me screaming at my mom when I was 16. Surely I'm not alone right? Not sure how my mom kept her cool when she had this insane frizzy haired daughter squawking at her, but she did. I probably would have laughed if the role was reversed back then: raging hormone filled teenager on the loose. It was obviously nothing like my current situation (other than my hair has calmed down), but I'm just saying, I probably could have blown a blood vessel if I moved just right. On the bright side, I thought I did good, I wanted so badly to say SHUT UP, b̶u̶t̶ ̶s̶i̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶g̶i̶r̶l̶s̶ ̶l̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶p̶u̶t̶ ̶m̶y̶ ̶o̶w̶n̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶d̶s̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶m̶y̶ ̶m̶o̶u̶t̶h̶, I chose "KNOCK IT OFF". The alternative meant I was still in control and they couldn't discipline me.

We made it a whole 2 minutes before they were sticking their tongues out at each other whispering to the other how much they wanted a happy meal and had to "pretend" like they liked each other. Sigh. My suburban is big, but not sound proof, so I'm pretty sure they think I can't hear them in the 3rd row plotting. The girls told me "you're the greatest gift I could ever asked for". Even if this was a ploy, HEART MELTED. Seriously, why do kids have to be so great. The mom-guilt totally set in and I felt bad about raising my voice. That lasted about 5 minutes before I had to yell at them again, but nonetheless, I felt bad for those 5 minutes.

We hit up a total of 5 stores throughout the day and the girls actually did decent for how the morning started off. After a day filled with more than enough estrogen in one vehicle, I was counting down the seconds leading up to bedtime. I assumed that they were tired, silly me. Somehow the bedtime showdown still lasted about 40 minutes. They act like they live in the Sahara Desert around 7PM. Even with the chaos, when I tuck them in, I get so overwhelmed with gratitude and feel so blessed as I shut the door behind me. Then they come out for the 10th time and that all passes and I'm yelling again. Someone please tell me I'm not alone?! How can no sleep for a mom somehow bring out the inner teenager on an early school morning. I don't get it. Hopefully I'll miss these days someday; I know it's not today though. Tomorrow doesn't look good either.

ｈｅｌｌｓ